14 years ago
Genre diversity on XBLA
Microsoft’s Xbox Live Arcade service has been running for over half a decade now seeing a major boost in content since the Summer of Arcade promotions began running and since last year House Party (previously Block Party) has joined it for Spring releases. A steady flow of releases during each month also bring a fair amount of titles to the downloadable market space. With a healthy mix of ports, original content, big and indie developers, it begs the question: how mixed is the genre offering?
Before examining what isn’t out there, it’s important to observe what is. Xbox.com has listings for the amount of games contained in each of their classifications, bringing up some pretty startling numbers. Leading the way (not surprisingly) are Action & Adventure games with 177 individual titles including Castle Crashers, Battlefield 1943, Geometry Wars and Shadow Complex. Puzzle & Trivia and Classics are the next highest below Action with 74 and 76 respectively. On the opposite side of the spectrum are some very niche genres including Kinect with 4, Music with 6, and Educational with 3. A genre expected to have plenty of titles would be fighting, but believe it or not only 13 titles are classified as fighting games on XBLA, while the nebulous Other category has 7. Above those are 23 Role Playing games, 20 Racing & Flying games and 33 Strategy & Simulation games. Also noteworthy you’d think there’s more than 38 platformers out there, but not according to Xbox.com. (as of October 2011) Read More
14 years ago
Dungeon Defenders review (XBLA)
Dungeon Defenders was developed by Trendy Entertainment and published by Reverb Publishing. It was released on October 19, 2011 for 1200 MSP. A copy of the game was provided for review purposes.
Loot, levels, and fantasy creatures–the essence of most RPGs. Add hack and slash, also quite the staple, and spells, then four different classes, then add an array of towers to summon, four player coop, challenge levels, survival and tower-only modes, a player versus player mode, and plenty of customization. In a nutshell, or perhaps an empty watermelon? No, maybe a carved out star. Yeah. That’s Dungeon Defenders. This action RPG tower defense has an abundance of content, variety, and polish; what do you know, the three spices of life!
Dungeon Defenders takes a semi-new approach to the tower defense genre, employing traditional elements like loot, leveling up, classes and towers while also changing the mentality up, advocating use of blockades at choke points and giving each class a different set of towers to summon as well as abilities. Of the four classes are the Apprentice, magic user employing high damage dealing elemental towers; the Squire, who takes the hordes with a sword while being backed by meaty blockades; the Huntress, with ranged weapon in hand and powerful multi-use traps; and lastly the Monk, support class extraordinaire, able to use both ranged and melee attacks and summon auras which apply affects or damage over a wide area. Levels are long and allow for up to four players with drop in and out coop local or online. Each level also has a challenge mission which presents distinct gameplay variations that force players to change their tactics, foregoing entire elements of the game or sometimes making them more important. The loot system is robust, allowing for set bonuses, rewarding players for playing on higher difficulty levels and with more people in their party. Mana gained during levels can be used to upgrade weapons, armor and pets.
There’s just so much in this game, it’s mind boggling.
Orcs Must Die!: Weavers Guide
Steel Weaver
Death Augmenter (500) – Orcs killed by traps and guardians earn 66% more coins.
Guardian Armor (1500) (requires Death Augmenter) – Guardians have increased health and will …
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14 years ago
Crimson Alliance Vengeance DLC Guide
Vengeance DLC Dead Among Us Secret Areas (6):
- In the early bits of the level after passing the Assassin door (there’s a room with a blue beaker in it) …
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14 years ago
Orcs Must Die: complete guide
Everything you need to know to eliminate the orc infestation
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14 years ago
XBLAFancast Special – Orcs Must Die! interview
Orcs have been a problem throughout the universe for all eternity. Well. Maybe not, but they still have to die! And so they will in Robot Entertainment’s action tower defense strategy game Orcs Must Die! Justin Korthoff, Community Manager at Robot Ent, joins myself and John Laster to discuss the game’s origin, some details about Robot Ent, and of course the awesome points of the game.
Justin goes over the bit of time following Ensemble Studios’ collapse all the way up through the beginning of Orcs Must Die!, and how small the game started at first. On top of that is the birth of a lot of the game mechanics, how three traps turned into over 20, and how the crossbow and various other elements of the game were balanced to ensure that each of the game’s levels played differently. This podcast is full of great insight into the processes regarding this game’s development and the result of those design strategies.
Venture forth and listen!
[podcast]https://xblafans.com/xblafancast/XBLAFancastOMDInterview.mp3[/podcast]
14 years ago
XBLAFancast – Skulls of the Shogun Interview Special
Upcoming turn based strategy game Skulls of the Shogun is being developed by a core team of three gentlemen at Haunted Temple. We were lucky enough to talk with the founder and design director Jake Kazdal (the guy in the dev diary). Fresh from his showing of the game at Fantastic Arcade, Jake was kind enough to venture into the netherworld and sort out some of the details, or rather, pretty much all of the details on Skulls of the Shogun.
Of the massive plethora of topics discussed, up first was mechanics. While the game may look shallow at first, we can guarantee you the tactics go far deeper than one might imagine, without being all that complicated. Spirit walls, eating skulls and haunting structures are just some of the finer mechanics in Skulls of the Shogun. Jake goes on to discuss art direction and story, telling of his time spent in Japan and the myriad of influences that period of his life has had on the development of Skulls of the Shogun.
[podcast]https://xblafans.com/xblafancast/HauntedTemple_InterviewSpecial.mp3[/podcast]
14 years ago
Dungeon Defenders Servants Quarters (level 5) guide
Strategy breakdown
WHOA! Two crystals? Wait wait, don’t quit, you can do this. Hm… it’s asymmetrical!? Still possible, believe it or not. Servants Quarters is the first level …
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14 years ago
Dungeon Defenders Throne Room (level 8) guide
Strategy breakdown
Boss level time! While this map is symmetrical, the boss comes out of G, meaning defenses there should eventually be stronger. If you ever get lost, …
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14 years ago
Dungeon Defenders Ramparts (level 10) guide
Strategy breakdown
Up to Wyvern town we find ourselves! Ramparts looks pretty intense, especially due to being asymmetrical, but with some beefy Squire blockades and relentless mage tower …
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