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Xbox LIVE Indie Games - The August 2010 Thread

Nasreddin said:
Great thread. Better than any other Indie Game coverage on the web. :)
Aw, I feel all warm inside :D

Warm Machine said:
Great thread but I have to agree with others about Crossfire. It is really good and deserves a better mention.
I think I messed this up. What with it being 'GAFs thread, and nearly all of GAF liking Crossfire a lot, it has been promoted!

Parallax Scroll said:
Gumzoobo: What Bubble Bobble would be like if it sucked!
It's awkward, yeah, but at the same time it's 80 points for a ton of levels and it was definitely playable enough for me and I enjoyed it.

DownLikeBCPowder said:
Is this the first of such threads?
It's the second! June's best games are here

HadesGigas said:
If that has even the slightest puzzle aspect to it I'll end up buying it for a dollar.

SmallCaveGames said:
PS - that girl looks about 9 years old and it's disturbing.
<cough>

GAF needs multiquote :lol
 
"The harder the stage, the less the clothes." Oh yes, it's &#33804;&#12417;&#12367;&#12426;. Actually, what I said before happened, I did quite like it. It's one of those games where if you flip one tile, the surrounding tiles flip, and you have to have them all facing the same way to see a HOT GIRL NAKED!!!! picture. The presentation is nice, though, I like the bright and chunky logo/fonts and the music is quaint and Katamari Damacy-esque. There are some special blocks too. Grey ones can't be flipped, blue ones flip twice if you click on them (the surrounding blocks only once) and green ones flip every block in that row/column. So there's more to consider. Yeah, I liked it.

Graviton is a spacey racing game. Didn't play multiplayer but it has tons of weapons and stuff. I quite liked the single player mode which has nothing to do but race around laps. You press A to thrust and then take gravity/momentum in to account to steer around landscapes that look like they came from The Helicopter Game. The walls are bumpy which means if you hit them you spin around like crazy so getting your steering perfected to avoid such misery is a must. D-Pad control is a must as there's no analog deadzone and it sends you spinning. I liked this, too.

And this as well, madness! The No Button Game, which I didn't play in No Button mode but will do because I really want to know how it works. I assumed it just pressed the triggers in slightly, but when I pressed them myself it didn't seem to do owt. It's witchcraft, maybe. Anyway, single button mode is The Impossible Game with a few quirks, like a time limit and sections where you can hammer A to keep your speed up. I like the level-based nature of it. Graphics aren't the best and the controls didn't feel 100% responsive but certainly good enough and I enjoyed it.

Block Puzzle's Revenge, not so much. It's Tetris with four fields of play at once and each has its own time limit, you have to clear a line before the time expires to get more time, or you'll have a negative effect on that field. No pressing down, stuff like that. Then you have to clear a line to remove the effect. It's really slow and with four fields of play at once there's ALWAYS somewhere to put something that won't cause any gaps, so it's quite easy too.
 
toythatkills said:
"The harder the stage, the less the clothes." Oh yes, it's &#33804;&#12417;&#12367;&#12426;. Actually, what I said before happened, I did quite like it. It's one of those games where if you flip one tile, the surrounding tiles flip, and you have to have them all facing the same way to see a HOT GIRL NAKED!!!! picture. The presentation is nice, though, I like the bright and chunky logo/fonts and the music is quaint and Katamari Damacy-esque. There are some special blocks too. Grey ones can't be flipped, blue ones flip twice if you click on them (the surrounding blocks only once) and green ones flip every block in that row/column. So there's more to consider. Yeah, I liked it.
20htvua.gif
 
:lol

There's no actual nudity or owt, but it's hella pedobear. Well, no nudity but there are plasters/band-aids...

It's honestly a decent puzzle game though, and harder than you'd think!

EDIT: To pre-empt, THE GAME is harder than you'd think.
 

nli10

Member
JUGGLE is coming to XBL Indie Games

If all you insiders could go review this game so that I may buy it all the sooner I'd be really happy.

Essentially it's by the people who made Denki Blocks and despite almost collapsing as an outfit earlier in the year and making lots of people redundant they have come back stronger and rapidly increased their output.

Based on the iPhone remake of the 'classic game' :D .
 
toythatkills said:
:lol

There's no actual nudity or owt, but it's hella pedobear. Well, no nudity but there are plasters/band-aids...

