Features Archive

2011 was a standout year on XBLA, we saw a cavalcade of amazing games released throughout the year. Many of the more memorable games were entirely new franchises, with impressive debuts like Bastion, Iron Brigade and Orcs Must Die! to name a few. With such high quality and seemingly successful new IP’s (Intellectual Properties) we were curious about the spread of new versus established IP.

We broke down the games into three categories, Ports & Remakes, these being any game that was specifically ported to XBLA (or just consoles in general). So that includes stuff like Bejeweled 3 and Sonic CD. Then there’s New IP; this is pretty self explanatory, it’s anything that isn’t a sequel or based on a previously established franchise or brand. Thirdly is Established IP which includes any sequels or licensed games. Unsurprisingly this was the largest category, with 51 games fitting the criteria. New IP came second with 30 games and Ports/Remakes only applied to 12 of the releases.

It’s often said that publishers are reluctant to take risks on new IP’s and as such will stick to tried and true formulas as those prove more popular. Sadly there aren’t reliable sales numbers for XBLA releases so we can’t compare those to see if this is true. We can however look at the average Metacritic score of our three specific categories.

Ports & Remakes have the highest average with 77, perhaps not surprising as the main reason many of these games that are ported or remade is because they’re already well regarded or popular. New IP is next with an average metascore of 69, not a score to be sniffed at. Bringing up the rear is Established IP with 64, which while not terrible is a tad disappointing in light of the other two.

What we see here is that remakes and ports seem to be well regarded for the most part, again this isn’t too surprising because they are usually ported or remade for a reason. If these games were good to begin with and the transfer to XBLA is solid then it’s hard for anyone to dock them for not doing anything different.

69 is a pretty reasonable score for New IPs we feel. When compared to the 64 for what are most licensed games in Established IP it does seem to indicate the risk is about the same. Of course it’s understandable that publishers (and even developers sometimes) would rather go with the safe bets, looking at these numbers it’s hard to see it as that big of a risk. And if downloadable platforms aren’t the best place to experiment then we don’t know where is.

We would love to see publishers and developers change these numbers, while some licensed games, remakes and the like can be a lot of fun and on XBLA especially are of a high quality. It’d be nice to see more New IPs bringing interesting and unique ideas with them. If it’s a choice between a beautiful, lovingly crafted and unique experience like Bastion and a disappointing, derivative and dull game like Dungeons & Dragons: Daggerdale, we know which we’d choose.

Continue to: Looking at XBLA Sales

Return to: XBLA in Review 2011

Is Summer of Arcade Worth the Hype?

Believe it or not, we have been paying more money each year for lower average metascores. If that is the case, why does Summer of Arcade remain such a big deal for gamers? It wasn’t even mentioned at this year’s E3 Microsoft Press Conference, it was mentioned almost off handily in an interview beforehand. Is Summer of Arcade starting to diminish? Is it truly worth the hype?

[Editor’s note: while this piece frequently references Metacritic, we do not believe review scores should be treated as the end all be all of a games worth. XBLA Fans does not score games. We use a buy, try, skip system. However, as much of the rest of the industry, gamers, developers, publishers and some press still place a large weight on MC scores we can’t ignore them.]

Back in 2008, Microsoft underwent a promotion entitled Summer of Arcade. Back then, anyone who bought all five games, consisting of Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2, Braid, Bionic Commando Rearmed, Galaga Legions and Castles Crashers, would be entered in to win a grand prize of 100,000 Microsoft Points, a 12 Month Xbox Live Subscription and an Xbox 360 Elite Console. The following years would not need the same enticement as without question; it’s clear the first Summer of Arcade set a high bar for preceding years as it included the current XBLA sales leader (Castle Crashers) and Metacritic score leader (Braid).

