The waiting game is often a tricky one. Sometimes an extended wait can lead to having some of your wildest expectations fulfilled, and then some. On the other end of that spectrum, however, lies disappointment. That doesn’t necessarily mean that what you had finally received was poor by any means, but it simply didn’t live up to what you were hoping for. Brand is one such title which unfortunately suffers the fate of the latter.
When we first got wind of it in August, Brand was seen as a beautifully textured and modeled platformer, with all signs pointing towards a hit: A rarity on XBLIG. In terms of appearance, it has fulfilled its end of the bargain and carries quite a bit of the weight for the rest of the product. The models are crisp, the textures and color palette are vivid, in addition to being diverse. Each of the three stages has its own distinct feel, despite being inhabited by many of the same enemies.
New Life Interactive’s cancer-curing, voxel-based game, Cell: emergence finally has a release date. The “action surgery game” will be released on February 9 on Xbox Live Indie Games for $5 (400 MS Points). Cell: emergence HD will also be released for PC for GamersGate, Gamestop PC Downloads, Green Man Gaming, Playism, and Desura for $8.95. The extra four bucks nabs you almost twice as many cells to destroy, along with improved sound.
You might remember Cell: emergence as that trippy-looking game written by Sheldon Pacotti, the writer of the seminal Deus Ex. You play as a microscopic nanobot fighting against diseases inside a the body of a sick child, and you have to stunt the growth of the rapidly-reproducing malignant cells by employing a mixture of RTS tactics and good old fashioned arcade shooting. Sound confusing? Check out the developer walkthrough video (conveniently embedded above!) for a glimpse into this unique game.
The action surgery game “Cell: emergence” will be released Thursday, February 9th on Xbox LIVE Indie Games, GamersGate, GameStop PC Downloads (formerly Impulse), Green Man Gaming, Playism, and Desura. A free demo will be released on Tuesday, February 7th.
In the game players fight a nanoscale war against disease inside the body of a sick child. The fast, deep simulation of tissues, antibodies, germs, nanomachinery, and other elements is achieved with a “dynamic voxel” gameworld, within which every visual detail has meaning, reacts to the player, and interacts with its neighbors.
The Xbox version of the game, selling for 400 MS Points, offers a world of almost half a million cells, and the “Cell HD” version on PC, selling for $8.95 USD, offers a world of nearly a million. The HD version on the PC also provides higher fidelity sound and more frenetic gameplay tuned exclusively to the mouse/trackball/touchpad.
The Xbox version will be available in English and in English subtitled for Japanese, German, and Spanish. The PC version will be available in the preceding languages plus Italian, French, Russian, Simplified Chinese, and Korean.
Inspired by “hard” ’80s arcade games like Defender, Centipede, and Missile Command, Cell offers 17 punishing levels that require players to decipher a level’s “cellular automata” simulation and then battle living processes with speed and dexterity.
The game’s story, written by Deus Ex writer Sheldon Pacotti, is a first glimpse at a near-future fictional world where war is fought in code and chemistry and the inner workings of Nature.
ABOUT NEW LIFE INTERACTIVE, LLC
New Life Interactive, LLC is an indie game studio based in Austin, TX specializing in massively reactive gameplay.
Green Man Gaming (GMG) is the leading UK-based independent digital retailer for PC games, selling more than 700 titles from 75 publishing partners to 146 countries around the world. Thanks to its unique proprietary technology, GMG offers consumers the ability to trade-in their digitally downloaded games for new purchases, while enabling publishers to generate on-going revenue from their intellectual property. Green Man Gaming is the only games retailer to pay a royalty back to a publisher on all pre-owned sales.
EDIT: Developer Milkstone Studios informs us that an update is coming next week, which will include multiplayer mode
The XBLIG Marketplace is notorious for its often campy FMV games (sadly, no Night Trap port yet), Avatar-laden gimmick titles, and games that bear strikingly low production values. On occasion, a gem will find its way between the otherwise generic rocks of games and spark a glimmer of hope into XBLIG again. One such title is Little Racers STREET, the 15th title from Milkstone Studios, who have made a name for themselves for their high production values and strikingly beautiful games. I’ll have you know that they continue this tradition with their latest offering.
Rarely do I pick up an Xbox indie game and really hunger to return to it later, but LRS had me coming back for more. The gameplay was addictive and offered just enough incentive after each race to keep that carrot dangling in front of me, enticing me to continue. Read more
Whenever someone disagrees with a critic, their first reaction always seems to be “I’d like to see you do it better.” Well, Nick Puleo is going to try and do just that. The founder and managing editor of Co-Optimus has teamed up with longtime friend Dave Paul to form Brian Shape Games, and their first release, SCHAR: Blue Shield Alliance, is due out later this year for Xbox Live Indie Games and PC.
As you might imagine, SCHAR is a cooperative experience and looks to spice up the twin-stick shooter experience by adding strategy and RPG features. Set in the year 2997, you play as one of four unique ships in the Blue Shield Alliance, which is humanity’s last hope against the Constituents of Nothing, a bunch of aliens with a penchant for antagonizing human colonies.
“I’ve always been interested in game development, and have been tinkering with it for many years. I’m a programmer by nature and have been doing it since I was 12 or 13,” said Puleo. The pair have been developing games casually together for about 20 years, and have been working on SCHAR at night and on weekends.