It's honestly a decent puzzle game though, and harder than you'd think!

EDIT: To pre-empt, THE GAME is harder than you'd think.
OK, you've convinced me to download it.
 

robot

Member
Ha can't believe Ladybird Galaxy is mentioned. First indie game I bought, great stuff. Online multiplayer would've been an amazing addition.

Picked up Platformance and still have the trial of the tap tap game.
 

fernoca

Member
Went on a 80 Points-buying spree for 5 games; ended with:
1. Platformance
2. Breath of Death
3. Prismatic Solid
4. Avaglide
5. Old School Racer

Yeah, still looking around for a #5. :p

EDIT:
Got #5!
Tried to get different genres; but still good games (and which unique looks. retro look/pixelart is a plus.)
 
robot said:
Ha can't believe Ladybird Galaxy is mentioned. First indie game I bought, great stuff. Online multiplayer would've been an amazing addition.
Anyone tried that this month? C'mon, try it!

Maybe he should skin it and call it "Avatar Galaxy," he'd sell millions.

fernoca said:
Went on a 80 Points-buying spree for 5 games; ended with:
1. Platformance
2. Breath of Death
3. Prismatic Solid
4. Avaglide
5. Old School Racer
You need to go back for 6. Apple Jack, but that's a pretty excellent selection of games!
 

fernoca

Member
toythatkills said:
You need to go back for 6. Apple Jack, but that's a pretty excellent selection of games!
Apple Jack was my other choice actually. :lol
Ended with 'Racer' because it was a different genre than the classic/simple/platforming -kinda ones I got.
 

Kafel

Banned
fernoca said:
Tried to get different genres; but still good games (and which unique looks. retro look/pixelart is a plus.)

No love for Pixel Boarder ? It's 240 points but still.
 
Kafel said:
No love for Pixel Boarder ? It's 240 points but still.
Expect Pixel Boarder to appear in one of these threads in the future.

It's so hard though, it takes four or five trials just to get remotely good enough to justify paying for it :lol
 
Awesome thread! And really helpful. I may give Platformance a try, but you're right -- based on the description I'm surprised they didn't put leaderboards in.
 

luiztfc

Member
toythatkills said:
Anyone tried that this month? C'mon, try it!

Maybe he should skin it and call it "Avatar Galaxy," he'd sell millions.

Awesome thread! Got me buying games I'd never though I would.

Ps. I bought Ladybird Galaxy, it's excellent!
 
Ladybird Galaxy was also one of my first "Community Games" bought. Very fun, and looked a hell of a lot more professional than most of the other games back then.

In other news... you guys all LOVE Silver Dollar Games, right? Well they have another new dating game... So Many Girls So Little Time

Trailer



It's basically about managing your schedule/your money while you try and juggle an ever growing number of women. So actually more thought goes into playing the game than their average release...
 
So Many Girls So Little Time would be the best game I'd ever played if it was the only game I'd ever played. It's a time management game where you have to arrange dates with girls and make sure they don't clash with other dates with other girls, etc. There's no record of what's going on so you have to remember about ten dates at once and how long they are. You then decide what to talk about to which they will say "maybe I should be more interested in <what you said>." That's the extent of the game's script, there's no humour, none of the girls have a personality, there's literally nothing. I played it seriously for about three minutes before I was bored and just hit A to every choice until I died. Not in the game, I actually died. There's only one reason people would buy this, and to prevent that, here is a link to a Google image search for the word "girl."

Unplugged is sort of infuriating, but not how you'd think. You're in a sink and have to stop enemies getting to the plughole in the middle and avoiding it yourself. It's one of the ugliest games on the service, and you play the first level and it's just a shit twin-stick. In my head I was typing "shit twin-stick" and leaving it at that. Then you get to the next level and the water rotates quicker, and all of a sudden your bullets start spraying around wildly taking the flow of water into account, and you really have to give some thought to where you're shooting. The effect of the bullets is pretty excellent, yet the rest of the game is so horrible looking, and the first level is so plain, that most people won't even get that far. Infuriating, because it's better than it lets on.

Go Avatar Go. Auto-runner. Press A to jump or stop or various other things, probably. When you only have to program your game to use one button, you'd expect that button to work a bit more often when you pressed it. Poor responsiveness, poor collision detection, slow, not good.

