Session: Xbox Discovery Day - Temi Afolabi

[Music] Heat up here. So without further ado, I would like to welcome a very special person to the stage. Uh his name is Tam and he's from Idea Xbox and he's going to be hosting the discovery day for you. So can we give uh Tam a big round of applause, please? And of course for anyone that is out and about outside the track rooms, please do uh make your way into the track rooms if you'd like to uh you know join us for join us for the stage content. So thank you very much. Over to you Tam. Hi guys.

Good morning. Um hands up if you're familiar with Xbox. Okay, good start. Thank you. Um, okay. So, today's Xbox Discovery Day and I will be talking to you about Xbox, why I'm here, our global expansion goals. I'll be talking to you about the idea at Xbox program that allows independent developers to self-publish on Xbox. I'll talk to you about our new campaign, which is the Xbox Play Anywhere, which you may have heard about. and then I'll speak about the developer accelerator program which provides funding for independent developers as many of you are. So enjoy and um I will say my colleague James Lewis is not here so half of the presentation is his so if at some point I look like I'm not sure what I'm talking about that'll be why. Okay so introduction like I said I um lead the global expansion team for Africa and the Middle East. This team started about three years ago now. And

you may ask, well, why did we start this team? Very simply, the goal was to go into regions where we were not getting a lot of content and find out why and support developers in those regions to get more content to Xbox. What are expansion regions? It's really everywhere that's not the US or Europe. So, it's um Latin America, the Middle East, Africa, India, Southeast Asia, and so on. Now, how do we do this? So, we educate and engage through events like today, Xbox Discovery Days. We sponsor and participate in regional events such as this one and a couple on the continent in Africa. After that, we connect and represent. So, at events like this, I meet developers. I find out what is your holdup. Have you considered coming to Xbox? And if you haven't, you know, what sort of where can we plug those gaps for you? And that is anything from financial to technical support. And sometimes it's really just the awareness of knowing that this is a

possibility. Um and then eventually is to partner and publish. Like the goal here is to bring more games from the region to Xbox. Um I would say big picture we're a company and we want to sell we want to sell games in the region and the strategy is going to end up at how can we get more players from region. But currently we're focused in on getting as many games on our platform from the region. So so far we have connected with in fact about 150 now African and Middle East developers. We have received over 40 applications. We have sponsored nine events such as this one. Um four developer hangouts, five Xbox discovery days. Um game camps. Uh we're hoping to have a game camp in the Middle East sometime within the next 12 months as well. And um here are just some photos of me connecting with developers at different industry events. Um I try and be out where the developers are as much as possible. Um you know there are a lot of

countries in the Middle East, a lot of countries in Africa. So it's events like this where people can come from different countries and I can meet them all at the same time and share ideas are super valuable to us. So I'm really happy to be here with you guys. Um, and then I want to show you some of the games from some some different countries. So, here's a game from a team in South Africa. Uh, we discovered them at uh Africa Games Week about a year ago, no, two years ago now, and they're working on a game that's coming to Xbox. They pitched to us at a discovery day, actually. Um, we have Nightcape coming from Qatar, which I personally am very excited about. um incredible artwork and it's one of those games. I think it's interesting to point out this game for instance is from South Africa but there's nothing about the game that's specific to South Africa. It's a game about music and things like that. However, this is a game from the Middle East and it focuses heavily on cultural themes um in terms of astrology um language and so on and so forth. The

setting is in the region, the information, everything is in the region. So, I thought this is a good contrast to show you that while we want games from regional developers, you don't have to make a game about your country or anything specific to your country. Just make a game you want to make. And we try and we try and not influence um people's creativity in any way. Um just to show you some games we did release last year. Um so from Africa and Mina, I think we had seven releases in total last year, which is a lot. We're moving forward quickly. Uh and here are yeah here are some developer testimonies. So Takori Studio incidentally uh were here last year and I think they won the Indie Choice Award. Um so we had great meetings with them and they came to Xbox, they pitched and now they've been signed and they're being funded towards a release um hopefully early next year. So I just thought I'd put that up there.

So now I want to speak about the ID at Xbox program. Um the ID at Xbox program is probably the key cog in our global expansion plans. Um ID at Xbox stands for independent developer at Xbox and the the idea behind this is to allow developers to self-publish on Xbox. Um skip the step of having to come through us through um through a publisher and so on and so forth. You can just apply directly at the website xbox.com/id. I'll put that all that up um towards the end of the presentation as well. And what typically happens is you share your game concept with us. Uh we no you sign an NDA to protect you and to protect us and then sorry one second. After you sign the NDA, you send your game concept to us. We review it.

