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[DaveVoyles]

I bought Dark Reign today as well. About to try it out.

We've reached out to them to see what's up, and why they backed it on XBLIG. The $5 price point on the service is high, but it could be an attempt to test the waters, and see if XBLIG can turn into a GOG.

Personally, I'm all for it. I'd love to see larger pubs/devs op onto XBLIG to show that it's a viable maket and attract more attention to it.

We've recently started a thread on App Hub geared towards attracting more talent and large teams on XBLIG, then two days later this happens.

" We have worked out a deal with Activision to remake the game. The art assets are fully authorized. The legal issues has been reviewed by Activision's lawyer. Dark Reign Redux is a remake game QA'ed by Activision." - Magnetar Games
Here's the link, but you need an XNA dev account to view it.

 

[Gaspode_T]

For those that don't know how to find indie channel, the best way to get it is actually not Game Type - just go to Game Marketplace, scroll to Games tab and then the middle part that has a rotating, er, ad thing...the second one is always Indies Games. Right thumbstick changes between them, you don't have to wait for the rotation to happen. They said they are going to leave it there for now and devs are watching it like a hawk and complaining when it vanishes. The nice thing about that entry point is that it shows Kotaku's Favorites and Content finalists both of which are currently full of some pretty nice games...

Just tried/bought a bunch of games, quick impressions before I hit the sack:

Little Racers Street - They really nailed this one out of the park, super impressed by the level polish and attention to detail. It's almost like they listened to the feedback that their games would be so awesome if they just spent a couple more months and boom, this happens. The control is awesome, it reminds me of playing Death Rally on iOS but I can actually control this one better. http://www.milkstonestudios.com/2012/01/little-racers-street-available-now/

Hedge Wizard - This was sitting in my Trials/Demos section for months now so I finally tried it. Voice acting introduces the gameplay, which is kind of like ... Half Minute Hero???? Believe it or not. With time travel rewind. It's pretty decent laid back puzzle game, don't get it if you like zombies and boobs. I like it, nice touch of humor here and there but not overboard.

Alien Jelly - Yeah, this is basically Ilomilo with aliens, but it does have a time rewind thing that Ilomilo doesn't have and user created levels which Ilomilo also doesn't have! The only thing stopping me from pulling trigger was 240 pt price tag, I am going to sleep on this one but if you liked Ilomilo a lot you really have no reason to not drop everything and pick this up too.

Gravitron 360 - This was in my 'Picks' section, wow this game really has some nice style, music, I love the neon glowing lines that almost makes it like a Jeff Minter-ish game. The gameplay is similar to Pixeljunk Shooter. Total buy on this one (for me).

P3 - Twin stick shooter in petri dish, I had some trouble with this one so I skipped it. The framerate was a little jittery and I don't even know why I was dying sometimes.

Between stuff like Block Zombies and Little Racers, XBLIG is on a roll...gamers need to be whupped over the head with a salmon to go check this channel out.

 

[DaveVoyles]

I think Little Racer: STREET is the best deal on XBLIG this year. Really solid game. Great controls, deep features such as 30 vehicles to purchase, numerous upgrades, a ton of tracks, a variety of weather, and quite a few awardments to unlock.

 

[FunInfusedGames]

I had a conversation with someone at work last night who said he couldn't find the Indie Games section anymore. He used the Bing search to find games he was looking for specifically. Sadly that's very typical.

 

[Dark Octave]

I had a conversation with someone at work last night who said he couldn't find the Indie Games section anymore. He used the Bing search to find games he was looking for specifically. Sadly that's very typical.

It's difficult if you're really into xblig and nearly impossible if you are mildly interested.

 

[DaveVoyles]

What are you talking about? I've never had a problem before.

I just start here, make a right, after a bit a hang a left, no wait, two lefts, and then a right. Wahlah, you're there! Oh fuck, I've done it again - I'm in the lost woods.

 

[qupe1975]

For those that don't know how to find indie channel, the best way to get it is actually not Game Type - just go to Game Marketplace, scroll to Games tab and then the middle part that has a rotating, er, ad thing...the second one is always Indies Games. Right thumbstick changes between them, you don't have to wait for the rotation to happen. They said they are going to leave it there for now and devs are watching it like a hawk and complaining when it vanishes. The nice thing about that entry point is that it shows Kotaku's Favorites and Content finalists both of which are currently full of some pretty nice games...

Just tried/bought a bunch of games, quick impressions before I hit the sack:

Little Racers Street - They really nailed this one out of the park, super impressed by the level polish and attention to detail. It's almost like they listened to the feedback that their games would be so awesome if they just spent a couple more months and boom, this happens. The control is awesome, it reminds me of playing Death Rally on iOS but I can actually control this one better. http://www.milkstonestudios.com/2012/01/little-racers-street-available-now/

Hedge Wizard - This was sitting in my Trials/Demos section for months now so I finally tried it. Voice acting introduces the gameplay, which is kind of like ... Half Minute Hero???? Believe it or not. With time travel rewind. It's pretty decent laid back puzzle game, don't get it if you like zombies and boobs. I like it, nice touch of humor here and there but not overboard.

