How the Xbox One’s Cloud will benefit indie developers

Continuing the efforts in explaining the complex cloud server architecture of the Xbox One, Microsoft Game Studios vice president Phil Spencer spoke to GameInformer of how it will benefit indie developers.

"Both Kinect and Cloud as it relates to indie has been really interesting," Spencer told Game Informer. "If you're a two-person studio, you're probably not going to invest in a server farm. You won't know how many to buy or what the scale is going to look like. It's really hard for those guys. What we're able to do with Cloud, is say, 'Here are 300,000 servers. You don't need to tell us what that demand looks like. You don't even have to know.' We will handle the scaling capability on the backend. That has been one of the more interesting uses."

As GI notes, Microsoft's cloud servers could be critical in ensuring stable launches for MMOs and persistent online games such as The Elder Scrolls Online and Destiny. With flexible scaling, games games like Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn won't suffer from high demand at launch. Additionally, the cloud could help alleviate costs for developers and publishers who will no longer have to worry about the cost of maintaining the servers, possibly leading to longer lifespans. As we've seen in the past, companies will often shut down game servers if it becomes to expensive to maintain.

The cloud may not be this flashy object that you can see, but as we're slowly learning, it seemingly has tremendous power.

[Game Informer]