Competition(?) on the Windows Phone Marketplace

Last week or so, I started hearing around the blogosphere that Microsoft itself was going to be putting games out for Windows Phone 7. At first I was a bit miffed about this, because it meant that right out of the gate, this market for indie developers -- which is how I see this field -- was going to be crowded by the "big guy". I knew, of course, that there were small game studios out there, currently developing for iPhone and/or Android, that were going to be getting into the Windows Phone market, but they were "acceptable competition" in my mind.

After thinking about it, though, I decided that the game industry itself has done fine with the AAA developers and the indies alike (as has been the general theme over at Game Theory Online and The Escapist's Extra Credit feature), room for both. Yay!


But then I read tonight about Microsoft's continued focus on games for Windows Phone 7 and their support for many other existing XBox Live developers, and my heart sank again. It's not clear that they'll all be there on day one, or if they're all just in-development, but even though I've never seen any of these games (not being an Xbox 360 owner), you know that they can't suck if they're mentioned in this article.

Is there room for someone like me to even try? I've never published a game before, I'm new to XNA, and while I like to think I've got lots of game ideas, I have no idea what they'll be like if/when they materialize. Obviously there will be opportunity for many indie developers to make their mark in the Windows Phone marketplace, perhaps because of that next novel game concept, or perhaps because the price point on these "professional" games will leave a second price tier - the $0.99/$1.99 level? This is probably where I was going to end up anyway, so am I again worrying for no reason?

Should I just consider the app market instead of the game market?


Of course, at the rate that I'm accomplishing anything in Silverlight *or* XNA, this might be a non-issue. All these rumours of November release, then October... I had wanted to have made *something*, no matter how trivial, before the phone was available. That time sure seems to be approaching fast, and I'm still in learning mode.