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The XNA Indie Games Official Thread
- Thread starter Gowans
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Apparently, however, the time limitation is there no matter what. At least, that's what the comments say.Sean said:
The point being such that you can't make the entire game in the trial and ask only for voluntary donations. No matter what, at the end of XX seconds, a menu will pop up asking if they want to buy the game or exit.
That said, I'm glad to see this. I was wondering about demos. I was concerned it would be a fair bit of work to add support for the demo framework. I'd much rather just focus on the actual game and I'm sure many other people designing games for this service would feel the same way. Its really awesome that they implemented that basic system. It's not perfect, but it makes things a lot easier.
Alright, some interesting tidbits:
- If you live somewhere besides the places where they have community games, you CAN buy Community Games. There isn't some sort of weird thing like the videos - as long as you have a US account and US Microsoft Points, you can buy Community Games. You can then play the game on your regular account.
- In order to play ANY community games, even if you've bought them outright, you MUST be online to play. You cannot buy a game, move your Xbox 360 to a place without a internet connection, and play a game. It will come up with a "You must be logged into Xbox Live to play this game".
Now, does anyone know where I could get some cheap US Microsoft Points then? Due to the shitty Australia dollar, MS Points HERE are now cheaper than importing US Points, and they are of course only usable in their own country.
Also I bought Weapon of Choice. Crazy game. One thing I noticed though is that you have to play through a specific single player tree in one shot. It's probably very short, but still, kind of annoying.
- If you live somewhere besides the places where they have community games, you CAN buy Community Games. There isn't some sort of weird thing like the videos - as long as you have a US account and US Microsoft Points, you can buy Community Games. You can then play the game on your regular account.
- In order to play ANY community games, even if you've bought them outright, you MUST be online to play. You cannot buy a game, move your Xbox 360 to a place without a internet connection, and play a game. It will come up with a "You must be logged into Xbox Live to play this game".
Now, does anyone know where I could get some cheap US Microsoft Points then? Due to the shitty Australia dollar, MS Points HERE are now cheaper than importing US Points, and they are of course only usable in their own country.
Also I bought Weapon of Choice. Crazy game. One thing I noticed though is that you have to play through a specific single player tree in one shot. It's probably very short, but still, kind of annoying.
supermackem
Banned
Just buy lines dont even get the trail its that good.:lol
Kill Your Masters
Member
Rand al Thor 19
Junior Member
Haven't had the time to check these games out yet but there is something I need to know. Do these game have achievements??? Hopefully MS didn't make the same mistake twice.
Iced_Eagle
Member
Rand al Thor 19 said:
No.
MS has said they are looking into it, but for XNA 3.0, there are no achievements.
Obviously this can change very much year to year for each new version of XNA.
I know someone has invented a fake achievement that has the pop-up and such, but no gamerscore obviously.
This is the best thing to happen to consoles in a long time.
Brings back awesome memories of the Amiga public domain and PC shareware games. And of course the many quirky and wonderful bedroom coded games of the C64 era. Sure there'll be a ton of shit, but there'll be some absolute beauties too. And more importantly, it'll be a shit load of fun just trying them all.
Brings back awesome memories of the Amiga public domain and PC shareware games. And of course the many quirky and wonderful bedroom coded games of the C64 era. Sure there'll be a ton of shit, but there'll be some absolute beauties too. And more importantly, it'll be a shit load of fun just trying them all.
supermackem
Banned
pswii60 said:
They are if you have trouble buying them download trail and buy it from there.
They are available from the UK store, I'm talking as an Australian, in which Community games will NOT be available at launch, instead it's sometime in 2009. It's the same for people in Japan too.
Hellraizer - Thanks a lot. It's still more expensive, but I guess I don't have any choice unless someone wants to give up a ew of their half price cards.
Tried some more games too. Lines is very interesting, it's like Lumines meets Gunpey. You can fuck yourself up though by putting down two L curves next to each other, both facing eachother and both at the bottom. I guess that's why it's never really been attempted before :lol
Hellraizer - Thanks a lot. It's still more expensive, but I guess I don't have any choice unless someone wants to give up a ew of their half price cards.
Tried some more games too. Lines is very interesting, it's like Lumines meets Gunpey. You can fuck yourself up though by putting down two L curves next to each other, both facing eachother and both at the bottom. I guess that's why it's never really been attempted before :lol
Kill Your Masters
Member
You could still try and add points right from the dashboard. It doesn't always work because they have locked out any non-us cards out to buy points on the us store (AFAIK). However, apparently their card-check isn't flawless, as all you have to do is be annoying as hell and try and buy the points until the purchase gets confirmed (instead of declined all the times).Rlan said:
DUOTrix and Organon are currently up there.