If we like it, um you get a title license agreement. And what this means is that you now have permission whenever that game releases to publish it on the Xbox store. [Music]

[Music] All right. So, yeah, where was I? Um, and then you submit the concept. Our portfolio review teams will look at it. Um, usually we might ask you a few questions where necessary. Um, but if we

just if everyone just agrees in the room that this is a great game and should be coming to Xbox, it can be that straightforward. Sometimes we'll ask you questions about, you know, how do you plan for multiplayer? Um, how many hours of game play, so on and so forth. So, if there's any information that's not already captured in your concept or deck, um, then we'll we'll have a back and forth around that. Uh, sorry, the screens aren't changing. It's supposed to go to like we close it or we open

It's this one. Okay, this one. But this is the presentation. Yeah. Yes, this one. Okay. Um, and here you have some statistics about the program. Um, so as you can see, over 2,600 games in active development. We have over 4,600 studios in the program. Um, we've paid out over $2.5 billion in royalties. I think that number is probably closer to four now.

Um 5 billion hours played and 2,400 games released. So it's a very successful program. Um we take in hundreds of games every year and I think it's always worth a shot to apply. There's there's literally no reason not to apply. Um a lot of teams apply to this program and even if they get rejected the first time, sometimes we say it needs three more months of development. We want to see it again and so on and so forth. So persistence is definitely um helpful here. But also what sort of support do you get? You get development and environment support. Um when you sign into the program, you officially become a partner. So you get access to subject matter experts on everything to do with releasing your game from marketing to backend support to cloud services and so on and so forth. [Music] I don't know support and this is across engines, Unreal, Engine, Unity, and more. Um, a good another perk that comes with an ideated Xbox partnership is that

you get two free Xbox development kits to start working on your game. Um, depending on where you are, getting them across to you has been challenging in the past. Um, you'd be surprised at some of the regulations involved in getting a dev kit into a country. Um, but typically we should get them to you within a couple months if it's a straightforward process. Um, so the next part of my presentation will be talking to you about how to set yourself up for success on Xbox. Um, what we're looking for on the platform and, you know, how you should be thinking about a relationship with us. Some of this is from James. Shipping successful games is as hard as it's ever been, but the barriers are different. With the introduction of self-publishing, the challenge for developers has evolved from finding a publisher to finding your audience. There are tens of thousands of games shipping every year. And your competition is not just the game

shipping. When your game ships, it's the games that provide endless fun and engagement that shipped years ago. It's other forms of entertainment and on demand media. We always say at Xbox, we're not competing with PlayStation or Nintendo. We're competing with however people spend their time. So, we're competing with your streaming services. We're competing with where you listen to music. We're competing with everything really. Um, and that informs our strategy going forward. And I'm going to explain how. Um, one of your biggest challenges is that we as adults have to adult. wake up, work out, eat, clean, go to school, go to work, meetings, follow-ups, pay bills, pay attention, feed pets, ambition, breed books, etc. With all the demands of life and when players have so much access, it can be difficult to break through with a new game, something that isn't familiar and sort of you find people going back a lot to what is reliable and what they trust. So in terms of doing that, we think it's

best that we explain our strategy for reaching those players and bringing them in because that then will influence your strategy on how to come to Xbox and be successful on our platform. So I'll start with our mission um and the strategy to accomplish it, a quick guide for how to build a winning strategy. I'll explain the journey of ID and offer tips on how to maximize your success here. Our goal is what it has always been. Bring the joy and community of gaming to everyone on the planet. U we speak about it all the time, but especially with our new Xbox play anywhere campaign. The goal is really re to reach every game in the world. And it might sound like such a tall tale, but I'll speak to you about how we plan to get there. And it's more realistic than it sounds. Um, so, so the first thing is we're evolving our strategy to delight players. When players have a little time but plenty of options, it's important to find ways to

stand out and engage with them. So, because we jump into tip, so before we jump into tips, I think it's important for you to understand how we're going to delight these players. Xbox Play Anywhere. This is our new campaign. Hands up if you've heard about this campaign. No. Okay. Well, good. You will today. Xbox Play Anywhere really is about multi-device access. Um about games that ship across PC, console, and mobile. Sometimes games that have cross progression and cross-saving. So the idea really is you start a game at home, you've got to go somewhere, you keep playing on your handheld, all your saves and everything continue. It's like you never left the couch. And so far we have over a thousand games in the programs and we've seen across those thousand games which is a really large sample size they've received 20% increase in engagement and monetization by you know bringing in play anywhere capabilities which makes perfect sense right people are playing for longer people are playing in different places and so on

and so forth. We see a rise in multi-device gamers and their growing desire to play across screens. Players enjoy being able to access their games as they flow through the busyiness of life. I'm not always to sit on my couch. I'm not always able to sit on my couch and play a vow, but it's good to know that I can get a quick session in over my lunch on the phone or PC or pick up my handheld when I'm out doing some family obligation I don't want to be doing. Uh, one of the ways we support multi-device gaming is with cloud gaming. Players love having the option to play their games in more places, and Xbox Cloud gaming has expanded to new devices to enable more places to play. You may have seen or heard about or experience gaming from a smart TV or Fire Stick. Has anyone done that? TV app, Fire Sticks. Great. These efforts are doing a great job of making gaming accessible to more people in more places. The next part of this delighting players is ensuring that there's a cohesive experience across these channels. We call this Xbox Play

