XBLA Primer is an on-going feature in which we delve into the history of a given developer, catalog their XBLA releases, and look at why they make great games.
Way back in the 1980’s, a game designer named Tim Schafer started to make a name for himself at LucasArts. Working on and later leading development on cult classics such as Maniac Mansion, Monkey Island and Grim Fandango, Mr. Schafer quickly garnered a reputation around the industry as one of the most creative minds in the business. At the turn of the century, Schafer left LucasArts and started his own development studio which came to be known as Double Fine Productions.
Double Fine blew out of the gates with a platformer named Psychonauts, a game that literally put you inside the minds of others. You can only imagine the crazy things you’d find in the depths of people’s minds. Next up, Double Fine released Brutal Legend, an action/real-time strategy hybrid centered around the fantasy world of heavy metal. While both Psychonauts and Brutal Legend were received very well by critics and gamers alike, neither game managed to create the bucket loads of cash that publishers now look for.
The 12 Days of XBLA was an amazing success and we hope to bring you all more contests like this in the years to come. Thanks to all of our awesome community members for participating with over 1700 entries in a twelve day span, that’s quite an impressive turnout. And a huge thanks to the fine people at Microsoft and all the developers/publishers that donated all the prizes. Without them, none of this would be possible.
With that said, let’s get to the moment we have all been waiting for. After all the dust settled and we ran our random number generator for one last time in 2011, we are now proud to announce @OnyxPrimal as the winner of the Grand Prize worth over $150! Congratulations, you have won a copy of the following XBLA games: Read More
2010 was a pretty great year for XBLA games. It’s hard to think it could be topped. Yet here we are at the end of 2011 with a crop of games that are arguably even better than last year. XBLA has continued to grow throughout 2011 and the diversity of games continues to rise.
We saw the year kick off with unique games like ilomilo, zeit2, and Stacking and it ends with impressive titles like Dungeon Defenders, Joe Danger: Special Edition and Trine 2. We’ve come a long way since the days of Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved.
As a result this year’s XBLAFans Game of the Year awards were even more hotly contested than last year, with a few of the categories coming down to just a couple of votes. The list of nominees for the grand prize was almost excessive and could easily have gone into double digits. So without further ado, we are proud to present the second annual XBLAFans Game of the Year awards. Read More
Between October 20, 2010 and October 11, 2011, Double Fine released the XBLA games Costume Quest, Stacking, and Iron Brigade, as well as the retail game Sesame Street: Once …
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Major Nelson released the Top 20 XBLA sales for the week of December 15. 2011; these stats are based on individual full game purchases. Halfbrick is still proving that ninjas and fruit are an unbeatable combo, coming in first with Fruit Ninja Kinect. The next three on the list should be of no surprise to anyone: Pinball FX2, From Dust, and Dungeon Defenders. What is surprising this week is that Lara Croft and the Gurdian of Light sneaks in at a cozy number five, proving that a good sale can do wonders for a great game. Check out the full list of 20 for the week after the break.
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Double Fine’s Trenched was recently rebranded as Iron Brigade and given a brand new survival mode. Well, we’d like to celebrate the 12 Days of XBLA by giving you a brand new copy of the game! To submit an entry, please respond in the comment section below with an answer to this question:
What is your favorite weapon in Iron Brigade and why?
If you’ve never played, do a little research on your options over at the weapons section of our guide right here. And don’t forget to follow us on Twitter for a second chance to win today!
The winner of yesterday’s contest is: John (@jayceeel) – You have won a copy of Section 8: Prejudice and a Frontier Colonies Map Pack. We will be in touch with you today on Twitter!
It’s just the regular crew of myself, Perry and Todd for a regular episode of this here podcast.
This week there’s plenty to talk about, as we’ve all been playing Iron Brigade after the big update and European release. Both Perry and Todd have played a bunch of this weeks release of Joe Danger: Special edition. Read Perry’s review to find out more about his thoughts on the game.
Then we discuss a bunch of news from the last week, including the new dashboard, Xbox Live on iOS and the XBLA trailers from the VGA’s.
Please subscribe, comment, review the podcast on iTunes and tell your friends! We appreciate it! Check us out on twitter (@XBLAFans) where you can win codes for games, give us feedback or just ask a question.
Big thanks again to Chris Green for the awesome theme music, be sure to check out his site BlurredEdge and why not follow him on twitter too @BlurredEdge.
[podcast]https://xblafans.com/xblafancast/XBLAFancastEp41.mp3[/podcast]This weeks show starts off a little different as Nathan Bowring joins myself and Perry to talk a little about the new dash (which is now out).
After that Todd joins us for a regular show as we talk about last weeks releases as well as a few other things we’ve been playing. That includes Iron Brigade, Voltron, Mercury Hg and Half-Minute Hero. Then onto news and listener/reader questions to round things out!
Please subscribe, comment, review the podcast on iTunes and tell your friends! We appreciate it! Check us out on twitter (@XBLAFans) where you can win codes for games, give us feedback or just ask a question.
Big thanks again to Chris Green for the awesome theme music, be sure to check out his site BlurredEdge and why not follow him on twitter too @BlurredEdge.
[podcast]https://xblafans.com/xblafancast/XBLAFancastEp40.mp3[/podcast]What we are playing is a weekly column that appears each weekend. Various staff members let the world know what games had them hooked the past week and which ones …
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