Posted in: Games, Video Games | Tagged: cross-play, FASA Studios, hairbrained schemes, HRL, microsoft, pc, xbox

Shadowrun Had Xbox/PC Crossover Because of a Creative Dispute

Published Thu, 21 Dec 2017 15:45:15 -0600

Way back in 2007, Shadowrun was one of the few Xbox games to have proper crossplay with PC, and the reason behind that is a little bit sillier than you might think. It wasn't some grand strategy or decision made from the get-go — instead, it was a response to a creative difference between the development team and Microsoft leadership.

Former studio head (now co-founder of Shadowrun Returns developer Harebrained Schemes) Mitch Gitelman has revealed to IGN how exactly Shadowrun got cross-play in the first place.

"What my bosses [at Microsoft] were looking for was a big PC game," Gitelman said on the latest episode of their monthly interview show IGN Unfiltered. "They wanted to show their commitment to PC, but we had been developing it for Xbox, and all of our decision making was Xbox-related, controller-related, and the controls were just great at the time."

So Microsoft wanted him to make Shadowrun a PC game, but he was trying to make it a great Xbox game and you can see where this is going. In an effort to appeal to his bosses while still making an Xbox game, he proposed the idea of making it cross-platform. He credited a "visionary memo" written by original Chief Xbox Officer Robbie Bach about connected entertainment was the inspiration that led him to pursue cross-play functionality.

"[It] was connecting the dots. And then I realized, 'Oh, this is the way to really get the game elevated at Microsoft and get lots of marketing dollars behind it,'" he added. "It had nothing to do with the fans. It had nothing to do with them or what they wanted or what they expected; it's the single biggest learning of my career."

And it paid off.

Now, the problem of cross-play is much more difficult, and honestly getting a game with true console to console to PC cross-play seems like a bit of a pipe dream. That doesn't stop us from wanting it, though. And we can thank Shadowrun for at least part of that.

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