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[OnPoint]

I played Revolver360 today. Those complaining about the visuals being too busy are absolutely right, though I didn't die once in the trial. Cool game.

 

[toythatkills]

It also doesn't help that game like Zombies have forced everyone into thinking $1 is "the" price point for Indie games, greatly devaluing so many of the strong games on the service. It's has to be tough to build something compelling, putting a lot of your blood, sweat, tears and cliches into something, and then selling it to a couple of thousand people for the price of a pop.

Christ. Zombies isn't responsible for everything that's wrong with Indie Games on Xbox. Give it a rest.

 

[toythatkills]

From Kris Steele's flickr:

 

[Princess Skittles]

Christ. Zombies isn't responsible for everything that's wrong with Indie Games on Xbox. Give it a rest.

Look, I get that you love that song so very, very much, and that's perfectly fine.

But I think, purely as a gamer, that THAT is what the spotlight of Xbox Live Indie Games is rather disappointing.

And I'm sure, to developers that want to do more than make a quick buck off of a flash in the pan gimmick, it's probably disturbing and disenchanting.

 

[toythatkills]

But I think, purely as a gamer, that THAT is what the spotlight of Xbox Live Indie Games is rather disappointing.

And I'm sure, to developers that want to do more than make a quick buck off of a flash in the pan gimmick, it's probably disturbing and disenchanting.

Hundreds of thousands of gamers have gone to Indie Games to find that game. I imagine at least half, and probably a massively higher percentage, wouldn't even know the channel existed were it not for that game. Gamers (excluding you) like it.

To developers, it's a game that encourages people to learn about and visit the channel, and it's a success story that shows what can be done with the service in terms of sales.

There's nothing bad about it at all, apart from the shitty games that have tried the song-in-game gimmick since and failed miserably.

You're fighting a losing battle.

 

[InfectedZero]

From Kris Steele's flickr:

Winter Uprising.jpg

Thats really fucking awesome that its finally getting a section for WU.

 

[Sydle]

Inferno is a nice departure, a more methodically paced shooter with adventure elements and a steady loot collection and ship upgrade path. It's got a nice, clean visual style as well. I'm enjoying it a great deal, but I think it's unique among their games. I kind of wish he'd done more stuff along those lines.

I barely gave it a second look after purchasing two of his other titles. It looked derivative of his other work, but I'll give a shot based on your impressions.

 

[SAB CA]

How did the miss SoulCaster II on the Winter Uprising advertisement?

Awesome to see such a thing though!

And as far as "I MA3D A GAME"... I think it's the perfect example of what one SHOULD expect for a 1 dollar game. Anything that goes above and beyond for a buck is a STEAL.

I agree with the idea it does more to help the service than hinder it. For me, I don't care if it uses meme's, or if it's funny to me or not. I just find it to be a well polished game, perfectly blending playability for the buyer, and yet fair easy of creation for the creator.

Hopefully the Winter Uprising is a start in getting the stars of XBLIG to get some universal recognition. If they can keep going with events like this, that get premium dashboard place, with a variety of products that stand in a quality run perfect for their cost, then I can only see the service improving, and gaining more widespread acceptance.

Personally, I think it'd also help to add a section to search for games by specific publishers, with a filter to see games from the top-rated publishers...

 

[Dr. Zoidberg]

It also doesn't help that game like Zombies have forced everyone into thinking $1 is "the" price point for Indie games, greatly devaluing so many of the strong games on the service.

First of all, I think that 240MSP is a perfectly viable price point for IGs provided they are good and are not pretty versions of simple 80s arcade style action games. 400MSP is death for an indie game unless it is mindblowing. It's the equivalent of a 1200MSP arcade game in people's minds.

As for finding the good games on the service, I don't get why people say it's so hard for newcomers to do. If you go to the top rated category, yes, Zombies are there, but also in the top ten you've got Miner Dig Deep, Breath of Death, Epic Dungeon, Protect Me Knight, and Arkedo Pixel!. Those are some of the best games on the service and they are not hidden or buried under a mound of crap. Sure, if you look at the best SELLING games, those are some of the worst (except for Barker's Crest Avatar Golf, which is great) but there's no accounting for taste. I guess you should blame humanity and not the IG channel or MS. They made a platform where rank amateurs could put their stuff up and maybe even make a little money. There is no real quality control except for peer review which is mainly to make sure games don't crash or break the rules. If they weeded out all the crap and cash-grabs it would defeat the purpose of the channel.

I wonder if MS hypes the Indie channel, will it cause the "good" games to sell more, or will it simply allow the already successful games like Baby Maker Extreme to sell more. I figure the latter. The bottom line is that what GAF likes doesn't always sell well.

 

[SmallCaveGames]

I love that the Uprising gets some dash space.

I would agree that the Zombies game isn't anything spectacular in terms of gameplay or innovation. But it's still a good thing for the channel and it had other things going for it:

• Theme song basically went viral.
• Developer already had a sizable fan base and crediblity. (this helps the viral aspect)
• Simple fun, defined.
• $1 price point very soon after that price shift.

My favorite Radian Games game was Inferno - I really felt like it had that extra layer of depth. I think he reacted to the price points by cutting down dev time and getting some quick titles out. They are still good, but not as memorable. It makes sense, but since those other games were a slight notch less impressive, I think they sank quicker and got lost in the mess. There's a big dropoff between "hit" and "not a hit" (not much in between) so if you don't fall into that top 5%, you won't find sustainable margins.

 

[toythatkills]

Ubergridder has had an update with new modes/balance. Someone play and see if it's a game now!

