Hybrid official launch trailer revealed
The official trailer has been released for 5th Cell’s upcoming shooter, Hybrid. The game is being released as part of Microsoft’s Summer of Arcade Promotion along with Deadlight, Wreckateer, …
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Minecraft skins to get Summer of Arcade tan
The Minecraft skin parade — no, not that kind of skin parade, get your mind out of the gutter! — continued today with Major Nelson announcing that the …
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Weekly Roundup: June 24
Weekly Roundup compiles all the biggest news stories, reviews, and releases from the week into one handy post on the weekends.
Straw Poll Wednesday: Which year had the best Summer of Arcade promotion?
[poll id=”8″] 2008
- Bionic Commando Rearmed, Braid, Castle Crashers, Galaga Legions, Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2
2009
- Marvel vs. Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes, Shadow Complex, …
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Best of XBLA at E3 2012
Every year, E3 seems more hectic than the last. We spent five hectic days getting our eyes and hands on every XBLA game possible and we’ve picked out eighteen games that stood out from the crowd. Here is the run-down on the very best XBLA titles from E3 2012. Read More
Summer of Arcade titles priced and dated
Microsoft’s Major Nelson has announced the dates and prices for this years five Summer of Arcade titles. This years promotion will kick off on July 18 with Tony Hawk’s …
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Summer of Arcade 2012 titles announced
Update: If you buy at least three games, you get 400 MSP back.
This year’s Summer of Arcade was announced by Phil Spencer of Microsoft on GTTV’s pre-E3 coverage. …
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Weekly Roundup: May 6
Weekly Roundup compiles all the biggest news stories, reviews, and releases from the week into one handy post on the weekends.
XBLA Fans: PAX East Preview Hub
Believe it or not my favorite part about video games isn’t the games themselves but the way they bring people together. Arguably no show demonstrates this bond better than PAX. Thousands of likeminded individuals flooded Boston this past Easter weekend. It didn’t matter where you worked or what you did or what you had to do when you hit the ground again on Monday; for one glorious weekend everyone was an equal: a gamer. It didn’t matter if your weapon was a die, a mouse, a controller or one’s own body. Everyone at this show had a passion for games.
A few of us from XBLA Fans made the trip and had the honor of mingling and checking out some of the upcoming XBLA titles for 2012 and beyond. We were able to hear developers in their element talking to fans about their projects. It was an amazing experience. Our own Andrew Crews has already elaborated on this issue, but in the end you remember the little things. That being said, there were some amazing games. Check out our full breakdown below!
Dust: An Elysian Tail impressions from PAX East
I almost missed it. I almost wearily shambled right out of the Boston Convention Center this past Easter Sunday without playing what just might have been the most gorgeous XBLA title on the show floor. Luckily, Kinect Fans Managing Editor Nick DePetris issued a last minute reminder that readers had been flooding the site with requests for coverage of developer Humble Hearts’ Dust: An Elysian Tail. So off the two of us went to Microsoft’s blessedly carpeted booth one final time before departing PAX East 2012.
Sandwiched between the 360s running four-player previews of Minecraft and Tequila’s Deadlight demo was the side-scrolling action title from the inspired mind of one Dean Dodrill. That a sole man could craft something so wonderfully creative is extraordinary. It’s almost impossible to believe that Dodrill is the only member of Humble Hearts given how excellent his work-in-progress is at this stage of development. He’s been working on it for several years (see its victory at Microsoft’s 2009 Dream.Build.Play Challenge for evidence of its lengthy development cycle), but there are still some months to go before its vague 2012 release date arrives.
The titular main character is an adorable-but-deadly anthropomorphic hero questing through the alluring world of Falana with a charming fairy sidekick in tow. Falana features dark and dreary caves with medieval castles looming in the background. Players will venture into at least one cavern that is darker still, but they’ll also emerge from the “it was a dark and stormy night” motif and find themselves in a gleaming, tranquil forest with cute woodland animals prancing about at some point in the adventure. I’m hardly the first to compare the aesthetics to the masterfully animated Disney films of old, and I am unlikely to be the last.