Dragon Chess, I can't really talk about. I know how to play chess but I don't know how to play chess well, and so I don't know what the AI is like or anything. It looks OK if you want your chess to be dragon-y, and controls are as you'd expect them. What I will say is that the dragon chess mode with extra squares and extra pieces is a horrible idea, it's a real board game I believe. It seems kind of pointless when chess is so balanced, it hasn't stayed the same for so long for nothing. Anyway, good at chess? What did you think?

Leave Home cut its price to 80 points, got it yet? You should have.
 

Persona7

Banned
Fuck yeah pocoro. Platformance is also really nice.
+1 for ladybird galaxy as well

Keep up the good work OP, very informative.


I like the indie games service because when I get bored of playing retail and XBLA games on a slow sunday or something I can just hop on the service and buy a few cool games for a low price and get instant gratification without paying too much or getting too involved in the gameplay with a simple game.


Also, everyone should check out "Being" if you are looking for a neat platforming title. It is only a buck.

xboxboxart.jpg


http://marketplace.xbox.com/en-US/games/media/66acd000-77fe-1000-9115-d802585500f9/
 

qupe1975

Neo Member
Leave Home is now only 80pts. People need to buy this game.

Reading an interview with the developers of Platformance the next part of Platformance will have leaderboards.

Question: Was there anything you were hoping to get into Platformance that did not make it?

To reinforce the challenge factor of the game we wanted to integrate a global peer-to-peer leaderboard. But it was a "dangerous" feature to include at the time and we decided to leave it for the next installment of Platformance.

The interview is here: http://xblaratings.com/developer-qaa/2846-platformance-developer-interview

Also try Echoes+ cracking game.
 

Gowans

Member
Nobody hooked you up with a creators club membership yet Toy? you'd make a great Peer Reviewer

Gona bite on that Leave Home price drop.
 
Gowans007 said:
Nobody hooked you up with a creators club membership yet Toy? you'd make a great Peer Reviewer
Yeah, I really should have bought one of those by now! And for the future when I create my MASTERPIECE*

I'll probably get one as soon as I've got the disposable income to sort one out, tbh.

(*there's to be no masterpiece)
 

GDJustin

stuck my tongue deep inside Atlus' cookies
Great topic. My only request is that the OP should link to the previous versions of this topic (there was a July one, right?).
 

Kafel

Banned
GDJustin said:
Great topic. My only request is that the OP should link to the previous versions of this topic (there was a July one, right?).

at the end of the second post
 
qupe1975 said:
A Sequel =)
Rats, was sort of hoping for both!

Satellite Eagle is a shoot-em-up. GIMMICK: the right stick launches a satellite which you can rotate around your ship and use to destroy enemies/enemy fire. Enemies are colour coded and you press the face buttons to change the colour of the satellite to do varying levels of damage to enemies. That's what I did the first time, and I died fairly quickly. Then I noticed that there was a "fire" button and I suddenly ignored the gimmick and it turned into another dull shoot-em-up. There's a tiny amount of potential there though, using the satellite to shield yourself from bullets and the guns to attack, if you really want to get into it. Which is more than can be said for most of these games.

Battle-SX. Right. I'll throw this out there straight off - I'm terrible at beat-em-ups, can't play them, never been able to, never shown any signs of improvement. I'm sure I'm better than this game makes me feel, though. I've played it four times, and am still yet to land a single hit, or at least a single hit that does much in the way of damage. First, I ran in and punched and kicked and the AI blocked literally everything, and the second I let up launched into a barrage of blows that killed me. I tried again and the AI attacked at the same time I did, my hits did nothing, AI - barrage of blows killed me. So, I tried blocking. In response to this, the AI attacked me so relentlessly that there was no opportunity whatsoever to let my guard down and counter, and the second I got bored and did so the AI continued to just rain down blows on me which I could do nothing about. And killed me. Please, someone play this game and tell me if it's even remotely playable or whether it's genuinely impossible.
 
toythatkills said:
Battle-SX. Right. I'll throw this out there straight off - I'm terrible at beat-em-ups, can't play them, never been able to, never shown any signs of improvement. I'm sure I'm better than this game makes me feel, though. I've played it four times, and am still yet to land a single hit, or at least a single hit that does much in the way of damage. First, I ran in and punched and kicked and the AI blocked literally everything, and the second I let up launched into a barrage of blows that killed me. I tried again and the AI attacked at the same time I did, my hits did nothing, AI - barrage of blows killed me. So, I tried blocking. In response to this, the AI attacked me so relentlessly that there was no opportunity whatsoever to let my guard down and counter, and the second I got bored and did so the AI continued to just rain down blows on me which I could do nothing about. And killed me. Please, someone play this game and tell me if it's even remotely playable or whether it's genuinely impossible.