Anywhere. Um, to date we have seen more than a thousand games in XPA and it's part of the value that Xbox Game Pass brings to players. As we look outside of Game Pass, we see an opportunity for more titles to support multi-device gaming. How many people have a Game Pass subscription? Okay, same three people. See me later. Um, so yes, cross progression, cross entitlement. I think those are the main selling points of XPA and just general convenience. Other titles may want to also consider crossplay for games that have co-op and other multiplayer experiences. Enabling crossplay provides a consistent experience regardless of the chosen play device. Given the signal that we are seeing from player feedback, it shouldn't come as a surprise that we're hoping to lean fully into XPA as a way to delight more players. And I believe I have a couple videos to show you. [Music]

How do we make the games that creators make on our platform playable by more people? [Music] [Applause] We can bring the best of AI innovation, cloud innovation, console innovation, PC innovation to build the best games that can be enjoyed by gamers everywhere. [Music] Heat. Heat.

[Music] So tips for building your own strategy. Enabling multi-device game is a key way to increase engagement and win more mind share from a very busy player base. If you're seeking to join us in this journey, this is your cheat sheet for doing so. One, publish across Xbox, PC, console, and cloud to take part in our growth and reach players everywhere. Two, in de in the development phase, you should optimize for multiple screens. So, you know, what plays well on one screen doesn't always translate. You want to be in that happy place where people get a good experience regardless of what device. Consider how to optimize your games for devices, UI/Scaling for small screens, native touch for mobile or optimization for handheld PCs that are part of Xbox today. Then you support

game, you support cross device experience, and that's you know a lot of what I was saying about cross progression, cross-saving to make it easier to move seamlessly between devices. And then you want to maximize commercial best practices from considering game pass to taking advantage of some of the device that I'll share in a moment. Shouldn't be the next slide. Sorry. Wait. So now under the program some programs and opportunities under this umbrella to support you in bringing your XPA games to Xbox. um under the IDE at Xbox program. Um does anyone here know about the developer accelerator program? Okay. Okay. Okay. Good. Well, a few people do. The developer accelerator program is under ID at Xbox and is basically the funding aspect of the ID

at Xbox program. So, remember I said you can self-publish on Xbox and if you apply and are successful, we give you permission to bring your game to Xbox. Well, the developer accelerator program is a way where we support you along that process. Um, in a lot of our expansion regions, funding for gaming is difficult because a lot of the traditional financing houses aren't as aware of the opportunities and the creative spaces or they're not willing to take those risks. So, sometimes we need to step in financially and help you take that first step. So that is the developer accelerator program and the mission is to empower underrepresented creators with the resources and information needed to bring your creativity, innovation and originality to players on Xbox platforms. The types of developers we seek to support include but is not limited to those who are again Middle Eastern, black, indigenous, Latino,

women, developers with disabilities and so on. Developers from emerging markets or teams with unique perspectives. This also includes independent developers working on a game that responsibly centers the experience around diverse characters or prioritizes accessibility. Our goal is to partner with more developers that help us connect with more players with games that make them feel seen and included. We invite talented developers to share their stories and perspectives by applying. Now, like I said, um this there's a funding aspect to this the investment and under this what we do is we give out funds either for pro prototyping or for porting to Xbox. So, if you've got a game really early stage, you're still working at a prototype and you need something to sort of drive more interest and more um energy or to take to cause you're having with potential investors. If we like the concept and the team believes in it, we present some of that funding. If you catch me after, I can give you

um more context on the range of that funding. But it's important to know that this funding is non-recoupable. So, whatever funds we give you are yours. Um, typically how we protect against because the next question is, well, what if you just give me the money and I don't make the game. That usually doesn't happen. We're usually working with like good credible developers who want to make a game and release on Xbox. Um, but what we typically do is you get 50% of that funding up front when you sign the contract and then when the game ships on Xbox, you get another 50% of the funding after which you get a 7030% royalty split in your favor on the Xbox platform. So if you ask me this is a it's a great deal if you can get it and it's definitely something worth everyone looking into. Information like I said um under the idea at Xbox program this is a subcategory. So when we give you the funding it's also skin in the game for us right now. We need you to release this game and release it successfully. So then you can get one-on-one sessions.

