Microsoft traditionally has provided Xbox 360 game developers with a single free patch after which the company would charge hefty fees–but now has withdrawn this requirement.

Indie game developers have strongly supported the Xbox Live Arcade of the Xbox 360 service so far–but for every update, patch or release, developers had to suffer a re-certification process with the company and this used to be a very expensive procedure that can sometimes go up to several tens of thousands of dollars.  These requirements caused  amidst developers, mainly the “small and middle class” who had to spend such large sums for a patch.

Now, Microsoft has changed the fees policy and decided to facilitate game developers. According to a report from Eurogamer, Microsoft no longer charges developers for Xbox 360 title updates, but reserves the right to make that payment when submitting multiple times for the same game. Microsoft’s director of programming Larry “Major Nelson” Hryb and Xbox corporate vice president Marc Whitten have both confirmed the news on Twitter.

“Microsoft eliminated fees for Title Updates on Xbox 360 Arcade games in April 2013,” Microsoft spokesperson told Eurogamer. “We’re constantly evaluating our policies and implementing feedback.

“While our development policies are confidential, and will remain so, we’re pleased to say that this is just one of many ongoing changes and improvements we’ve made to ensure Xbox is the best place possible for developers and gamers.”

The most striking change for Microsoft is that it has stopped asking for fees since April but didn’t announce the news. The change in patch fees applies to both retail and XBLA titles.

Game developers have long been dissatisfied with Microsoft’s gaming policies and called the company several times as nightmare to work with.

Tim Schafer, founder of Double Fine Productions and author of The Cave and Brutal Legend has stated that he was asked $40,000 to make patch of the games on the Xbox 360 platform. Fez developer Phil Fish also sent the peaks for the above system, saying that “Had Fez been released on Steam instead of XBLA, the game would have been fixed two weeks after release, at no cost to us. And if there was an issue with that patch, we could have fixed that right away too!”

The change to less restrictive policies came after Sony’s PlayStation 4 received enormously positive feedback at this year’s E3. Microsoft is hoping to position itself as a more developer-friendly company.

This new measure would it be the next from the Redmond Company to win back independent developers to Xbox One. The update is followed recent change in attitude in online check-in and used game policies for the Xbox One. A free patch cycle will help developers to keep their games up to date and free of bugs. It will also bring the Xbox 360 more in-line with Steam as well as PlayStation.