It's a mess, although I was able to beat the AI I certainly would not call it playable. Seems like the dev tried combining multiple ideas from various games, but ultimately fails because it's such a bad patch job. So many problems, I couldn't even tell where I was running to because the camera was way too zoomed in that sometimes I would disappear off screen.
 

Gowans

Member
toythatkills said:
Yeah, I really should have bought one of those by now! And for the future when I create my MASTERPIECE*

I'll probably get one as soon as I've got the disposable income to sort one out, tbh.

(*there's to be no masterpiece)
Might be worth asking the indie community guys to throw you one, for the work you put in it's deserved.
 
jam86 said:
It's a mess, although I was able to beat the AI I certainly would not call it playable. Seems like the dev tried combining multiple ideas from various games, but ultimately fails because it's such a bad patch job. So many problems, I couldn't even tell where I was running to because the camera was way too zoomed in that sometimes I would disappear off screen.
How did ya do it! HOW!

Gowans007 said:
Might be worth asking the indie community guys to throw you one, for the work you put in it's deserved.
Seems a bit cheeky really, all I do is play games!

Anyone know why Lumi's just been patched?
 
I've played BioHack twice already and still don't get it. My gut is telling me that there's an awesome puzzle game here but it's so confusing, I need to play all the tutorial levels at least twice more I think, just so that I can really work out what's having an effect on what. At the moment, I have no idea why the things I do affect the game in the way they do. More impressions later though, when I understand it, because like I say, there's a pretty good chance it's excellent. Just be prepared to trial it in excess of five times!

There's not much chance of NoEnd being excellent. It's obscenely similar to The Impossible Game but it doesn't feel nearly as nice to play, and certainly doesn't look as nice. I like the level based nature of it, but that doesn't change the fact that The Impossible Game is still 100x times better than anything that's tried to clone it.

Protect Zoey from the Zombies, you've read the title, so whaddya think? Is the game going to be good or bad? You went for bad, didn't you? CORRECTAMUNDO! Horrendously animated zombies walk towards you at the top, middle or bottom of the screen and you shoot them really slowly, and upgrade weapons by spending the cash you earnt. The structure is nice, but there's little in the way of actual gameplay.
 
A quick post because there's three really good games to try, there's loads of not-good games I'll write about later!

HadesGigas said:
Star Crisis is out. 8-bit styled horizontal shooter from the developer of Aesop's Garden
Seems like a good place to start. You're given missions to complete, the first being to board a ship. You then take part in a horizontal shmup type game to get there. You can fire with the right trigger and thrust with the left, which you need to do because the game takes gravity into account, if you don't thrust you'll just fall to the bottom of the level and won't hit anything. There are power-ups and stuff to collect, points to rack up though I didn't play enough to work out if there was any nice combo mechanic or anything. Much like Aesop's Garden, it has an awesome style and brilliant music which is still buzzing round my head now, it's fun stuff.

MILITARY SNIPER-SIM 3.18 is a sniping game, you're given targets and you have to hit them. What makes this awesome is how in depth it gets, and its logbook. First, you take a shot under normal conditions, but even then you have to take into account your breathing and trigger action. Then you can change stuff up, the wind, the temperature, the target distance and each of these affect the path of the bullet. When you get a successful hit it's noted in your logbook and you can then use the settings you found out to adjust your rifle and make sure next time your shot is perfect. Practice practice practice and fill in the logbook, and you can take on a ten shot challenge and see how well you can score. The first sniping game on XBLIGs that's been done really well, and genuinely has a snipey kind of feel to it.