You we organize group sessions as well. Sometimes with our more technical teams. Um, sometimes we might have a week where there's marketing calls and you can sort of call in depending on your time zone. Um, we also put you forward for all our so, you know, if we're having a showcase, you might be one of the games there. That'll drive a lot of traffic to your game and so on and so forth. And then what we try and do as well is we have a lot of external contacts. Um, people reach out to me all the time. Are you seeing good games from the Middle East? Are you seeing good games from Africa? But we have a showcase and we're looking for some games. So we try and put our partners forward for as many of these programs as possible. The program. So um for porting the requirements are in development projects 6 to 18 months to release. Um, obviously being in the gaming industry, we all

know release dates change all the time, but um, if the team has a reasonable expectation based on what we're seeing that this game can release between 6 and 18 months, that pushes your chances up. You can ship on Xbox before on concurrently with other platforms. That means you can also ship your game on Nintendo or PlayStation, but not before Xbox. So you can do same day um or you can release on other platforms.

Okay, we'll give that a moment. I know this part from memory. Um, so yeah, you can release on Xbox. You can either release concurrently on Xbox first. Um and then the next thing would be for prototyping. For prototyping obviously what we need to see is considerably less because we understand that you haven't gone far. So maybe we need we would need a game concept a deck. You would have to as you can imagine we would have to be convinced that you've thought this through several steps. So your deck is going to need to be very strong if you're applying for prototyping. Whereas, if you're applying for porting, a lot of people just show me, hey, this is my game. It's already on Steam. People like it a lot. You guys should sign it as well. And that's a quicker conversation to have naturally. Sorry. Let me pull this back up real quick.

Okay. Turn off the Wi-Fi. Do I go back to presenter?

No, no, no. You know, I'm going to get some notes. All right, back up. Okay.

Now, we understand launching on multiple platforms can be challenging and the investment required can conflict with other priorities such as further development, polish, or marketing. We want to help support new developers in delivering their content to as many players as possible. To help with porting your game to Xbox, we offer non-recoupable funding. We do not require title exclusivity or any equity in your company whatsoever. We just ask that your title launches concurrently with other console platforms. Feel free to reach out as early as possible, but 12 to 18 months prior to release seems to be the sweet spot. To date, we have partnered with over 200 titles and have seen more than 75 titles launch. Here's testimony from one of our partners. Uh thanks to the program we are able to bring boty manner to its full potential. We have been able to spend more time on perfecting the design as well as adding accessibility features as we want to make sure our world can be explored by many. Finally, it's allowing us to

allocate extra time to optimization and polish. Now, in the incubation phase, we partner with promising creators with great ideas and provide funding that will allow the teams to flesh out more mechanics by building a playable prototype. Our requirements for a prototype are a game concept and vision, as I mentioned, um a team overview. Um, something that happens sometimes is sometimes the team will just say this goal is too ambitious for the studio trying to make this game. We don't think they can realistically ship this with all the things they're saying they're going to do in 18 months. So that has to be part of your plan. You have to have a plan when you come in and you pitch. If they say, "Well, this seems very ambitious," you should be able to say, "Yes, but these are our

road maps and this is our plan to get there." Um, prototype goal, timeline, and budget. So what I always say with the presentation is you want to give too much information better than not enough information. So sometimes people think they're rambling, but if you give us a deck and we can see, you know, you have comparisons, you have your best case scenario, your worst case scenario, you have research on similar games, you know your player demographics, you know the type of music you want to use and why and so on and so forth. It's that level of preparedness that moves the team. And a lot of the time your game is being judged by a portfolio team and it's a room of 10 people and many times it's really just about the enthusiasm in the room when they see this. One person might might like your game so much that the enthusiasm spreads on to everyone else and everyone's like okay let's take a chance in this game. Um so whatever you can provide whatever niches you have and another thing that does really well is if you've play tested your game feedback

is always good from people who have played your game. So the goal of this initiative is to help great teams with great ideas to build a playable prototype that communicates your vision and kickstarts production. While we have limited spots available for this initiative as we continue the pilot, we would still love to hear from you. Um so in terms of success rate, people definitely get more funding um for porting a game because of course it's less of a risk than they do for um prototyping. Uh so the sweet spots I find which fortunately unfortunately is most people who get signed for um for porting already have something. It's not like oh this game is going to be ready in 12 months and then we're going to want to port to Xbox. That works as well and there are examples of that. But the lowest barrier to entry is our game is already great, people already play it. Great reviews on Steam and so on and so forth. Maybe not as many as we'd like but very positive. Those are the little metrics that we will be looking at.

I think I have one more video. The developer acceleration program empowers underrepresented creators to bring amazing games to Xbox players around the world. Since 2019, we have heard from hundreds of global teams seeking resources and support to reach the global audience on Xbox. DAP supports developers in three primary ways. We provide funding to offset the cost of porting games to Xbox so teams with limited resources do not have to decide between polish, marketing, and Xbox development. We provide access to relevant information via webinars and events to help level the playing field for Xbox developers of all experience levels. And we incubate new ideas to ensure that barriers to funding, resources, and networks don't block talented developers with great ideas. We've forged more than 200 partnerships and supported the launch of over 75