This was followed up with the 2009 Summer of Arcade consisting of ‘Splosion Man, Marvel vs. Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in Time Re-Shelled, Trials HD, and Shadow Complex. At the time, fans had been clamoring for a re-release of Marvel vs. Capcom for quite some time. And ‘Splosion Man and Trials HD became huge success stories that have both spawned sequels. But Shadow Complex arguably stole the show as it pushed the boundaries on what people believed was possible for an XBLA game.

But 2010 set a new benchmark, it was the first year all five titles, Limbo, Hydro Thunder Hurricane, Castlevania: Harmony of Despair, Monday Night Combat, and Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, launched at a 1200 point price tag. It’s hard to argue the price increase was unwarranted as games have been increasing in size scope over the years. Limbo was the true highlight breaking into the 90’s on Metacritic.

We debated back and forth for months internally about what games we felt would make 2011’s Summer of Arcade list. The resulting titles were very diverse: Toy Soldiers: Cold War (sequel to the highly popular hybrid tower defense title), Fruit Ninja Kinect (popular iOS game and the first Kinect XBLA game), Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet (a Metroidvania title from the The Iron Giant’s Michel Gagne), From Dust (return of Eric Chahi), and Bastion (a captivating world by an indie darling). In the end, we were entirely pleased by the results. All five titles shined with four of the five placing on the top ten selling titles for the year.

Ironically enough, if you crunch the numbers 2008 was by far and away the best year for XBLA Fans. The Average Metacritic score was 84.8 (the highest), and the average price was 960 (the lowest). The following year has the second best numbers with 80 and 1040 respectively. Again the third year, saw a decrease in Metacritic Scores (79.2) and an increase in price (1200). This past year saw another decrease in score (78.8) but also saw a decrease in price (1120). In 2008 we paid an average 11.329 Microsoft Points for each Point of Metacritic Score earned by the Summer of Arcade titles, while in 2011 we paid an average 14.165 Microsoft Points for each Point of Metacritic Score by Summer of Arcade titles.

So if Summer of Arcade is arguably on the decline why do we care so much about it? We can tell you first hand there is a reason that almost every XBLA developer will tell you they are aiming for summer for their release window. Many of them are hoping to work their way into the Summer of Arcade promotion. It receives an unparalleled amount of promotion, both by Microsoft and by Press. Just looking toward Metacritic will prove this yet again. Bastion received 79 reviews on Metacritic and From Dust received 76 whereas few games outside of this promotion will even encroach on 50.

If you want to be noticed by both press and gamers who traditionally ignore XBLA titles, Summer of Arcade is your ticket. And in the end, what everyone is looking for is sales. Trials HD and Castle Crashers chronically sell at the top of every XBLA sales chart. And every year a new group of games are trying to break into that territory.

Continue to: Taking Risks (New IP, Established or ported)

Return to: XBLA in Review 2011

It’s a sentiment we here at XBLA Fans hear often:, “1200 is the new standard”. Everyone seems to think that XBLA pricing has increased over time, It appears to be a fairly accepted idea so there must be some truth to it, right? We took it upon ourselves to do some research to find out if it actually is the case or just a case of a shared perception becoming accepted as fact.

We looked at the pricing for all of the Xbox Live Arcade games released over the past three years. We wanted to know if 1200 really has become the standard, and if it hasn’t why does that appear to be the perception?

In 2009 there were a total of 91 games released, of those only 18 were priced at 1200 Microsoft Points. It is also worth noting this year saw the only example of 1600 point releases, of which there were four in total. In fact of the three years we are looking at here, 2009 has the biggest range of pricing. There were also 14 at 400 and 56 at 800.

In 2010 we saw 86 new XBLA games hit the marketplace and of those a total of 28 were 1200 points. This seems like a big increase from the previous year but when you consider 2010 lacked any 1600 points and less games overall were released, then the increase doesn’t seem as large. This is also the year we saw some free games released on the marketplace, three in total. The number of 800 and 400 point games did fail though with only 50 and 9 respectively.

