Today XBLA hit an important milestone thanks to two special Friday releases, Fireburst and Storm. These new titles have boosted the XBLA library to a total of 600 games. The image above shows every game to release on the platform from the beginning. What’s more amazing is that only a year ago the 500 game milestone was hit, when Virtua Fighter 5 Final Showdown and Bang Bang Racing released June 6, 2012.
Big thanks to @Lifelower for telling us about this great milestone.
I’m terrible at fighting games, but it’s hard to deny the brilliance of Killer Instinct with many of my colleagues and friends already swept away in the hype. XBLA Fans will be diving into the game later this week from a writer with a much better pedigree to do so; however, something needs to be cleared up. The pricing model for Killer Instinct is a brilliant test case, and one we hope succeeds.
Xbox Live Arcade multiplayer games suffer from a severe flavor of the month syndrome, with notable exceptions such as Minecraft, games often end up losing their player bases fairly early into their life-cycle. Titles such as last year’s Hybrid, a Summer of Arcade title, showed glimmers of brilliance but saw their player bases eradicated by fall juggernauts. Matchingmaking becomes a barren wasteland devaluing the experience for everyone. Microsoft is side stepping the potential for this by giving multiple pricing options.
Players will be able to play the game for free with Jago with full online functionality. This is the trial or demo mode of this game. From here players will be able to purchase individual characters or a pack similar to a season pass that will unlock everyone. Pricing has not fully been decided, but as long it is fair this structure seems like it could alleviate the frequent premature aging process for an XBLA title.
This isn’t meant to be free to play in the traditional sense, but instead a way to assure the player base continues for years to come beyond just a core group of die-hard fans. It’s an experiment and it’s one we hope works.
Xbox Live Arcade is a dead platform downloading. Microsoft’s designated home for small and inexpensive downloadable video games will not make the jump to the next generation. When the Xbox One releases later this year, all of its video games will live in the same space. The nearly nine-years-old Xbox Live Arcade might continue to exist on the Xbox 360 and slowly fade away during the transitional year(s), or Microsoft might quickly yank it like a Band-Aid through a dashboard update. In either case, XBLA has been read its last rights.
One day soon, gamers everywhere will turn on their Xboxes and find all available games under an aptly named Games section of the dashboard. It’s tempting to read this move as another case of Microsoft pushing independent developers farther away from the green glow of the Xbox spotlight. It’s tempting to assume that the new dashboard will shine that light even brighter on big-budget game releases and multimedia options, and that may well end up being the case. However, some indies, believe it or not, actually enjoy working with Microsoft. Additionally, Microsoft’s Phil Spencer told Eurogamer that he feels the new layout, which includes a recommendation system, will “solve fantastically some of the challenges that independent developers face, particularly around discovery and connecting their game to an audience, by some of the platform features we have in the machine itself.”
We’ll have to check back in a few years into the Xbox One’s life to verify whether or not Spencer spoke truly — but no one wants to wait that long. So here and now, what does the elimination of Xbox Live Arcade mean? Will it continue the Flight of the Indies? Or will it better a system that obviously has more than a few kinks and bring back the downtrodden and departed?
Those hoping the Xbox One will provide a more open platform for independent games studios, such as the teams behind XBLA hits like Fez, Super Meat Boy and Limbo, may be disappointed to hear that indie developers will still need to find a publisher in order to release their games onto Microsoft’s next gen console. Instead, they must get a publishing deal either with Microsoft Game Studios or with a third-party partner. In contrast, Sony has already promised indie developers that they will be able to self-publish on the PS4. The news also follows on from recent revelations that there will be no XBLA or Indie sections on the new Xbox One dashboard, instead all releases will be grouped under a simple Games tab. All eyes will be on Microsoft’s E3 conference to see what this means for the future of XBLA and Xbox Indie Games.
Source: Shack News via Kotaku
Thanks to our friends at Kalypso Media and Reverb Publishing, we have another great console prize package to give away. As listed above, we are giving out the custom 250 GB Alien Spidy Xbox 360 and more! We were very excited to get a hold of this prize package, but we’re not keeping it for ourselves. One lucky site reader will be gaming on this console very soon! All you need to do to enter this contest is answer the following question in the comment section below:
The long-rumored death of Microsoft Points is just around the corner, according to The Verge’s sources. Recently, Microsoft has been slowly transitioning away from points across its various stores. While XBLA games can only be purchased with points, the Games on Demand platform uses real-world currency in addition to points. When Windows 8 launched, app, music and movie purchases defaulted to real world cash pricing.
The Verge’s sources report that Microsoft may unveil the new payment standard as early as E3 (Microsoft’s pre-E3 media briefing is scheduled for June 10), and a full launch is expected by the end of the year to coincide with the release of the next-gen Xbox. The gift cards will reportedly function like iTunes gift cards many people are already familiar with, and credit and debit cards will also be accepted. The new pricing/purchasing system will supposedly span across Microsoft’s various marketplaces: Xbox, Windows Mobile Store and Windows Store.
Going to a real currency system lifts the veil of confusing point conversions to determine how much something costs or the requirement of buying points in bundles instead of exact amounts. This much more consumer-friendly approach makes console holder’s purchasing ecosystem easier for everyone in the household, which will help in Microsoft’s battle for the living room.
Source: The Verge
Sega of America has released new screenshots and an extended version of a trailer teased earlier this month for Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse. The game, described as a “complete re-imagining” of the original released in 1990 on the Sega Genesis, will join the already announced Ducktales Remastered for a summer 2013 launch on digital platforms, including XBLA. With any luck, this trend of Sega and Disney teaming up will continue and bring even more classics out of the vault.
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Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams is the rare platformer in today’s world that is simultaneously incredibly demanding and very satisfying. The game, ported to XBLA from the first batch of Steam Greenlight games, was originally part of a successful Kickstarter project. The game’s protagonist, Giana, derives her name from the original Great Giana Sisters of the 1980s which was most well known for being successfully sued by Nintendo for its close similarities to Super Mario Bros. The new game maintains the charm of an older era while demonstrating a keen awareness of how graphics and sound have improved in 25 years between the original and Twisted Dreams.
The game’s main mechanic involves Giana’s ability to shift between two different forms, which shifts the entire world’s graphics and music accordingly. Players will find themselves shifting back and forth between worlds extremely rapidly at times — it recalls the shifting of Ikaruga and Outcast, though with substantial changes to the environment also, not just the main character.