titles through the program so far. We've seen some of the most innovative and inclusive content reach global players on Xbox as a result and we're just getting started. We invite you to apply for the developer acceleration program today. Visit xbox.com/id to learn more. [Music] So for ID at Xbox, some of our top tips, speak to us early. Um, I think the earlier you start to get feedback from us, the better. We see games at all stages of development. Sometimes it's just a concept, sometimes the vertical slice and so on and so forth. Um, the first feedback might be this is not ready. You need to do XYZ. Or it might be we're excited already and how can we start to work together? share assets. Um the more we see the better. So again it's a lot of people have a good pitch but we want to know that you can actually execute and that your team can

see things through. Tell us you are with where you are with announcements. Um as you can imagine as a platform we enjoy making the announcement first. So where possible we would like to be involved in that roll out. Sometimes the game is already released or you already have players and that's not possible. But the earlier you speak to us, the better. Um, tell us how does your game innovate? Why is it the best in class? What are you doing differently in the genre? Um, what's your selling point to attract players? Um, find your champion, which kind of like what I was saying about the portfolio sessions is it's good to have contacts within that will advocate for you. Um because you know you send a pitch in and every pitch will get looked at but some pitches get more reminders like hey guys we haven't concluded on this or have you considered this do you want to take a second look and so on and so forth that does make a big difference so hey if you would like that to be me or me to do that for you that's why I'm here I'd be very happy to help you um

research users research our platform and ask us questions and tell us what you need and um here are some of the email addresses that you should have. So, like I said, if you wanted to apply for the funding at the developer accelerator program, it would be under xbox.com/id as well. Um, marketing, Twitter, so on and so forth. We have a lot of YouTube content that also supports our developers. And then I think we have quite a bit of time left, so I'd like to run through a Q&A. I hope some of you have questions about the program. Anyone? Does anyone have any questions for Tenny? Do you have one? I'll write that there blind. Thank you. Thank you for your talk. Um,

my question is regarding the funding uh that you provide on the uh developer accelerator program. Um, so what if uh there someone is planning on porting the game definitely and they need funds for the porting but also maybe funds to be to utilize uh in finishing the game. Maybe they're reaching at the final stage and meet that extra little bit of funding to give them there. They have a proven concept, they have a good demo and things like that. So is that Yeah, that's a good question. Um, so not every team that applies for porting funds has finished their game and we know that as well and so that's fine. Um, and when we fund the game, I mean to be honest with you, we're not going to be ask you how you spend every dime. As long as it's spent on production of the game to eventually bring it to Xbox, that's fine. Um, we're not we're not too fussy about that. So if you use part of your porting funds to actually finish the game, that's a okay with us.

I think you run into more of a hiccup if you use the funding for, let's say, marketing or things after. But again, I'd like to say we're not terribly strict about things like that. We just want your game to be successful and, you know, if you're not gambling the money away, it's fine. Anyone else have any questions? One over there. Oh, I'll go there first. Hi there. Thank you for that presentation. Um, actually just following on from that and something you just said, uh, I saw on one of your slides you mentioned marketing and one of the biggest challenges for India developers is discoverability, right? It's it's it's getting users to play your game. So, um, you have mentioned this, but could you talk a little bit more about what how you can help get our games into the hands of players? Yeah. No, thank you. That's a great question. Um, and I think discoverability is should be the next phase of the developer accelerator program in the sense that if we help you finish a game, but no one knows you finished it, it's a

waste of your time and ours. Um, so what we do is we have a lot of showcases throughout the year. If you're big Xbox's fans, I think you guys will know about some of those. Um, so we try and push as many developers from these regions um for from our expansion regions so that it's not dominated by AAA titles. So that's one thing. Um, something we're walking working working towards in the next year or so, but we need to get more games from the region is doing indie selects per region. So, we have indie selects currently, but it would be great to have an indie selects for Middle Eastern games. Um, you know, other platforms, I think Steam had a Ramadan um, selects once. So, things like that, but it's kind of why we started with getting content, right? We can't do a Middle East or Mina selects with just three games or five games. So, we need to work to where it's like 10, 15, 20 games. Um, and then people feel like they have a real choice and it shines a real spotlight. And then each

game helps you discover another game and so on and so forth. So, those are the main things. It's indie selects, but also advocating for more of your games to be in our showcases and so on and so forth. And another thing people do is I try and be proactive about so for instance um there's a game Nightcape from Qatar last year the Tribeca Film Festival started a gaming subsection and they reached out and they were like okay do you know any international games that would be good for this and I put a few forward that I thought were really cool and they picked um Nightcape and they got a lot of press from that they got a lot of promotion for that. So a lot of times it's also a case whereby one we have standard things that we know we can do but the other thing is also just ask us try and be creative. Sometimes things pop up in real time and we're like okay we'll put you forward for that as well. So yeah that's that's kind of how we look at discoverability at the moment. Yeah I I had another question. Um, so I

