[url=http://www.polygon.com/2013/7/29/4567418/xbox-ones-biggest-innovation-is-freedom]"...getting out of the way of independent developers."[/url] [quote]With Microsoft's approach, getting that dev kit is as simple as running to the local retailer and picking up a console. The impact of this form of development democratization can't be understated. It will be as important a change in the shape and face of console gaming as was the robust online support of Xbox Live was for consoles. This approach seems to echo Apple's approach to mobile gaming and ironically, because it was so long in coming, Microsoft's own approach to PC game development. And look what those models have delivered. With few exceptions, the most successful new gaming brands of the past generation weren't born of massive publishers and developers pushing out multi-million dollar blockbusters, but rather one-person, two-person, three-person studios creating something toy-like and fun. Three students from Helsinki University of Technology teamed up to make mobile games in 2003, resulting in Angry Birds for the iPhone in 2009, a game that has since been downloaded one billion times and propelled that small team to a multi-million dollar company with more than 500 employees. A single Swedish game developer created the billion dollar Minecraft game for the PC and Mac. Finish developer Supercell was bringing in an astounding $2.5 million a day from sales of virtual items through its games Clash of Clans and Hay Day. None of these games were spotted by developers or plucked up by publishers; they became grassroots, overnight successes simply because there wasn't anything in the way to stop them. And that's what Microsoft seems to be promising to do: Getting out of the way of people who want to make games. More importantly, if handled properly, this could portend not just a flood of fun, new games coming to the console, but perhaps the sort of gaming that never had a chance on consoles, not really.[/quote] Recently, [url=http://www.reddit.com/r/xboxone/comments/1izk09/now_that_any_xbox_one_can_be_used_as_a_dev_kit_it/cb9sye1]Major Nelson also hinted on Reddit that developers could add mod support.[/url] Opening up the Xbox One to more independent development and even user-created mods could give it quite an edge.