Despite ID@Xbox generating hundreds of millions in sales, Xbox still eyes store discovery improvements

ID@Xbox is Xbox’s initiative designed to help independent developers publish games across the Xbox ecosystem. First launched in 2013, it essentially replaced Xbox Live Arcade and allows developers to self-publish games on Xbox consoles and PC, while also giving them access to Xbox development tools and services.

Now, among all the Xbox news coming out of GDC, Xbox Wire has revealed that the program has “generated hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars in sales on the Xbox Store.”

That makes it a clear success for the platform, and Xbox now wants to build on that momentum by improving how players discover games on its store. So let’s go over the details.

Xbox is making active changes to how new games are discovered on the Xbox Store, particularly within the New Releases section. This area has often been cluttered with bundles, where the same game could appear multiple times if a publisher released several editions.

For example, a standard edition and a deluxe edition could both appear separately in New Releases. Under the new changes, Xbox is reducing that noise, so only one version of a bundled game will appear in the section.

Xbox also says its developer code of conduct prevents developers from trying to crowd out other games. In the past, some developers were reportedly using multiple bundles or listings to push their titles ahead of others.

Another change involves improvements to algorithmic promotion across the store. The goal is to improve fairness and discoverability, particularly for smaller titles that might otherwise struggle to appear in discovery sections.

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Seeing ID@Xbox bring in this level of success for developers is great to see. It remains one of the true standouts for Xbox right now, and hearing that the program is performing so well, while Xbox is committed to improving the Xbox Store, is encouraging.

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