if if u a studio gets accepted uh for their game for the again for the uh accelerator and get funding um do you look at them uh as a studio? Could you possibly look at funding their next project or do you look at it purely as an individual game per basis? That's a good question. Um so the studio becomes an ide partner. Um but then you sign a TLA for that specific game, right? So, you would still have to come you would still have to what's the word? Apply. You would still have to apply again when you when you got your new game. And obviously, there's no guarantee that you will get in because we'll have to see the game and judge it on its merit. But you definitely have a much better chance, right? If we've worked with you in the past and you've delivered on your games and also in a nent market, we realize it's very unlikely that it's people's first game that does great, right? So if we sign you for the first game, it might be the second or third game that really sets the world al

light, right? So we want to continue to build on those relationships and hone those relationships. So I would say once a partner, always a partner. You'll always have access. You'll always get responses from us and so on and so forth. Thanks. Good question. Hi Timmy. Hi. Piggybacking on the question the gentleman asked uh putting games in the hands of uh or being discovered. Um we are a company that has uh 14 connections across subs around Africa with big telos. Um we're looking into providing content. So are you looking into going into that area in terms of gaming? We're looking at bringing gaming to the mobile phones into the telco space and that's why we're here. We want to see if you have something in that thought process or in that area that we can collaborate on. Okay. Um yeah, thank you. That's a great question. Um, feel like some of my colleagues should be answering that, but I'll give it a shot. So, basically, I

think XPA is the next big thing for us, which naturally means mobile is going to become an even bigger priority for us, which is great for me cuz when I started this role 3 years ago, we almost had nothing in the mobile space. So, imagine talking to African and Middle Eastern developers and you don't really have a mobile offering. It's like it's not you kind of need to meet the developers where they are. So now that that's going to become a bigger part of our strategy going forward, we will naturally have to work with Telos. Um in the regions I covered, data is a big deal, right? Um and other companies we see in some places in Africa, you have like Tik Tok and YouTube have special partnerships with um Telos to make their content cheaper. So that's something we will definitely have to look at down the line. And um we've spoken to talkers about different things in the past as well without revealing too much but yes that is definitely something that will be of interest to us moving forward and um I think that what also comes with that also is local currency payments is

another thing that's going to be crucial for us um because a lot of people can't pay with the cards or the bank accounts they have on our platforms and that is a lot of you know leaving a lot on the table. Yeah. Go on. Mobile money. Okay, listen. I should get you into the office. Um, next question. Does anyone else have any questions here? Yeah. Um, does genre matter when it comes to the porting um for the funding for the porting, for example, if it's like a RPG or deck builder? All right. Good question. Um, so I was saying early in the beginning that we are very genre agnostic. like we don't want to say if you make this type of game you're more likely to concede. You just want to make a good game. Now where genre might help is sometimes the DAP team will also consider are you the only one that can tell the story. So if you pitch a game that is native to your region in a way that we haven't seen before and we feel like you're the only person that can

make this game in a way that translates then the genre becomes relevant, right? because but typically no we don't we don't we have no preference for any genre whatsoever. Just make sure you're making a good game in the genre you're picking. Make sure you have some sort of comparisons to other games in that genre. So, how are you different? How are you similar? Why do you think you do well in the genre and so on and so forth? You'd have to defend that. Um but I don't No, I wouldn't say we lean towards any genre specifically. Thank you. What about if the game is a sequel? So, we released our first game, let's say in my case, released on Steam, our first installment a couple of years ago, and now we're almost pretty much done with the sequel. We're like six months, seven, maybe 10 months out from release. And would you like accept the sequel immediately even if like the first installment is on another platform or is it like a That's a very good question. Um, I don't know is the short answer. I don't know if the DAP team will want

that. Like so for instance if you know if you're playing part two on our platform it kind of stands to reason that you want access to part one as well. Um so but if we like the game enough we might say okay we'll fund the porting of part one to Xbox as well so they both can be there. Um that would depend on but again a lot of these conversations are individual right. So if you see the game and it's like oh you've got to have this then it's always workable is the short answer really. It's always workable. Yeah. Okay. All right. Thank you. Another question. Oh, okay. No, go for it. Uh, no. Yeah, I was just telling you because it's in my case that that's what we did. Yeah, the first installment is on Steam. Second one is Okay. Um, what I'll also do before I leave is I'll share my email address, but if you see me on the floor, let's have a word. We can set up a chat and talk about it more. Um, but I think you should apply anyway. And if we say, "Oh, we'd prefer to have the first one as well," then we extend the conversation

to that. Thank you. Does anyone else have a question for Tami? We got loads of loads of time. If if anyone has any uh burning questions, should I take it everything I said was perfectly understood? I I think so. Really? Oh, thank you. Thank you. Maybe maybe maybe maybe Timmy maybe maybe you could shout out some of the some of the other stuff that uh you you and your team are currently working on. Uh what's next on the sort of road map for you uh over the next 6 to 8 months or so? Okay. Um I think over the next 6 to 8 months it's about trying to get more releases this year. So like I said we had about seven releases last year from the regions I cover. See if we can top that this year maybe get to 10. Um, and that involves a lot of one-on-one time with developers, advocating for them internally, making sure they speak to who they need to speak to. Um, then I have things like sorting out people that

