Autumn Games Archive

The long-delayed Skullgirls patch that originally arrived on the PlayStation Network way back on November 20 of last year should finally be available on Xbox Live Arcade within the next two weeks, Lab Zero Games has informed XBLAFans. Lab Zero has been working on getting the “Slightly Different” patch onto XBLA for months, but its enormous original size (590 MB) thwarted the developer’s previous efforts to release it.

“So, if all goes well, the Skullgirls Xbox 360 patch should finally be out soon,” Lab Zero CEO Peter Bartholow said via email. “We won’t know exactly when it goes out – [Microsoft says] it’ll take two weeks, but [Microsoft] actually estimated that it would likely only take one.”

The patch is currently going through Microsoft’s certification process and cannot release unless it successfully passes. “But we don’t expect it to fail,” said Bartholow in response to a follow-up email from XBLA Fans. XBLA gamers’ prolonged wait for the patch should be over once it is finally certified. “As soon as it passes certification it will be pushed out,” Bartholow asserted.

Continue reading “Skullgirls ‘Slightly Different’ patch likely hitting XBLA within two weeks” »

Lab Zero Games, the caretakers of XBLA and PSN fighting game Skullgirls, last week reached a couple more stretch goals in its Indiegogo DLC crowdfunding campaign. Newly pledged funds will go towards the creation of the game’s first male character, Big Band, along with a stage and story mode for the saxophone lung-implanted veteran of the “Grand War.”

The man with the musical respiratory system’s story mode will focus on “a grizzled veteran tackling a new threat.” His stage will come complete with a new track from Michiru Yamane.

As of this writing, $449,504 have been pledged by Skullgirls fans. That number puts the campaign on pace to eclipse what was originally the final stretch goal of $625,000, which would mean Lab Zero would create a level and story mode for a fan-voted mystery character. The mystery character will be bankrolled at the $600,000 mark.

That mystery stage and story mode is no longer the final stretch goal, however. Polygon reports that, in an interesting move, Lab Zero is now offering to donate usage of the game engine it created for Skullgirls to developer Mane6 for use in its Fighting Is Magic game. Magic was originally a My Little Pony-themed game until IP owner Hasbro stepped in and put the kibosh on Mane6’s usage of the license.

Continue reading “Skullgirls to get the (Big) Band back together” »

Update: In the brief span of time since this article was published, Lab Zero Games was able to raise another $25,000, meaning it has hit its first stretch goal: Squigly will now get her own stage and story mode. Original story follows.

Lab Zero Games was hoping to reach its goal in 30 days. Some thought the notion of raising $150,000 for a DLC character for XBLA, PSN and PC fighting game Skullgirls would be “impossible.” As it turns out, it was — just not in the way many onlookers were thinking.

It didn’t take Lab Zero 30 days to raise the funds it requires to finish designing the character Squigly and get her into its game. It didn’t even take 30 hours. In less than a day, the independent studio that last year was sculpted out of some bits of clay that fell from Reverge Labs was able to raise the full $150,000 it says it requires to bring Squigly to gamers.

“In less than 24 hours, #Skullgirls has raised $150k for Squigly!” reads a tweet that went out this morning from the official Skullgirls account. “Everyone at Lab Zero is humbled. Thank you so much!”

Shortly thereafter, Lab Zero Games CEO Peter Bartholow provided XBLAFans with details on the character’s XBLA release. First, a title update and mandatory DLC pack that will add Squigly — along with any stretch items that the Indiegogo campaign is able to hit — will be released. An initially free-of-charge Squigly unlock will be released simultaneously. Squigly will remain free for a 3-month period and will set gamers back $5 from that point forward.

Continue reading “Skullgirls hits Squigly DLC crowdfunding goal in under 24 hours” »

Update: Lab Zero has informed XBLA Fans that the studio has been working with Microsoft and has successfully shrunken down the size of the update some, though they declined to go into specifics about the current size of the update. Look for a full follow-up article coming soon. Original story below.

Lab Zero Games, the studio now responsible for all things Skullgirls following publisher Autumn Games and original developer Reverge Labs parting ways last summer, still hasn’t been able to get the patch that released for the PSN version of its fighting game in November onto the Xbox Live Marketplace. The holdup, apparently, is Microsoft’s XBLA update file size limit.

A tweet from the official Japanese Skullgirls Twitter account went out on Friday claiming that the update is exponentially larger than what Microsoft will allow. The update Lab Zero put together for its fighting game is roughly 590 MB in size — a whopping 147.5 times the size of the paltry 4 MB limit the developer says Microsoft places on updates. A rough Google translation showed that the Skullgirls team is under the impression that it’s possible to be granted an exception, but the process is arduous.

The revelatory tweet came on the same day that the main Skullgirls Twitter account stated that the team was “frustrated.” It’s not clear whether its frustrations are directed at Microsoft size limits or the two sides’ inabilities to get something worked out, but XBLAFans has followed up in an attempt to find out exactly what the team is unsated with and will update this story if we get a response.

Regardless of where the developer’s frustrations lie, Lab Zero Games is working with Microsoft to get the patch out “as soon as possible,” so there is still hope that it will make its way to XBLA. Skullgirls fans might not want to get their hopes up too high for it to appear anytime soon. The patch has been “held up in MS submission and holiday limbo” since as far back as December 12, according to an earlier tweet by the game’s official account. Though the team was said to be “pushing hard” later that very week, the calendar is nearing an entire month later and it sounds as if little, if any, progress has been made.

Continue reading “Microsoft holding up Skullgirls XBLA patch due to size restrictions *updated*” »