If it was such great news internally known earlier surely MS would have just announced it much earlier? Common sense.
So clearly its a recent change.
That's not true, they never claimed at any point after the unveiling and at the run up to E3 that they were not going to offer self publishing, or that they were not backing Indies. They made it quite clear during interviews that they were not ready to discuss their full intentions but that they would be offering a platform for indie developers.
From a PR standpoint it's better to trickle good news over the run up to launch, it makes the console more appealing than just releasing everything at E3. The plan was to announce this at Gamescom which would of been the place to do it since it's the biggest gaming event of the calendar. If you're Sony, MS or Nintendo it's expected you announce something there.
Comments
With the way everyone is arguing about it I got the impression it was bad they are "perhaps" adding it in at a later stage.
That's not true, they never claimed at any point after the unveiling and at the run up to E3 that they were not going to offer self publishing, or that they were not backing Indies. They made it quite clear during interviews that they were not ready to discuss their full intentions but that they would be offering a platform for indie developers.
From a PR standpoint it's better to trickle good news over the run up to launch, it makes the console more appealing than just releasing everything at E3. The plan was to announce this at Gamescom which would of been the place to do it since it's the biggest gaming event of the calendar. If you're Sony, MS or Nintendo it's expected you announce something there.