can't get their dev kits. How do we work around that? And then even the conversation he said about mobile, um, things like payments, infrastructure across Africa and the Middle East, who can we partner with to do better at those to make our games more accessible to our players? Um, I think those are pretty much the goals, but every day, every week, also just looking at games, new games, introducing new teams to funding and so on and so forth. And do you like how how often do you sort of like collaborate with the sort of other regions teams with ID Xbox like I guess the Latam region? Do you have offer any like sort of close collaboration with them? Um, so it depends. So I mean so the global expansion team is one team so we're technically a team. Um so for instance this month in Shengai we're going to have a summit what can we do what's happening in each region take feedback from you know because China was one of these regions how many years ago nent what did they do right how did they get success and this is happening in

China so take those learnings see how we can apply them um XPA is a new campaign so we're going to be looking at how do we roll that out and another really big thing that's coming up is AI and gaming I think that's something that we're very excited about internally and I think over the next year we're going to shift a lot of time and resources to just maximizing gaming and AI and that's from a player experience point of view and from a development point of view. Yeah. Could you expand a little bit more on the on the AI side of things then like what what's specifically in AI are you excited about? Okay. Um this is Tammy's answer. This is not the Microsoft answer because there's an AI department. Um my answer is I hear people talk internally a lot about how AI is going to improve how people play. So from a player's experience um in terms of knowing your tendencies, knowing what gets a bigger reaction out of you, so on and so forth. So I'm really curious to see how that

works out in practice, how that makes a game so much better. Will AI start to influence um user generated content as well and to what degree and so on and so forth. So um yes, I'm I'm very excited about that. Thank you. Um does anyone else have any questions? Like I said, we got loads of time. Dave, I see the cogs turning in your head now that AI was mentioned. No. Are we all good? I think you covered pretty much everything, Tam. So Oh, we do have another question here. Fair enough. Yes, please. Let's say I want to submit my game. Do you guys ask for like the demo of the entire game? Like how how does it usually work? Sorry, I missed that. A demo. Yeah, if I want to submit the game or if you wanted to submit a demo. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like a demo the entire game cuz I don't think you guys are going to have time to look into every single part of the game. If there's like a lot of content inside the game, you'd be surprised. We We look Well, we look we look in depth. Um Yeah. But no, you can

always send a demo. You can send a demo to me personally and then like I said at xbox.com/id when you're submitting your concept and stuff, there will be space to submit a demo if you want to as well. But if you want to book time with me to talk oneonone and give you feedback on your demo and sort of talk you through the application process, we can do that as well. But yeah, we're always looking at demos or I could play your demo as well if you would like me to and so on and so forth. Yeah, cuz like we have like 10 different demos. I can give you like 10 different demos. Yeah, like multiple chunks, you know. Okay. The same. Okay. Yeah. So, absolutely. Are you based in Dubai? Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Uh, does anyone else have any questions? Let you think let you think about it. Do you have a question? Oh, yes. Tammy, could you could you share your email on the screen by any chance? Yeah. Um, I'm trying to figure out how I would write that down.

There we go. And then uh yeah, people can take a take a picture and uh connect with you uh directly. Tammy, I guess like for I guess I I like to ask this, you know, it's a bit like a personal question or stuff like what what's your favorite game at the moment? Uh there's a game called Angerfoot. Okay. uh by a South African developer. It's really random game. You your foot is the weapon and you walk into rooms and you kick things. But why I really like it is um I went to Playtopia in

December and they had the game set up with a kickstand. So you would actually kick the stand to kick people in the game. And I was just there for like an hour. I It was It was just really good. It was really different. And um yeah, just the the fact that they had made a booth and they had added that element to it, it just brought me it immersed me in the game in a way that a lot of games don't. So yeah, that's probably my favorite game at the moment. Brilliant. I have a question right here. Yeah. Uh another small question. Um if you don't mind putting it like this, what do you think of possible merger of Xbox games and Telegram games? I'm a co-founder of a telegram mini game. Not the tap to earn game like last year but another type of game more like chess and there are lots of games like this appearing in telegram this year. Telegram yes in telegram in telegram ecosystem to say it like that the telegram media ecosystem. So the question is would it be possible for these games to be somehow present in

the Xbox um ecosystem? What do you think? Maybe it's not possible now but would it be possible? Thank you. Would it be okay? So the short answer is will it be possible? Yes. Um I think since we started global expansion and um XBA strategic market so on and so forth we're now more open to we also have a global partnerships team now and the idea is really how do we reach more people through partnerships. If this partnership is an opportunity to reach more people then it's definitely something that can be considered. Um, I think we're becoming more open and dynamic in how we do business now in the sense that we're doing less of like console competing and more of how can we get more games in front of more people in more different ways on more devices. So, it's definitely a conversation worth having is is what I'll say. Thank you. Um, do you want to take any more questions? I realize we've been asking you loads, but if you've got load time, as many as you can. Yeah. Cool. So like