Alien Jelly - Yeah, this is basically Ilomilo with aliens, but it does have a time rewind thing that Ilomilo doesn't have and user created levels which Ilomilo also doesn't have! The only thing stopping me from pulling trigger was 240 pt price tag, I am going to sleep on this one but if you liked Ilomilo a lot you really have no reason to not drop everything and pick this up too.

Gravitron 360 - This was in my 'Picks' section, wow this game really has some nice style, music, I love the neon glowing lines that almost makes it like a Jeff Minter-ish game. The gameplay is similar to Pixeljunk Shooter. Total buy on this one (for me).

P3 - Twin stick shooter in petri dish, I had some trouble with this one so I skipped it. The framerate was a little jittery and I don't even know why I was dying sometimes.

Between stuff like Block Zombies and Little Racers, XBLIG is on a roll...gamers need to be whupped over the head with a salmon to go check this channel out.

P3 is no different to many other games on the service and there are a lot of better versions out there.

Gaspode, looks like some of the games you have played are ones I recommended on the Grcade thread So even if you didn't think of them because of that thread, I know that others like similar stuff I am recommending . I think you should buy Alien Jelly, for 240pts you're getting loads of content.

Gravitron360 is a great game. I need to go back to a fair few games and complete them, this being one.

 

[Gaspode_T]

P3 is no different to many other games on the service and there are a lot of better versions out there.

Gaspode, looks like some of the games you have played are ones I recommended on the Grcade thread So even if you didn't think of them because of that thread, I know that others like similar stuff I am recommending . I think you should buy Alien Jelly, for 240pts you're getting loads of content.

Gravitron360 is a great game. I need to go back to a fair few games and complete them, this being one.

Yeah your thread has awesome info it. For what it's worth I've included a nod to that thread in a mailing list at work that has multiple thousands of people on it (but on the other hand I directly pimped Volchaos and Orbitron on the same place and it didn't seem to help those games that much...)

My strategy for a long time for trying to help indies was sort of randomly e-mailing specific people and trying to put pressure on specific problems. Something I realized lately is that I shouldn't have to do everything myself, so I'm trying to make people more aware of indie games in general so there are more pockets of supporters here and there. I'm kind of surprised at how many e-mails I've gotten saying "Oh wow some of these games are so innovative, we should really support this stuff" (from people who are on Xbox team )

 

[Gaspode_T]

Updates and news:

Pixel Blocked released a huge update that reworks the way the game plays and adds new stuff. This is a great game, you should check it out if you like puzzle games at all, penny-arcade even wrote gushing about it. You can see the dev's blog here: http://damnigames.com/

Bloody Checkers was also updated with DLC level content recently it seems, I need to get back into that one. I started to learn the tricks, I really wish this one was released on tablets because it's a nice pick up and play game. This is still the best article about it: http://www.gamesetwatch.com/2011/06/bloody_checkers_is_everything.php

CastleMiner Z sold 100,000 in January, pretty amazing!

Dead Pixels dev tweeted that he broke 30,000 sales total. Gee I would like $20K to be randomly direct deposited into one of my bank accounts, I have to work pretty darn hard to make $20K of my salary.

I guess $20K is still small peanuts for some devs that want to go 'full indie studio', but for dude in his house working in after hours it's pretty successful...

Since I've given up on achievements ever being added to XBLIG titles, it makes it easier for me to just accept them how they are...but it's kind of funny and sad that in the end achievements are likely to be available for even Windows 8 games and maybe some other yet-to-be-announced things but still not XBLIG (see Build conference talks about Windows 8 games, they basically even explain how to call the service with something called RESTful APIs that are basically asynchronous service APIs). I think one of the major problems is that the RESTful API thing works through Http request, but Http request is not available at all to XBLIGs (which is why they have to do P2P for all networking).

This talk from Gamefest is somehow online anyway so I guess it's not a secret:

http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=28035
from http://www.microsoftgamefest.com/london2011.htm

This talk will describe how developers can create compelling companion websites, applications, and games that take advantage of our new RESTful Xbox LIVE Web Services from console and non-console platforms (Windows Phone, websites, etc.). You will learn how your application can obtain secure access to our service, as well as how to use the expansive set of Xbox LIVE services, including Profile and Storage, to keep your customers engaged through your websites and companion applications even after they’ve stopped playing your game.

I'm pretty sure this is still for people with XDKs only (Xbox dev kit), but pressure from success of certain XBLIG games is one way to convince them that having a more open platform is good idea.

