XBLA File Sizes

The XBox Live Arcade file size has been raised again, this time to 350MB.  I have mixed feelings on this: part of me is suspicious that it’s just another step on the long line to digital distribution controlled by the console manufacturers (including the concomitant DRM issues).  On the other hand, it never made a lot of sense to me.  If a company wants to have a good, decent-sized game available for download, and they were willing to use XBLA to distribute it, what was the point of a size restriction?  Just make the size obvious, and what’s the problem?

Ikaruga Is Hard

That is all.

By The Way, I’m Back

I neglected to mention this, but I’ve been away for the past two weeks due to a trip to China and Korea.  (Sorry.)  During the trip, I had the chance to meet with a number of different companies, but I was most interested in some of the technology companies and their vision for the future.  By far the most prominent meme we saw at consumer electronics companies was that of digital convergence, the somewhat played-out concept that eventually all devices will converge into a single “master player” - say, a central unit that plays games, watches movies, connects to the internet, and so on.

It was with that in mind that I read about the new deal Microsoft has inked to make 10 minute short episodes for Xbox Live.  Convergence is definitely alive outside the US; Korean consumer electronics were far beyond anything that I’ve seen in the States, and for a variety of reasons.  Yet at the same time, I’m skeptical of its eventual promise: the best Asian products were those that did a specialized function extremely well, rather than trying to be a jack of all trades.

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Microsoft Live Royalties

Well, if this is true, it seems like a terrible move on Microsoft’s part.  Kotaku reports that MS has decided to cut the royalties that it pays to indie developers in half, from 70% to 35%; the rationale for this move is unclear, but might be related to a push to use the XNA package for future development. 

This seems like a bad idea for two reasons, 1 practical and 1 theoretical.  From the latter standpoint, it’s unclear to me why Microsoft deserves to earn a 65% cut of revenues when it provides no actual content development - its role is purely distribution and QC (both of which are traditionally low-margin businesses, since they’re not responsible for actually creating anything).  And from a practical standpoint, XBox Live derives most of its advantages - absolute and relative to the PS3 - from having lots of exclusive content, not from its interface or style.  If the PlayStation network had great games and a lousy appearance, we’d still use it. 

 This move is clearly going to discourage many developers from continuing to stay with the Live network, and to the extent that it hurts creative content development, is dangerously close to ceding ground to Sony.  We all saw what happened when Sony’s hubris led it to disregard its consumers’ needs and create an expensive product without enough content.  I would caution Microsoft to be careful about doing the same.

This is still just an unconfirmed rumor, but Microsoft’s response is hardly encouraging.  Good job to Kotaku for investigating this.

IrRezistable

Rez is out on the XBLA now, and while I was fond of the PS2 version after renting it, it’s more beautiful than ever in its new, HD form.

It’s short, but not a complete pushover of a game.  You can’t just tap a button over and over again without paying attention to what’s going on in the game, but you’ll likely not have too much trouble with the game (although I still need to complete the last level after I just unfortunately failed on the final boss).  Like Portal, the game may be short, but is well worth it.  There are few games that are as profoundly and uniquely moving as Rez is.  There’s essentially no story (just some short explanation in the options menu), but that’s not really the point.  The mix of visuals, music, and interactivity create something wholly unique and beautiful, somehow blending into something that almost transcends the medium.   There are times when I was just in awe of what the game accomplishes.  If this isn’t “Art”, then nothing is.

Rocket Race Rules

I just thought I’d thank the Shacknews folks for showing me the Halo 3 custom game Rocket Race.  It’s sort of like The Road Warrior (movie) meets King of the Hill (gametype) with infinite rockets and invulverability.  The gametype is so much damn fun Bungie probably could’ve shipped it as a separate game.  I highly recommend it if you have Halo 3 and can get a minimum of 8-10 people together in a custom game (shouldn’t be too hard with the party-up system or with friends).  You won’t be disappointed.

CoD4’s Corrected Beta Registration Works in my favor

I just got a notification that I’m in the beta.  I’ll have impressions up as soon as I have a chance to play it (assuming there’s no NDA on it, which I don’t think there is, but I’ll have to double-check).