Organon is a game where you have to fly around in an enclosed space and shoot the right squares before the time runs out. Seems okay, but I feel the vertical axis controls are all wrong for some reason.
There are some decent games up here - even something like Fruit Attack is a competent Columns clone. But you know what there people need? ARTISTS. It's sad to see some game concepts up there are good in theory, but are bogged down by the fact that they look terrible.
There are so many artists out there, surely these people who can program can work with a dude who can draw.
We're seeing an awful lot of "Space Shooters" as well. Seems everyone's trying to frontload it since so many seems to be popping up. "Bad Atom Episode 1, a 3D Sci Fi Shooter, and "Abstacked", a puzzle game that really needs an artist should pop up sometime in the next 24 hours.
Organon is a game where you have to fly around in an enclosed space and shoot the right squares before the time runs out. Seems okay, but I feel the vertical axis controls are all wrong for some reason.
There are some decent games up here - even something like Fruit Attack is a competent Columns clone. But you know what there people need? ARTISTS. It's sad to see some game concepts up there are good in theory, but are bogged down by the fact that they look terrible.
There are so many artists out there, surely these people who can program can work with a dude who can draw.
We're seeing an awful lot of "Space Shooters" as well. Seems everyone's trying to frontload it since so many seems to be popping up. "Bad Atom Episode 1, a 3D Sci Fi Shooter, and "Abstacked", a puzzle game that really needs an artist should pop up sometime in the next 24 hours.
xblarcade said:
In a community game space, an artist could most certainly get more recognition than the programmer. Braid looked like shit before an artist came in
The problem is that there is no STYLE to the games. Fruit Attack works fine but just looks like he went Google searching. The background is a wooden panel or something and just looks damn ugly. He could have easily made it crazy, spruce things up, like Baku Baku Animal or something ridiculous
Back in the day I used to run Sonic Fan Games HQ, where people made games in Click & Create. Now obviously they can't do that here, but there was a huge community on editing sprites or completely making brand new sprites for use in their games. These guys should be all over this stuff.
Once the XNA Community Games comes out people will realise what an opportunity this could all be and jump at the chance. Those Deviant Artists could start putting their stuff to good use, and the same for the hundereds of people who STILL do midi sequencing of old video game titles at VGmusic.com
Lots of new games up today:
Abstacked (200 Points) - Puzzle game where you have to clear star pieces from the board by surrounding them.
Bad Atom Episode 1 (200 Points) - "Bad Atom is a 3D Sci-Fi shooter where David Malcolm, a well respected pilot, takes on the responsibilty to help create an experimental intergalactic weapon."
Beat IT! (200 Points) - "Multiplayer pad-passing party game" You have to perform actions in time with the beat.
DUOtrix (400 Points) - Awesome little puzzle game, seems to be renamed and such since the previous version which was put up but seems to be the same game.
Organon (200 Points) - "Organon is a 3D flight and shooting game." Rlan has more detail on it, I'm just running these off the marketplace screen.
Impressions on these later, just thought I would provide the basics.
Abstacked (200 Points) - Puzzle game where you have to clear star pieces from the board by surrounding them.
Bad Atom Episode 1 (200 Points) - "Bad Atom is a 3D Sci-Fi shooter where David Malcolm, a well respected pilot, takes on the responsibilty to help create an experimental intergalactic weapon."
Beat IT! (200 Points) - "Multiplayer pad-passing party game" You have to perform actions in time with the beat.
DUOtrix (400 Points) - Awesome little puzzle game, seems to be renamed and such since the previous version which was put up but seems to be the same game.
Organon (200 Points) - "Organon is a 3D flight and shooting game." Rlan has more detail on it, I'm just running these off the marketplace screen.
Impressions on these later, just thought I would provide the basics.
Rand al Thor 19
Junior Member
Iced_Eagle said:
So they did make the same mistake again. How dumb can you be???
Rand al Thor 19
Junior Member
Brakara said:
I can enjoy them for sure... it just that they are missing out on many, many achievement whores buying these low priced games for the achievements. To me, it seems like a wasted opportunity just like Xbox Originals. My friend's list is filled with people who would buy these games if they had achievements, just like these same people do for every XBLA game. That's all i was saying.