 

[OnPoint]

Coming to XBLIG and PC, Smudged Cat's newest is Gateways.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkuyeqsgbYw

Gateways is a 2D platform game set in the lab of an inventor called Ed following an outbreak of a number of his more “creative” experiments. Can you help him escape the lab?

Alongside the traditional platform elements such as jumping on enemies heads, spikes and moving platforms are the gateway guns. The gateway guns allow you to place two gateways on the walls, floors and ceilings of the lab so that when you pass through one you emerge out of the other. As progress is made through the game different types of gateway gun are introduced with different effects. After the basic gun, you acquire a gun that creates two gateways of different sizes, passing through one way shrinks Ed to half his size and the other way makes Ed grow to twice his size. Then you find a gun where one gateway doesn’t just connect to the others location but also its time, allowing Ed to travel back in time and encounter earlier versions of himself. Finally, the last gun manipulates gravity so passing through allows Ed to walk along walls and on ceilings.

Gateways takes place on a single sprawling map rammed with puzzles and challenges. As power ups are acquired more and more of the map opens up containing more power ups and secrets. In addition to the gateway guns Ed will also find a torch letting him light up the darker areas of the map and a mirror which can be used to deflect lasers.

A sophisticated help system will help Ed along throughout the game. Every puzzle has a help point next to it where Ed can use power orbs to find out if the puzzle can be solved using his current power ups and abilities. If it can be solved and you’re still stumped then spending more power orbs will provide you with the solution.

And not a mention of cake in sight… apart from this one.

 

[Stumpokapow]

Glad Smudged Cat is still making games after Shuggy didn't work out as well as it should have for him/them.

 

[OnPoint]

Me too. They deserve better sales than they got... what an awful situation that sounded like.

Just received word that Brand has passed peer review and is releasing on February 2.

 

[MikeHaggar]

our artist began work today on our upcoming xblig title. very excited. it's going to be a while before i have anything to announce or share, but i cannot wait. reactions are going to be really, really interesting.

 

[DaveVoyles]

our artist began work today on our upcoming xblig title. very excited. it's going to be a while before i have anything to announce or share, but i cannot wait. reactions are going to be really, really interesting.

Yeaayuhhh, well that's always good news. How far along are you guys?

I just started to put together a dev diary of the Mega Man 2 remake I'm doing right now. It's being done in UDK, but I've always wanted to put something on XBLIG, so I'm going over XNA tutorials right now to see how practical something like that would be with the Sunburn engine.

 

[MikeHaggar]

Yeaayuhhh, well that's always good news. How far along are you guys?

I just started to put together a dev diary of the Mega Man 2 remake I'm doing right now. It's being done in UDK, but I've always wanted to put something on XBLIG, so I'm going over XNA tutorials right now to see how practical something like that would be with the Sunburn engine.

not very far at all. a lot of the tech is built, but the game just doesn't "exist" at this point. our art development schedule is very long, so it's going to be quite a while until the title is released. however, i have some cool ideas for revealing the title and continuing to keep people interested by doing a staggered roll-out of info. i'm very excited to see people's reaction to the concept itself. 3 months hopefully...

the mega man 2 remake looks cool. i'm assuming if you ported it to xna it would be free and pc only?

 

[Gaspode_T]

not very far at all. a lot of the tech is built, but the game just doesn't "exist" at this point. our art development schedule is very long, so it's going to be quite a while until the title is released. however, i have some cool ideas for revealing the title and continuing to keep people interested by doing a staggered roll-out of info. i'm very excited to see people's reaction to the concept itself. 3 months hopefully...

the mega man 2 remake looks cool. i'm assuming if you ported it to xna it would be free and pc only?

Do you already have a game on XBLIG??

I have my own game in development with XNA but I'm on the fence about whether to go through with it on XNA or to just jump into HTML5 or DirectX instead. The thing is I am pretty sure going through the App Hub peer review process would be a good learning experience so it's kind of tempting for that reason alone, and I haven't ever released a game, the closest I got was doing graphics programming of little demos through school years and and games coded with QBasic or Turbo Pascal when I was in elementary school.

It's sort of a test of my fortitude of putting foot down at home at nights and coding instead of killing crazy crow-ladies in Skyrim. Skyrim is so good...mmmm...Skyrim...it has a dragon claw shaped clutch over my heart.

 

[Gaspode_T]

Is someone doing a Feb thread?

Kobold's Quest and Maid's Caving Adventure both dropped to 80 pts.

 

[Dark Octave]

Is someone doing a Feb thread?

Kobold's Quest and Maid's Caving Adventure both dropped to 80 pts.

Yeah me and OnPoint have agreed to alternate months. It'll be up first thing tomorrow morning.

 

[Gaspode_T]

Cool, here's another game that dropped to 80 pts: Rotorscope http://marketplace.xbox.com/en-US/Product/Rotorscope/66acd000-77fe-1000-9115-d8025855042f Says it won 2nd place of Dream.Build.Play