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Sony will start hosting quarterly indie developer events at its London offices this year, Develop can reveal.
Sony Computer Entertainment Europe senior account manager Agostino Simonetta said the events would be open to the entire development community.
The events will be used offer the latest updates on Sony’s PS4, PS3 and Vita platforms, and will be used to discuss topics such as how the PSN is performing and how the install base is looking.
Although targeted at European developers, indies from all around the world are also invited.
SCEE is looking at starting the scheme in September but details and dates have yet to be finalised.
“You know we do these things very regularly with all our partners, but with the indie community, it is so vast and they are spread out, that it is hard for me to go and work with developer days in the Middle East,” said Simonetta.
“So while we do these things, we want to make sure it is that on a regular basis. With the great success we are having actually of indie developers registering, we are seeing incredible numbers of new companies coming to the platform. There is a real sense that PS4 – and Vita as well, PS3 still has a long life – that this is a great opportunity for them to come back to console.”
He added: “We are really accelerating and changing the way we approach this. So before was more of a narrow cast, now there is a real opportunity for us to go what I call broadcast – a lot more visibility to be able to answer the questions."
Simonetta also said that the current number of indies registering to develop for the PS4, as well as Vita and PS3, was unlike anything the company had seen before.
Although he wouldn’t go into specific numbers, he said: "I can tell you I have been there for four years, and one of my colleagues has been in third-party relations for ten years, and we’ve never seen anything like this. And this is not just PS4, it applies to Vita and PS3 as well."