you know thank you for that question cuz that sort of formulated my next question. Um web free integration. Uh what what do you think about that? Not much is really not much. Um that is something that doesn't come up. So web 3 metaverse that sort of thing honestly it just doesn't really come up internally. That's the truth. Fair enough. Um, so you've been part of the big indie pitch uh yesterday and you've been part of the big indie pitches at our previous events. Um, without, you know, spoiling anything or whatever like that, how how have you been find how did you find the pitch yesterday? So, um, are any of the judges here that judged alongside me? No. Um, there was one here, but he's left. Honestly, we were saying how so there was two of us actually that were returning from last year to this year. They judged again and the improvement in the pitches. I don't know what it is,

but in one year we saw much better pitches. Last year had great pitches as well, don't get me wrong, but last year was a mixed bag. There were some great pitches, there were some not as great pitchers. This year we had a really hard time selecting those top three. Um, I wish it was the top five or six. Um, so one of my top three games didn't make it into top three. And that's because everyone had really strong opinions about what, you know, should make it through. So, no, I I really enjoyed the pitch and now I'm even curious for what it's going to be like next year if it keeps growing exponentially and so on and so forth. And what I've also found is in the developer community, I used to work in finance. Um, but in the develop community, I think what I've realized is when people see that, oh, you're serious. If I do this properly, I can get support for my game, I can get funding, I can get mentorship, blah, blah, blah. People react very quickly to meet the new standard, right? So, I really think a lot of the pitches this year were influenced by last year and everyone's like, "Okay, we need to do better than what was done last year." Um, and so on and so forth. And like I

said, um, the team that won the big indie pitch last year, um, to Cory signed a deal with us and the developer accelerator program as well. So, it goes to show that these are real quality games that we're really interested in. So, I imagine there'll be some few a few conversations happening post event for you guys. I can imagine. And then of course, you know, we've some of some of the indies over in the indie zone. Um, I imagine they would have been part of the big indie pitch as well. Um, could you talk a bit about the variety of what you've seen over in that indie zone area? Of course, you're going to be presenting the audience choice award later, which uh all of our attendees have been voting on. Um, so yeah, just speak about like, you know, the variety that you've seen and any sort of like cool stuff that you'd like to particularly highlight. Okay. Yeah. Um, I see I saw a lot of good stuff. Um, some of it came through the big indie pitch as well. So, that was really good. Um, I always like when I see teams that have either pivoted or improved on what I saw before. So, it's really nice to

see progress. Um, for instance, we saw a game called Isuma, can't remember the last name, and we saw that game last year. It was pretty nent. This year, you know, the artwork has taken a jump. There are more levels, so on and so forth. And the concept is it's just very interesting and different, right? It's like you're at a family party and you're trying to escape before you have to see all your uncles and aunties or something like that. And as an African myself, that's a familiar concept, but it's I haven't seen a game like that before. So, I like seeing little things like that. Um, not to put you on the spot, it was good to see Nomadroid again. Um, because I've seen some of their games before. They showed us another new game this year and I thought that was really interesting. And what I found interesting as well was when they said they had pivoted away from a game they had shown us before to focus on this game and this game is better. But more importantly is I respect that they took feedback. They were able to say ah we like this game but maybe this isn't working and we

might be better off you know using our resources to do something else using our time and energy. So it shows a real maturity in the studio and how they think and it gives you more confidence that they'll be able to execute on their vision as well. So yeah, um seen a lot of great stuff, but progress is what excites me the most. Brilliant. I imagine uh yeah, you'll be back for next year and uh maybe even Jordan later this year. Jordan what? Jordan. Jordan PGCoba. I'd like to go to Jordan. It looks beautiful. Brilliant. Well, yeah. Hopefully we can get you involved. Um so there is one question over here. Okay, I'm just going to come back here. Yes, thank you if I may. Um, for the games that do get accepted into the ID uh uh program, uh do they also get included into the Xbox Game Pass library or is that separate? That is not um automatic. So, you would have to then either be invited to Game Pass or then um apply again to be brought into Game Pass. I'll say the barrier for entry to Game Pass

is very high. Um, so it's not a great percentage of the studios from the ID program that get into game pass, but yes. Um, why is that though, if I may ask? Why is that? Why is the barrier much harder to get into the um because one, you have a select number of games. Um, and then there will be dynamics around how people are paid just for being on Game Pass. So, how many hours do we think this is going to drive to Game Pass? How many new players do we think this is going to bring up? like we're not going to just put it there to put it there. So, it's very datadriven, right? It's very insight and so on and so forth. Different criteria for acceptance there. There are much different criteria. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you. [Music]

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