Another title has came up on Live since my last post, called Endless Swarm. It costs 400 points and the description reads "Endless Swarm is a game where you build and control towers to defend two factories from waves of enemy onslaughts. It features 8 unique towers, 7 different enemy types, 2 player cooperative multiplayer, 3 powerful superpowers, and endless challenge. See how long you can survive the Endless Swarm and beat your high scores!" It's quite a hefty download for the service at 66MB but the trial version played quite well.
Just to clear up a few things:
- yes, ALL of the Community Games' trial modes run on a 4-minute timer, whether the developer specially implements a trial mode or not. It's kind of a pain for anyone trying to sell a game with any type of complex gameplay in it. Someone on the XNA forums said that their game is a strategy-type game with a 10-minute tutorial...sucks.
- the main reason Achievements aren't there is because anyone could just create games with easy Achievements, and it would cheapen the system, making it unfair for XBLA and retail game developers. At least...that's the way it was told to us in the XNA forums by members of the team. I'm pretty sure that Community Games will *never* get Achievements or integrated leaderboards, from the way they were talking about it.
And now for a shameless plug:
My Community Game will most likely be available by Wednesday. It's called Snake360, and as you would expect, it's a snake game. But it's got 200+ levels, battle modes for up to 4 players, co-op, internet-based leaderboards and an Achievement substitute called goals (completing goals unlocks stuff). I've been working on it for almost a year and it will cost 400 points. You can see videos and read more info at http://www.snake360.com. I hope some of you will take a few minutes of your time to try it out =)
- yes, ALL of the Community Games' trial modes run on a 4-minute timer, whether the developer specially implements a trial mode or not. It's kind of a pain for anyone trying to sell a game with any type of complex gameplay in it. Someone on the XNA forums said that their game is a strategy-type game with a 10-minute tutorial...sucks.
- the main reason Achievements aren't there is because anyone could just create games with easy Achievements, and it would cheapen the system, making it unfair for XBLA and retail game developers. At least...that's the way it was told to us in the XNA forums by members of the team. I'm pretty sure that Community Games will *never* get Achievements or integrated leaderboards, from the way they were talking about it.
And now for a shameless plug:
My Community Game will most likely be available by Wednesday. It's called Snake360, and as you would expect, it's a snake game. But it's got 200+ levels, battle modes for up to 4 players, co-op, internet-based leaderboards and an Achievement substitute called goals (completing goals unlocks stuff). I've been working on it for almost a year and it will cost 400 points. You can see videos and read more info at http://www.snake360.com. I hope some of you will take a few minutes of your time to try it out =)
UltimaPooh
Member
yyr said:
Achivements are understandable. Of course, they should allow you to have achievements with 0 gamer pooints. What I really don't understand is the fact that you can't have laderboards. Lame.
OMG!!!! SNAKE! I love snake. +1 buy here. Are you guys allowed to make DLC for your XNA games? If so you could make new map packs for the snake game.
At this time, there is no support for DLC in Community Games. The team indicated that this may change in the future.
By the way, there is no support for auto-patching either. If we discover a bug, issue etc. within a Community Game and need to update it, we have to resubmit the game. It takes the place of the old version, and then players need to manually re-download it. =( So in that regard, CG developers are being told "make sure to thoroughly test your games" which should be happening anyway!!
Thanks for the enthusiasm re: Snake360 =)
By the way, there is no support for auto-patching either. If we discover a bug, issue etc. within a Community Game and need to update it, we have to resubmit the game. It takes the place of the old version, and then players need to manually re-download it. =( So in that regard, CG developers are being told "make sure to thoroughly test your games" which should be happening anyway!!
Thanks for the enthusiasm re: Snake360 =)
Psychotext
Member
Ha... yeah, just like the XBLA devs who actually get certification. :lolyyr said:
yyr said:
I wish you good luck but I'd also wish that game was 200 points. Not only for me but for you to make more money with it.
You could have put a hundred times more levels, this sort of game should be 200 points for impulse buys. I think you'll only convince some fans of Snake to buy your game at that price.
BTW I'll buy DUOtrix today or tomorrow, Weapon of Choice too. I would have bought Word Soup at 200 points.
Metalic Sand
who is Emo-Beas?
chubigans said:I really hope at some point there will be a Game Maker type interface for XNA. I don't want to learn code.
http://research.microsoft.com/projects/boku/
UltimaPooh
Member
Is Boku going to come out?
UltimaPooh
Member
I really hope Boku becomes a tangible thing in the future... Something we can get all ours hands on and be the "answer" to Little Big Planet. Hell it looks like with Boku the possibilites are ten fold over Little Big Planet's, I hope it becomes a reality.
The only problem is with Boku they need to spice it up more and give it the HD graphics that LBP has.