Thanks for fixing the registration, Infinity Ward! I didn’t even have to refresh the page 1000 times!

How Quickly We Forget

Joystiq is pitching Prime 3’s ”token” system as Achievements Lite.  But you can make at least a colorable argument that the basic idea of accomplishing in-game feats to obtain rewards has been around at least since the Warp Pipes in Super Mario Brothers.  And although I’m not sure exactly where the idea of using in-game rewards to “redeem” additional content originated, it certainly wasn’t with Live.  I mean, Mega Man had Rush-accessible areas, Mario World had the Yoshi Coins and Star Road system…  I’m sure you can think of other examples.

This isn’t to demean Live, of course.  But Achievements were an outgrowth of existing ideas, not an innovation in and of themselves.  In fact, I rather prefer Metroid’s system, since at least the tokens there can be used to do something in the game.  Bragging rights don’t really motivate me to do anything.

I feel like running a Marathon

I highly recommend you check out this quasi-interview that Bungie conducted with Marathon: Durandal (XBLA) developers Freeverse. In my recent list I mentioned that I had dropped Marathon: Durandal from my “Probably Will Buy” to my “Could Buy” category, but with a completely new 3d engine (that looks extremely colorful and beautiful), new network code, 8 player online coop, 8 player deathmatch, and what sounds like a really fun new mode with new levels, I may have to bump it back up again. The new mode? I’ll let Freeverse explain:

When you start a Survival game, you’re dropped randomly into one of four brand-new deathtra–er, levels and given a metric -blam-ton of guns and ammunition. After you gather your bearings, we start teleporting groups of enemies, dozens at a time, into the level. It’s literally wave after wave of Pfhor and S’pht against you, and we keep the action moving by changing things up every sixty seconds. The more enemies you sack–and the less damage you take–the higher your score will be at the end. (And we all want to be at the top of the Leaderboards, right?)

As you progress through each round, we rotate new threats in and out of the game, from lowly Pfhor Fighters to Hunters to Juggernauts. (Did I say Juggernauts, plural? Hmm.) Our goal was to keep the experience fresh both while you were playing and between individual games. By rotating the enemies in waves and randomizing the placement of the enemies each time we add more, we keep Survival challenging and unpredictable–each time you play, it’s a little different.

While the placement of the enemies is random, the progression of the waves is not. Thanks to our wonderful testing crew, we’ve been able to craft a cleverly escalating difficulty ramp for the Survival rounds. It’s also a pretty awesome way to play with some of the weapons the game doesn’t give you much time with outside of multiplayer.

Does this sound sort of like a 3d FPS version of Geometry Wars to anyone else? Can’t wait to see it on my own 360.

What Do We Want From WiiWare?

Here’s a subject for debate: GameSetWatch asks what we want from WiiWare, Nintendo’s new tool for original DLC.  To start things off, I’ll suggest that these are the top three things Nintendo needs to do in order to make WiiWare a viable alternative to Xbox Live.

1. Provide an open forum for developers to create their own Wii games as they see fit.  That means that Nintendo can’t put its thumb on the scales to limit developers’ options, as it often does (see, for example, the nanny mentality that led to Friend codes or no-blood Mortal Kombat).  Let people create whatever they want to create, as long as it meets basic quality requirements.  This also means aggressively pursuing outside IP to prevent Microsoft and Sony from locking it up… Flow would have been a good addition to the Wii lineup, if Nintendo had been better prepared and more aggressive.
2. Be careful leveraging Nintendo IP for new DLC.  Nintendo’s biggest advantage over Microsoft is the fact that it has so many recognizable brands… but if it just churns out more crappy minigames, people are going to wonder why the hell they’re paying full price for more Mario Party.  Nintendo also needs to distinguish between new WiiWare games and its own historical library - I’d much rather play a new Alien Hominid game than try to remember why I bothered re-purchasing Blaster Master.
3. Price appropriately.  I already think Nintendo’s Wii pricing is lousy, and $8 is the most I’ll pay for almost any older game.  But if they think WiiWare is an opportunity to sucker their fanboys for a few extra dollars’ profit, (I hope) they’re mistaken.  Please don’t try to rip me off.

Your thoughts?

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