XBLIG prices can be changed every 7 days starting May 23


Big news from Microsoft today, as they announced via the App Hub, the official MS forums where XBLIG developers Read more

Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 2 Review: Rolling in the Right Direction


A new Sonic game always brings a level of uncertainty with it. Sega’s mascot has seen more highs and Read more

One Million Fans Take a Stroll with The Walking Dead Episode 1


Comic books, television, and now video games: is there any form of media that The Walking Dead can't conquer? Read more

Kittens Spit Fire When Serious Sam Double D XXL Assaults XBLA This Fall


Take a long, hard look at you what is on your screen right now. Yes, that’s a kitten, spitting Read more

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Guardian Heroes Review: The Best of the Treasure Trove

Posted on October 25, 2011 by Dave Voyles in Reviews, XBLA, XBLA Reviews | Leave a comment

If you’ve played one beat ‘em up, you’ve played them all, right? I mean how many Double Dragon clones can you tackle in one lifetime? I don’t know about you, but I can only take so much Bimmy and Jimmy in my lifetime. But this is different.

The flurry of Sega ports (the Saturn in particular), to grace XBLA this fall, including Sega Bass Fishing and Space Channel 5, continues with October’s release of Guardian Heroes. Combining RPG elements such as leveling up and divvying statistic points, a control scheme as deep as any fighter, and the narrative of a short novel, Guardian Heroes remains one of the deepest beat ‘em ups today, despite being initially released 15 years ago. I mean here we have not one, but TWO Treasure games being re-released within one month of one another, and this one certainly deserves to be part of the trove.

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Radiant Silvergun Review: Shooting up the Competition

Posted on September 22, 2011 by Dave Voyles in Reviews, XBLA, XBLA Reviews | 2 Comments

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At Armless Octopus, we’re no strangers to a good shmup. What I believe turns most people off from the genre are two factors: 1) the absurd difficulty, and 2) how similar each title in the genre is. I mean it’s really just a ship shooting directly at things on screen, right? Wrong. Radiant Silvergun takes a few of the standard conventions you’ve come to expect from the genre and adds a twist. Originally released in 1998 in Japan for both the Sega Saturn and in what was then a thriving Japanese arcade scene, Radiant Silvergun has managed to stand the test of time.

That’s not to say that the steep difficulty curve gamers faced back then isn’t still present in this release, because it most certainly is. While enemies relentlessly fire upon your lightly armored vessel, you come to expect that you will die, and quite a bit at that. Your time is not spent in vain however, thanks to Radiant Silvergun’s persistent upgrade system, which carries over the experience and levels that you acquire with each progressive Story Mode playthrough. This comes as both the title’s greatest strength, but also its greatest weakness.

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