Breeze is, I don't know what genre, platformer? You have to blow a daisy through a level to a target by rotating a fan around it and then using the right trigger to adjust the speed of the fan, being careful not to hit the daisy, or blow the daisy into any obstacles or walls. It controls perfectly and the gravity/fan physics feel spot on. The best bit is the dev times, which are very difficult to beat but if you manage it, you get a gold star (and a round of applause). There are sixty levels, it looks lovely, it sounds beeeeautiful, and with the dev times to beat you'll be playing for ages.

All excellent games, go try!
 
"Doc Logic" ft music by "8 Bit Weapon"

Doc+Logic+2.png


Check out the press release/trailer for our upcoming Xbox Live Indie Game:

Kelowna, British Columbia -

Cosmic Logic Inc. is proud to officially announce details on their upcoming release: "Doc Logic" featuring the music of indie sensation "8 Bit Weapon."

"Doc Logic" is an arcade-style platformer with an emphasis on explosive action and survival. Doc blasts across the screen with upgradeable weapons and abilities through expanding levels of increased difficulty that will challenge and engage the true gamer in you. Unique level designs combined with increasing enemy difficulty makes "Doc Logic" an intense sci-fi adventure. Do what you can to keep the clock running as you collect points, destroy enemies, and collect time bonuses.

"Doc Logic" features a collaboration with indie music sensation "8 Bit Weapon" that heightens the gaming experience to new levels. "8 Bit Weapon" is Seth & Michelle. Inspired by classic video game soundtracks and electronic music from the arcade era, "8 Bit Weapon" delivers a sound that is as unique as it is original.

"Doc Logic" will be available on Xbox Live Indie Games and PC in 2010. PC Demo coming soon.

Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYi21mVE5Kk
Screenshots: http://cosmicblogic.blogspot.com/2010/08/blog-post.html
Cover art: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_y_lPYGaUV1...+Cover+Art.jpg
 
OldmanAndroid said:
"Doc Logic" ft music by "8 Bit Weapon"

"Doc Logic" is an arcade-style platformer with an emphasis on explosive action and survival. Doc blasts across the screen with upgradeable weapons and abilities through expanding levels of increased difficulty that will challenge and engage the true gamer in you. Unique level designs combined with increasing enemy difficulty makes "Doc Logic" an intense sci-fi adventure. Do what you can to keep the clock running as you collect points, destroy enemies, and collect time bonuses.
Looks excellent, and will sound excellent with them doing the music! They did music for Cubed Rally Racer on iPhone, didn't they?

jetpacks was yes said:
Would it be inappropriate to discuss in-development projects here? Since the other general XNA thread was closed.
Nope, go for it, we love that stuff :D
 
Clover: A Curious Tale is out. Fully voice acted remake of last years Indie Game release Clover.

If you hold off on buying it until this weekend, some of the money goes to charity. Which might take some sting out of paying $5 again if you already own the original. (Though the PC release costs $10 anyway, so you get two versions for that price on Xbox.)

At long last Clover: A Curious Tale has returned home to Xbox LIVE Indie Games. What's even better than that though is the fact that this weekend all proceeds will be donated to War Child.

If you buy the game on Xbox LIVE on the 21st or 22nd August, Binary Tweed and Blitz 1UP will be waiving their royalties and instead giving them straight to charity. Please remember that the offer only applies to this weekend, and only the XBLIG version.

The good peeps at Microsoft did try very hard to organise Microsoft waiving its 30% cut, but unfortunately changes in a huge organisation take a lot of time to effect.

For those unfamiliar Clover: A Curious Tale, it's the new an improved version of Clover that was co-developed by Blitz 1UP, and has a ton of new features.

It's now fully voice-acted. There's 50% more puzzles, and even the ones that were in the original have changed. Everything's been made to look prettier, from the menus and dialogue screens to the all-new character animations. The whole soundtrack was re-recorded.

There's three new endings as part of a playable epilogue. There's a side quest. There's even a secret clue about a hidden truth in the plot, that's so incredibly secret and subtle no-one's figured it out yet - not even all the PC players that have had the game since March!

So, if you don't buy a copy this weekend, not only are you a mug for depriving yourself of a great game, but you also hate war-afflicted children. Could you really live with yourself if you didn't buy it?
http://www.binarytweed.com/
 
So what is the clover game that has just appeared on the market place? A sequel or an updated version of the game?

Edit: lol, question answered! ^
 
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