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XBox (Games)

360 Live Arcade Details Out 50

Posted by Zonk from the old-skool-flava-with-a-new-skool-twist dept.
Edge Online has a short piece on Xbox VP Peter Moore's announcement of the Live Arcade's full potential. Gamespot has a list of the planned titles, which is thoroughly impressive, including hits like Bejeweled 2, SmashTV, and Wik:Fable of Souls. From the Edge article: "Amongst the 40-odd developers slated for further Live Arcade development are Namco, SEGA, Konami, Capcom, SNK Playmore and Hudson Soft providing a selection of their retro titles, as well as the usual lineup of casual PC game producers like Wild Tangent, PopCap, and GarageGames, but the two most unexpected additions to the list are Mizuguchi's upstart Q Entertainment and AntiGrav/Guitar Hero developers Harmonix."
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360 Live Arcade Details Out More

360 Live Arcade Details Out

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  • WildTangent (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dbhankins ( 688931 ) on Monday October 17, 2005 @07:46PM (#13813126)
    While their games appear to be of good quality and they had some nifty screensavers, the WildTangent package is also a spyware/adware enabler. I had it at one time, and eventually (regretfully) removed it because of the spyware/adware aspects.

    If this is one of the vendors that Microsoft is allowing into their XBox Live Arcade program, then I will have to think twice before signing up for it.

    Bad enough to have that sort of thing on a PC where with sufficient care it can be removed. I fear that once it's on the XBox360's HD it'll be collecting all sorts of data on my buying and playing habits, and I'll never be able to get it off.
    • The XBox is a very closed environment. It is unlikely that Microsoft would sign games that affect the functionality of their product. It is in their best interest that your system continues to function, so that you can buy more games.
      • Who cares? The fact that they support companies like that is disgusting.
      • I worked for WildTangent until I was drummed out the door in 2001. The product always "called home" for updates (something the core of the company was 50/50 on) and if you joined the game channel it would stream in games and adds that were in-game (like on billboards of a race game, etc). To my knowledge that has not changed, even though Spybot picks it up as Spyware. I does call home though, which always annoyed the security sensitive folks (and rightfully so).

        Now it has been 4 years, so they may hav
    • How would that possibly even work? When you run PGR3 or DOA4 or whatever it takes total control of the console. It's not like a PC where you can have something running in the background. The game will monopolize the processor. It's possible this isn't true for Xbox Arcade games, but is there any kind of valuable info even available? And that is assuming MS even allows this info to get back to WildTangent, since it would be running on MS' servers.

  • Indie devs (Score:5, Interesting)

    by amliebsch ( 724858 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2005 @01:09AM (#13814614) Journal
    I'm surprised nobody else has mentioned what a boon this could be to indie developers, who might come up with some great original gameplay but not have millions of dollars to produce a full-blown game release. The ability to get some simpler yet fun independent games via XBL, if utilized, could be a great feature.
    • Jeff tunnel (one of the founders of garagegames) talked about this the other day. He is working on a system to "pair up" people who need assistance developing games within the GG community (eg: programmers who need art, and vice versa). Also, gg has said that if your game is good enough, they'll work on getting it onto xbox and XBL. I really dont see how there could be a better way in the industry to get your indie game on a console.

      • Also, [a GarageGames representative] has said that if your game is good enough, they'll work on getting it onto xbox and XBL.

        Is this publishing/promotion service available for all games developed by independent PC game developers, or just for games using the Torque family of game engines?

        • If i recall correctly, torque products are recomended. Their reasoning was, if it was a 3rd party lib/engine, it would be quite difficult to have GG get the code ready for xblarcade. Check out jeff tunnells latest plan over at garagegames.com for more information
  • Many of those games require a mouse to be played properly (for example, Wik does). Will Microsoft make an official one for the X360 or will we be stuck using an analog stick to slowly push a cursor around?

    Also, isn't going after casual/non gamers with a "complicated" control scheme like that rather stupid? Would your mom or dad (whoever is the casual gamer) rather play a game with a mouse where he/she just needs to point and click or with a gamepad (or that remote MS is offering) with more sticks and button
    • My mom and dad both play guildwars almost nightly, I don't think they would have a problem with the control scheme of that game.

      Likely all the games that go on XB360 Live arcade will have to be adjusted for use with the gamepad.
  • Dearest Mircosoft, While many soccer moms are probably happy at your addition of bejeweled to 360 live, could we please get some classic street fighter 2, mortal kombat 1 and 2, killer instinct, etc games on there that have VS mode online? Thanks. I'm sure I can pick up super hyper street fighter vs Snk vs your mother, but I'd really like to just play good old SF with some friends online.
  • It would be nice to play at least one game on Xbox Live that doesn't require twitch reflexes and dealing with 14-year-olds screaming "PWNED!!!!"

    Heck even chess, checkers, Monopoly, etc. would be an improvement over nothing.

    -Eric

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