2011 saw the most 1200 point games released but the increase was fairly small, jumping up to 29. It’s worth noting the number of games at 800 also saw an increase with 59 being released. Comparing these numbers we can see the average price has increased over time but not by a huge extent. 1200 is certainly far from the new standard price, if anything that’s 800, now more than ever.

We’d speculate that the reason everyone thinks 1200 is the new standard is because these bigger, or rather more hyped, titles tend to carry that premium price. The last couple of years of Summer of Arcade has largely been made up of 1200 point games. As such that’s the price point that has become expected when we see an especially ambitious or high production value game come out. In some cases it can even have the opposite effect, we recently saw AMY release with a 800 point price tag. When that price was announced it caused a little skepticism as AMY (in previews at least) seemed like it was a game that fit the premium price tag.

While it’s easy to bemoan the creeping price increase it’s hard to argue the games coming out aren’t worth it. One just has to look over our recent Game of the year awards to see the quality of games coming out on XBLA. It’s no coincidence that many of the games we highlighted launched at the 1200 MSP price point.

As an example we averaged up the Metacritic scores for the games in each price range. The results show that 1200 point games are generally the most critically acclaimed, averaging at around 75. The 800 and 400 point games averages are respectable but closer to the middle of the scale with 63.8 and 66 respectively. While this is by no means a definitive indication that 1200 point games are better, it is certainly suggests they are much more highly regarded.

It seems the perception of the 1200 point standard has grown because it is associated with the biggest and best releases. The prices are increasing because the quality of games on XBLA is increasing and that can only be a good thing.

Continue to:  Is Summer of Arcade Worth the Hype?

Return to: XBLA in Review 2011

Waiting on a deal

The common perception is that Xbox Live Arcade titles rarely go on sale, but our research shows this is anything but the case. In 2011, the Xbox Live Arcade had 93 games released on the service, of which 44 went on sale. If you take into account the average days before initial sale (about 158 days), only 60 of the 93 titles had either gone on sale or were given the proper amount of time to go on sale. With that statistic in mind, the data shows that 44 of an available 60 games went on sale during their initial launch year. This figure represents a remarkable sale percentage of 73%. This would mean that roughly three out of every four games received a discount during their initial launch year when given the appropriate amount of time. This blows the notion that XBLA titles don’t go on sale completely out of the water.

We found that certain games went on sale one time for one day only. If you don’t turn on your Xbox every day it’s easy to miss one of your most wanted games on sale. These one day sales tend to help the misconception that XBLA titles do not receive sales. Being diligent and alert will help you get the games you want most, at a discounted price.

Genre breakdown

When we set out to group the releases by genre, most were self explanatory. Genres such as Fighting, Shooter, and Role-Playing were all comprised with specific attributes that all gamers could relate to. Certain concessions were needed when grouping other genres to be able to present the data properly. We grouped Puzzle and Word games into a single category, which included titles such as Apples to Apples, Crazy Machine Elements, and ilomilo. Action Arcade, our largest category, consisted of titles such as Ms. Splosion Man, Trine 2, and Islands of Wakfu.

The 2011 Xbox Live Arcade releases spanned 12 genres with only one particular genre having ample offerings. Over 43% of all XBLA releases in 2011 were from the Action Arcade genre, which had 40 releases. The Shooter genre held the second highest release percentage with 12% represented by 11 releases. The last 10 genres make up the remaining 46% in 2-8% increments.

Only two genres, Sports and Console Classics, did not receive a single mark down in 2011. Alternatively, Role-Playing games were the only genre where all three of its 2011 releases went on sale.

The average Metacritic scores across each of the genres ranged between 62 and 76, with the Fighting game genre the only outlier at an average of only 48. With only two releases, the Card and Board genre fared the best with a 76 average Metacritic score. Though Sports and Console Classics did not receive a single sale in 2011, they each posted decent average Metacritic scores of 73 and 74 respectively. Role-Playing games, which had all its releases go on sale, received an average Metacritic score of 72. The data seems to indicated that the genre and score do not have a correlation to the game receiving a sale.

Return to: XBLA in Review 2011