CSTW is a matter of hours away, for you lucky people :lol

 

[besiktas1]

Ubergridder has had an update with new modes/balance. Someone play and see if it's a game now!

CSTW is a matter of hours away, for you lucky people :lol

irony or a big kick in the balls that the one month we've had such amazing games is the one month you can't play them. The Jan thread is going to be epic. My favourite so far is Astro Boy...

 

[toythatkills]

Cthulhu Saves The World is out NOW, and you'd be doing the dev a massive favour by trying it ASAP.

From their blog:

On the business side of things, we NEED to get Cthulhu Saves the World out this month with some time to spare. How much Cthulhu Saves the World sells in December will determine how much time we have to work on game development during the first few months of 2011 – we’ll get paid in February for any sales we make in December, but we won’t get paid until May for any sales made in the first quarter of 2011. If we can manage to sell 10,000 copies or more of Cthulhu Saves the World in December, I could go full time game development. If we manage to sell 5,000 copies or so, I’m looking at the same sort of development we do now (part-time job, develop in my spare time). And if we somehow miss releasing it in December and don’t sell anything, well, we’re looking at close to no-time development, because I’ll probably have to grab a second job just to make ends meet.

tl;dr version: the more sales they get before 2011, the earlier they get paid and the more time they can put into new games.

So, you know what to do. Probably just skip the trial and get the full game, Breath of Death VII was excellent and by all accounts, this is even better. Go!

Someone play and |OT| it!

 

[GhaleonEB]

Cthulhu Saves The World is out NOW, and you'd be doing the dev a massive favour by trying it ASAP.

From their blog:



tl;dr version: the more sales they get before 2011, the earlier they get paid and the more time they can put into new games.

So, you know what to do. Probably just skip the trial and get the full game, Breath of Death VII was excellent and by all accounts, this is even better. Go!

Someone play and |OT| it!

That's my plan. I know what I'll be playing this weekend.

 

[besiktas1]

I'm a wuss. I heard Breath of Death was hard so I didn't buy it. I wonder if the same is for CSTW. I want a game I can finish.

 

[Diablohead]

I played the block on shooter game this morning, really fun might have to buy it, I like the aliens expressions when you shoot them

Also the pocket bike game aka trials with avatar is well made also, these sort of games are what I love about indie stuff, the few gems between waves of shit.

 

[GhaleonEB]

I'm a wuss. I heard Breath of Death was hard so I didn't buy it. I wonder if the same is for CSTW. I want a game I can finish.

It was not hard. It's also $1, you should snag it.

 

[toythatkills]

I'm a wuss. I heard Breath of Death was hard so I didn't buy it. I wonder if the same is for CSTW. I want a game I can finish.

CSTW has difficulty levels, so you can play on easy

Music video/trailer!

 

[Spyn Doctor]

I was sold on CSTW right at the beginning, when the narrator explained that you can hold B to walk faster, and Cthulhu said something like "Hah! You fool! I will now finish the game in half the time and be able to return it to the shop to trade it in before the trade-in value drops" (or something like that - quoted from memory).
:lol

Doc

 

[SmallCaveGames]

Stuck at work. Trying to get out early to go home and get this thing!

Any early impressions?

 

[Erekiddo]

I had 100 points to spare, and I noticed Vorpal just went up. It's another bullet hell SHUMP, but the art style interested me. I bought, and well, IT'S FUCKING HARD.

http://marketplace.xbox.com/en-US/Product/Vorpal/66acd000-77fe-1000-9115-d80258550758

 

[Enk]

Damn, two good indies in one day. Cthulu Saves the World was an instant buy from me. I enjoyed Breath of Death VII and have been looking forward to see them better themselves on their next game. So far it doesn't disappoint. I am also very much liking Vorpal. It's tough, but unlike Score Rush, Decimation X3, and Revolver360, the patterns here are clearly defined yet required some heavy concentration. Love the presentation of the game too.

 

[SAB CA]

Vorpal is pretty cool. It's like Senko No Ronde: Light Edition! The artwork is quite slick, and the minimalistic presentation actually makes it all wasy to read, and doesn't feel like a copout.

Would love to see these guys make a game with actual animated characters.

 

[Beezy]

Vorpal

The amount of good to great shooters coming out of XBLIG is retarded. 360 is easily the greatest shooter console ever so far.

 

[SmallCaveGames]

CSTW is fantastic - just finished it, took about 9 hours. Definitely much prettier than BoD and with a fun new story and some of the same formula that made BoD work well. Well worth $3.

 

[Dr Zhivago]

Revolver would be great if I could see what was happening.

I love the aesthetic of Vorpal, but I found the game boring.

Warbirds at Work is another poor shooter. Here's my rule of thumb for shooters - Does the basic enemy take more than one shot to kill? If so, your shooter will most likely be shit.

 

[Ventron]

Apologies for the bump, but has the January thread been created yet? Or are we waiting for toy to get proper internet again?

 

[toythatkills]

Apologies for the bump, but has the January thread been created yet? Or are we waiting for toy to get proper internet again?

It's on the way, I think there's just a slight delay with there having been so much awesome stuff last month!

 

[Chauncy Talon]

Vorpal

The amount of good to great shooters coming out of XBLIG is retarded. 360 is easily the greatest shooter console ever so far.

I feel so late to the party. I just found out about this game today. A good Shmup for 80ms points. That's a steal waiting to happen.

 

[Fladam]

It's on the way, I think there's just a slight delay with there having been so much awesome stuff last month!

JOIN THE PARTY