The trailer is heavy on story details, but light on actual gameplay. “We’re only about halfway through the development process at this point, and we have a lot of work to do on things like art, sound, and level content,” Puleo wrote on a post on Co-Optimus. We’ll have a better feel for it after we get our mitts on it this spring at PAX East.
The past few weeks have been pretty light on the new releases, so of course that means it was time for developers to release 3 quality racing games in the same week, right? There’s also a compilation of comic bookshelves from the 90s, a remake of an old PC RTS, and the weekly dose of balloon boobs.
This is the best value on XBLIG this year. It’s one of the deepest games on the platform with a world that is beautiful, cars which handle wonderfully, and gameplay that will suck you in or hours. Milkstone Studios has a history of creating some of the most prrofessional looking games on XBLIG, and their latest release further reinforces that idea. At $1 it’s hard to find a better deal in the past year on XBLIG. Whether you’re a racing fan or not, you’re sure to find something to appreciate within this indie gem. Read more
Reality TV shows are all the rage. I mean who doesn’t want to watch short-tempered wealthy housewives duke it out in their own little worlds? There isn’t much for us gamers though. Sure, Sony has The Tester, but that’s more absurd challenges as people make their way toward simply testing games. But what about seeing the process of developing a full game, from inception to completion, along with a few kinks in the chain? Fortunately, IGN has concocted such a show, titled The Next Game Boss.
XBLIG developer Team2Bit has made the cut, and the duo of brother’s Matt and Jake Lewandowski illustrate their newest game concept in the first episode that aired yesterday on IGN’s YouTube channel. They “operate under the moniker ‘Team First Puncher,’” which is also the name of their upcoming XBLIG title, explaining “Yeah we couldn’t be ‘Team Team2Bit.’”
You can root the XBLIG developers on and follow along their progress through their Twitter account, @Team2Bit.
Brand has finally recovered from that nasty bug that delayed its release back in November, which means you’ll get a chance to slice up some manticores on February 2. Nine Dots Studio spent some of the extra time polishing up menus and adding in Avatar support, but we’re more excited to start shooting flame walls out of that upgradable sword. In the meantime, take another gander at that spiffy trailer.
Activision might be about as indie as Metallica these days, but that hasn’t stopped the goliath of a publisher from releasing Dark Reign Redux on Xbox Live Indie Games for $5. The remake of the 1997 PC RTS popped up on the Marketplace yesterday with nary a press release or hint of marketing to support it. At least Activision got that part of the indie formula correct.
The port was handled by Magnetar Games, and there is also a browser-based version available using Microsoft Silverlight. Magnetar’s website claims that “Dark Reign Redux is a faithful remake of the original game, maintaining the same look and feel, and incorporating the many innovations that made the original game a top seller.” That’s a nice way of saying that they’ve made the game look exactly like it did in 1997. But, the game does run at a higher resolution (up to 1024 x 768) and has widescreen support. If you’re wondering how a 90s RTS handles on a console, one glimpse at the controls may make your hands fear ever gripping a controller again.
We contacted Magnetar Games and Activision for more information about the project’s origin and if the publisher has any plans to revisit its vast stable of PC franchises.
Update: According to a post on the Creators Club Forums, Magnetar Games “worked out a deal with Activision to remake the game” and the game has been “QA’ed by Activision.” It sounds as if Magnetar licensed the dormant IP from Activision rather than being contracted for the project, but we’re still waiting to hear back from both parties. We’ll update when we know more. (Thanks Michael Neel).
Sinister corporations tend to be a bit obstinate when it comes to changing their nefarious ways or closing up shop entirely. Heck, sometimes it can take several sequels before they finally take the hint. Vilhelm Industries will return to reprise its role as the freedom-hating enterprise later this year in Miasma 2. ESP Games recently released a lengthy video walking through the combat and introducing some of the new features it has implemented in hopes to improve on its predecessor.
There’s a new first-person mode in between levels where you can walk around and talk to your squad and do other RPG things like steal everyone’s prized possessions upgrade your characters. Developer David Addis explains that they’ve remixed the combat from the first game and calls the sequel a “turn-based planning game.” Basically that means that you’ll input the commands for your team in between each round and then watch the melee unfold over the course of a few seconds and repeat until one team is zipped up in body bags. Older PC junkies might see some similarities to the D&D Gold Box games. We’ll find out for sure when Miasma 2 comes to Xbox Live Indie Games later this year.
Contest is closed! Thanks to everyone who entered, and congrats to Jody Owsley (@viper1829) on winning. Okay, admit it. It’s fun to be bad. It’s okay, we won’t tell your parents. We don’t want them thinking they raised you to be some kind of hooligan or something. But acting our your maniacal powertrip fantasies in a video game like EvilQuest? That’s perfectly normal. And if there is anything better than paying a measly buck for a darned good game, it’s getting a darned good game for free. That’s why we’re going away a copy of EvilQuest for Xbox courtesy of Chaosoft Games.
Read our full review to find out why we think so highly of EvilQuest. There are two ways to win, and you are encouraged to enter both ways! One random winner will be picked Friday, January 27 at 6 PM EST.
1) Post in this thread about your favorite villain of all time.