The only problem is with Boku they need to spice it up more and give it the HD graphics that LBP has.
Iced_Eagle
Member
Rand al Thor 19 said:
First off, the community games are about the fun first and foremost and inspiring some creations and talent. It's the first place where anyone can make games and distribute it to millions of people very easily.
Second, notice I said in XNA 3.0. Hell, they didn't even have multiplayer in XNA until last year.
Just give it time. The XNA team has had a lot on their plate getting this system all set up for the public in the fall, so next year, there is always the possibility of achievements. I'm not saying it will happen, but it's just that MS only has X amount of months to figure out and solve Y amount of problems. XNA 3.0 is a huge step forward in everything they've done (even added another platform with the Zune).
So, sit back, breathe, and play some games just for the hell of it.
At times, achievements make me think gaming has gone backwards with people only playing games with achievements and ignoring anything that doesn't have them...
Something which is kind of weird is how segmented away Community Games are with the rest of them. Right now community games do NOT show up on Xbox.com at all, so you can't really see if anyone you know is playing any of them. You also cannot access Community Games from the Quicklaunch bar.
This might all change once it all really goes live though, like the ability to buy stuff thorugh Xbox.com directly.
This might all change once it all really goes live though, like the ability to buy stuff thorugh Xbox.com directly.
PhlivoSong
Member
Rlan said:
Along with you, I'm going to assume that will change next week. It looks like it could be near complete relaunch of xbox.com. They added a new support page today.
yyr said:
Do you mean just 4 minutes and it's done, or you can vary the time scale based on 4 minute increments? If you make your own trial mode can you get around that 4 minute timer? I don't see how the trial can be effective at all if you are given 4 minutes to experience it.
yyr said:
Going off of what somebody sort of asked... if you update a game that is already published does it still go through the same approval process with other XNA devs? Does it get automatically published because your game is already on XBL? Are you even allowed to post updates once you publish the initial build?
Psychotext
Member
4 minutes and done... and no, you can't get around it.PhlivoSong said:
Geez, more games:
Tail Gun Charlie (400 Points) - Charles Charlie Chatsworth is the pride of the Great British Galactic Diplomatic Corp. No other individual has done more for race relations and intergalactic war. Using his trusty weapons of peace, it can only be a matter of time before Charlie manages one of his legendary diplomatic incident recoveries following a recent misunderstanding with the Dax.
UAV Wars (200 Points) is a 3D action arcade game where you remotely pilot your Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) and destroy the competing UAVs to win a military defense contract.
Tail Gun Charlie (400 Points) - Charles Charlie Chatsworth is the pride of the Great British Galactic Diplomatic Corp. No other individual has done more for race relations and intergalactic war. Using his trusty weapons of peace, it can only be a matter of time before Charlie manages one of his legendary diplomatic incident recoveries following a recent misunderstanding with the Dax.
UAV Wars (200 Points) is a 3D action arcade game where you remotely pilot your Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) and destroy the competing UAVs to win a military defense contract.
Psychotext
Member
I really hope they have an auto download for these trials. I'll likely try most of them but I don't want to have to keep looking for new ones.
I don't think anyone posted a link to the official list of approved xna titles. So here it is:
http://catalog.xna.com/en-US/gamescatalog.aspx
I know I'd hate to get burned with buying a game that has a game breaking bug in it only to find out the dev can't do anything to fix it. Also, given the number of xbla games that shipped with broken online modes, it's a bit worrying that xna devs who put out network games won't have an easy way to fix their potentially broken network games.
Regardless, I'm looking forward to Wednesday, some of these games look pretty cool.
http://catalog.xna.com/en-US/gamescatalog.aspx
From what I understand, you're not allowed to update titles. Microsoft wants to discourage people from releasing games that aren't complete. I did find mention in the XNA forums that they may work with some developers to allow bug fixes, but there won't be any automated system in place that devs can use.PhlivoSong said:
I know I'd hate to get burned with buying a game that has a game breaking bug in it only to find out the dev can't do anything to fix it. Also, given the number of xbla games that shipped with broken online modes, it's a bit worrying that xna devs who put out network games won't have an easy way to fix their potentially broken network games.
Regardless, I'm looking forward to Wednesday, some of these games look pretty cool.
Psychotext
Member
What the hell?!?homez99 said:
Well, that's going to save me money... but it's not going to do their service any good.
PhlivoSong said:
As Mxylptlk said, there is no update process. If you want to change something, you need to re-upload your game, after which it goes through the same peer review process it had to go through originally. Once it passes, it takes the place of the old version. At this point, you need to somehow tell your users to download the new version, because there is currently no other way that they'll know an update is available... in other words, we have to try to ship bug-free games (not necessarily a bad thing).
