At Gamescom Asia 2022, Jun Shen Chia, the Global Expansion Incubator Manager of Xbox who has helped bring the brand to Hong Kong, Taiwan, and South East Asia (SEA) held a talk called ‘Global Appeal of Asia-Made Indie Games’.

Here, he shared more on the various ways that Xbox helps smaller indie titles in the SEA region so they can be seen and played by more people. 

Making Indie Games

In the modern day of age, the internet, social media, and video games are the primary ways for people to stay connected with one another. While there are a lot of bad things that happen on the internet, there is also a lot of good stuff happening as well, and gaming is one of them.

According to Chia, Video games can help educate and cultivate people’s empathy, naming titles like Never Alone and Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, as examples of this. These games have truly showcased the power of video games as an “empathy machine” that can connect people together.

We’re likely to get even more of these empathy machines as, with the popularisation of self-publishing, the increase in console support, and an online community, anybody that wants to develop games can build the game of their dream and Xbox is there to support them

ID@Xbox

Xbox has a program that is specifically created to showcase the indie games of the world named the ‘ID@Xbox‘. Through ID@Xbox, the company has paid 2 billion USD to indie game developers as a sign of their support. Examples of games that have been part of the ID@Xbox program include popular hits like Outlast and Inside.

Other than the ID@Xbox, Jun Shen Chia also mentioned that they are constantly helping the developers by providing direct support, developer kits, certificates, and such. For SEA, in particular, they have planned to help the developers in the region in three different ways: Education, Ecosystem, and Marketing.

Of course, when we talked about Xbox, one does not leave Game Pass out of the conversation. Chia says that nine out of ten players who joined Game Pass have tried some new games after they joined. Furthermore, the games that are on Game Pass have three times more social engagement when they are announced, compared to those games that are not on Game Pass.

The Domestic Market

Jun Shen Chia ended his talk by speaking about the domestic SEA games market. He says that players in the Asia-Pacific market have a high affinity for domestic games and that it is likely the same for the SEA region. From this, he says that increasing their investment in domestic games, will in turn increase their usage as well.

He says that the culture and history of the SEA region are powerful tools for the game developers here, and one of the most amazing things that he saw at Gamescom Asia itself was that all the game developers came together to support each other. This mixture of community and culture will be one of the reasons why indie games from SEA have such great potential to be successful.