That same night, there was another indie showcase going on, this one hosted by Sony. I couldn't attend both events, but during an earlier demo session in Sony's space I saw an event space kitted out with demo stations for an array of PS3 and Vita indie games. It seems evident that Sony, a billion-dollar technology company, would very much like you to know that Hotline Miami plays great on the Vita. This feels noteworthy.

The sense among the indie developers that I spoke with was that Sony has invested in them in a tangible, financial way. (See also: Sony's well-timed announcement of a partnership with Unity that will allow the indie-friendly development tools to work seamlessly with all of their platforms.) Both Nintendo and Microsoft had a more low-key presence at the conference, with Nintendo revealing a web framework to help developers make apps for the Wii U and Microsoft staying almost entirely out of view, likely because they have yet to publicly announce their own next-generation console. Sony certainly won the largest amount of mindshare among independent developers, and appear to be gambling that they can have their interesting, creative indie games and make money with them, too. Have their indie cake and eat it too, if you like.

http://kotaku.com/and-then-the-video-game-industry-woke-up-464888949

This is big....Indie developers backing XBL earlier on this Gen was a huge win for MS and adding value to XBL

PS4 won in the minds of every person in the planet, it is just that for some it was buried deep down in their sub-conscience.

Well, let's first make the assumption that Microsoft is paying attention, that they've heard the developers who have come out with complaints about how indie games are handled on Live. They can't make the same mistakes again, that's not how Microsoft got to the top of the mountain, and I don't believe they will. I have no doubt they will do better next gen.

Now, that being said, the benefits of Sony announcing the PS4 early are starting to pay off. Positive news is swirling all around and it can't help but sift into the minds of developers. The people Sony has hired to work with smaller studios appear to be working extremely hard and, judging from what I've seen thus far, it's paying off. PSN, the PS4, and even the Vita are all gathering momentum with those who make games, which is an important group indeed.

As I said, I think Microsoft will have their act together, but what Sony is doing now might amount to a kind of "indie head start", which is exactly what the 360 enjoyed this gen. I don't think that will result in a huge number of straight exclusives, but I do think we'll see more timed exclusives go to PSN, both contracted and virtual--the latter being games where the developer simply chooses to create the PSN version first before moving on to a Live version.

While this probably won't be a huge deal by itself, everything does add up. If competition between consoles is a war, then games are the ammunition. I don't think anyone can deny that having more bullets than your opponents can only be a positive thing.