Kafel said:
1) If you look at the feature set (2-player co-op, 4-player battles, internet ranking, etc.) I think it compares very favorably to all other 400-point games, even on XBLA. There is a LOT of replay value...more than some $60 retail games. I even have some unannounced features...wait 'til you try the insane unlockable difficulties (yes, that's plural), and 4-player suffocation battles (Collisions are not enough. you must TRAP other players to kill them. A total blast at parties).
2) Because the final size of my package is going to be over 50 MB (mostly due to the high-res textures and almost 30 minutes of music included), I cannot select the 200 MSP/$2.50 price point.
Darkflight
Member
Indeed, its not a bad game, we test Itbox games at my work so I could play it for free at lunch if I hadn't got bored of it months ago :lolGowans007 said:
Hey guys, nice some new stuff to check out & will post my opinions soon.
Also I am a professional designer (I have a big focus on UI) and if any GAFers want me to consult on their games I will do it for free (I have the XNA membership) just let me know.
I will do another update here but I can see you guys have dropped some in, if you want to use this template for an update it would be great I don't want to be stuck doing them
NEW UPDATE
Abstacked- 200 points
Bad Atom Episode 1- 200 points
DUOTrix- 400 points
Endless Swarm- 400 points
Organon- 200 points
Tail Gun Charlie- 400 points
UAV Wars- 200 points
Also I am a professional designer (I have a big focus on UI) and if any GAFers want me to consult on their games I will do it for free (I have the XNA membership) just let me know.
I will do another update here but I can see you guys have dropped some in, if you want to use this template for an update it would be great I don't want to be stuck doing them
NEW UPDATE
Abstacked- 200 points
XNA Profile Page
Bad Atom Episode 1- 200 points
XNA Profile Page
DUOTrix- 400 points
XNA Profile Page
Endless Swarm- 400 points
XNA Profile Page
Organon- 200 points
XNA Profile Page
Tail Gun Charlie- 400 points
XNA Profile Page
UAV Wars- 200 points
XNA Profile Page
AlphaTwo00
Member
The 4 minute cap is stupid, stupid, stupid. However, it does give me a good measure of whether the game is good or not.
If I quit before the 4 minute trial, it's safe to say it's a pass. However, if I'm swearing at the 4 minute trial window, then the game is potentially good.
If I quit before the 4 minute trial, it's safe to say it's a pass. However, if I'm swearing at the 4 minute trial window, then the game is potentially good.
ok checked out the new stuff, the stuff I liked.
Bad Atom has a really nice intro and I like what its going for, a 3d tempest in a sphere where you have to protect the centre with Ikaruga style switching firetypes but I can't seem to hit jack. Something seems off, wish it was a litter clearer.
DUOTrix is excellent, familiar drop and match puzzler but different enough to be really interesting. Think this will join Weapon of Choice to be my second purchased community game.
I like Organon too, its music and artstyle reminds my of late 90's shareware stuff and its fun enough hunting down the cubs to shoot in the time but I wish it has a boost to liven up the controls a little and from what the trail let me get too it seemed a little mundane I hope it ramps up later on.
The four minute time enforcement of trials is pissing me off a little now too, hard to get a read on some stuff in the time and I'm constantly aware of it from starting the game up.
Anyone else getting a kick from all of the Home Studio intro screens?
yyr: Very much looking forward to see your wosnake360, I was a beast at snake on the old Nokias, maybe this will be my third XNA purchase. Any details on online (friends) leaderboards?
Bad Atom has a really nice intro and I like what its going for, a 3d tempest in a sphere where you have to protect the centre with Ikaruga style switching firetypes but I can't seem to hit jack. Something seems off, wish it was a litter clearer.
DUOTrix is excellent, familiar drop and match puzzler but different enough to be really interesting. Think this will join Weapon of Choice to be my second purchased community game.
I like Organon too, its music and artstyle reminds my of late 90's shareware stuff and its fun enough hunting down the cubs to shoot in the time but I wish it has a boost to liven up the controls a little and from what the trail let me get too it seemed a little mundane I hope it ramps up later on.
The four minute time enforcement of trials is pissing me off a little now too, hard to get a read on some stuff in the time and I'm constantly aware of it from starting the game up.
Anyone else getting a kick from all of the Home Studio intro screens?
yyr: Very much looking forward to see your wosnake360, I was a beast at snake on the old Nokias, maybe this will be my third XNA purchase. Any details on online (friends) leaderboards?
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