We haven’t seen more than a handful of free-to-play games hit the Xbox 360 since its launch, and there’s a solid reason why. While the PC and PlayStation 3 are pretty lenient when it comes to the update and Q&A process, Microsoft’s Xbox 360 has been known to give developers a bit of trouble. Nothing about the certification process is quick or easy, and for a free-to-play title that’s constantly being updated to allow for a better experience, that’s just unacceptable.
Speaking to Polygon, Wargaming CEO Victor Kislyi discussed the challenges of bringing World of Tanks to Microsoft’s box. Instead of simply sitting back and accepting the policies that have been in place for years, the developer is working with Microsoft to make the online ecosystem more friendly before the game’s summer launch.
"The good thing is with online games, sometimes if you screw up, you can do frequent updates," Kislyi said. "But one of the biggest challenges with Microsoft was the frequency of updates because the QA process and certification process takes an extremely long time. Totally unacceptable for a meaningful free-to-play. We are working with them to do quicker updates."
Sadly, World of Tanks will require an Xbox Live Gold membership, which no one over at the studio seems too happy about. The team understands that they cannot drop the price just for a single game, but with the PC version of World of Tanks boasting 60 million players, Kislyi “would rather add another 30-40 million non-Gold members who would monetize occasionally.”
