team 17

Schrödinger’s Cat and the Raiders of the Lost Quark was developed by Italic Pig and published by Team 17 on Xbox One. It was released on May 12, 2015 for $9.99. A copy was provided for review purposes.

On May 17, 2015, I had a chance meeting with developer Italic Pig over at the XBLA Fans Twitch channel while streaming Schrödinger’s Cat and the Raiders of the Lost Quark. For the sake of brevity, let’s just say I happened to learn quite a bit of the making process of Schrödinger’s Cat. The message I took away from the impromptu discussion with Italic Pig is that the developer had a vision and set out to create a game around a passion for physics. In Italic Pig’s eyes, each portion of the game was designed with a specific purpose to test players in different ways. Most things in the game have a reason for being there, but not every reference or purpose is obvious. Still, the developer believes there is something for everyone here. Do I fully agree with all of the design implementations? No, but I respect the decisions made during the process. Schrödinger’s Cat and the Raiders of the Lost Quark took two years to make with an estimated 60-70 percent of the effort coming from Italic Pig alone. Meanwhile, I spent about eight hours across three different days to play through in its entirety. Let’s see how it stacks up.

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Every cat has its day. From the publishers Team 17 and developers Italic Pig comes an action-adventure puzzle-platformer featuring the legendary Schrödinger’s Cat. One day, a catastrophic event occurs that causes all primitive particles to escape from The Particle Zoo. The zoo is locked down and emergency services are called into action. Join the cat as he collects his army quarks to create up to 14 unique abilities to solve problems across 30+ levels of gameplay to defeat the forces of evil.

Schrödinger’s Cat and the Raiders of the Lost Quark comes to Xbox One for a price of $9.99 on May 13.

Check below the jump for a trailer.

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Joining the fray of games being released in March is LA Cops, a ’70s-based top-down shooters featuring six playable cops with mustaches and aviator glasses cleaning up the mean streets of LA. Players take control of two different cops at the same time and handle the duties of law enforcement in 13 different levels of gameplay with up to five different upgradable unique weapons.

Let the bad guys know that LA Cops are on the case on March 13.

Take a look at the groovy trailer below.

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The Escapists was developed by Mouldy Toof Studios and will be published on Xbox One by Team 17 Digital. It is set for release on February 13, 2015 for $19.99. A copy was provided for review purposes.

The Escapists positions itself as a kind of craft-em-up roguelike set across a number of fiendishly designed secure facilities including prisons and POW camps. Think of it as somewhere between Terraria, Monaco and any number of top down action-RPGs. The main difference is that in order for you to be successful, The Escapists demands significantly more time and patience than almost any other game I’ve played — and what’s more, it’s perfectly suited to being a cute 8-bit indie title.

With only a very small number of simple core mechanics to rely upon, The Escapists turns the table on the typical sandbox approach taken by similar games. Instead, players are literally forced to adhere to a strict regimen of roll calls, mealtimes, break-times and work whilst simultaneously plotting their escape. It’s an inspired system that asks an awful lot from players and results in the rewards being all the sweeter.

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Worms Battlegrounds is the Xbox One Games with Gold free offering for December and will be available until December 31st. If you have Xbox Live Gold and an Xbox One, then there is no reason not to download the game and give it a try. Worms Battlegrounds is one of the deepest and largest Worms games to date featuring over 25 single player missions, 30% larger landscapes and over 60 weapons. The ability to create, join and battle other clans builds on the multiplayer component from previous Worms installments.

Along with Worms Battlegrounds being added to the Games with Gold lineup, new DLC was also released for the game. The Alien Invasion DLC pack adds brand new game mode: Bodycount, 10 new deathmatch missions, five re-imagined weapons and more. The Alien Invasion DLC is normally priced at $4.99, but as an added deal for Xbox Live Gold Members it be can purchased right now for the discounted price of $3.99.

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The Worms franchise makes it’s next generation debut on with Worms Battlegrounds for the Xbox One. Battlegrounds released on May 30th and is available for $24.99 on the Games …
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Two of the first ID@Xbox games set to hit Xbox One in March have been announced courtesy of Phil Spencer, corporate vice president at Microsoft Game Studios, who tweeted:

@GeorgeTeV @Lambent_Ewok I think you will with @ID_Xbox. Played 2 of the first shipping games, a Worms game n Nutjitsu, right before DICE.

— Phil Spencer (@XboxP3) February 10, 2014

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We’re late, and it seems that’s become somewhat of a trend for us lately. Our Game of the Year awards weren’t doled out until January, and now our look forward at the XBLA and Xbox One XBLA-type games of 2014 is just making its way to you in February. You were on your own when it came to planning out January’s releases, but now it’s time for our annual look ahead at the top downloadable games likely to arrive on an Xbox platform during the (remainder of) the year ahead. Read on to find out what you can expect out of Xbox over the next (not quite) 365.

Developer: 4J Studios, Mojang and Microsoft Studios

As was announced at Microsoft’s E3 2013 presentation, 4J Studios will be bringing its open-world block-building game to the Xbox One. The 360 edition of Minecraft was a huge success and 4J is looking to build off of that success by bringing a “bigger” world to players. The Xbox One edition promises to deliver on the power of next-gen gaming by giving players more of what they want. Maps, Adventures, multiplayer features and console specific enhancements will all be improved and larger in scale on the Xbox One than they were on the Xbox 360. Minecraft: Xbox One Edition will be released sometime in the month of March of 2014.

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Good news for fans of Worms Revolution, as just last week (November 21) saw the release of a brand new Medieval-themed DLC pack for the latest (and arguably greatest) …
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Worms: Revolution was developed by Team 17 and published by Warner Bros. Entertainment. It was released on October 11, 2012 for 1200 MSP. A copy was provided for review purposes.

Worms, Worms, Worms. The Xbox Live Marketplace has seen Worms, Worms 2: Armageddon and Worms: Ultimate Mayhem, and now we’ve got Worms: Revolution. That’s really quite a bit of Worms, it’s strange to imagine that the artillery shooter genre is in such high demand to warrant four Worms games all in one place. Since each of the games have been at least competent, enjoyable, playable iterations all more or less with the same problems, was there really space available for another Worms game? Worms: Revolution had no space to fit into, so instead Team 17 cut the fat, renovated the foundation of the game and built something grander, smoother, and far more polished than its precursors.

But it’s still a Worms game. It’s a Worms game with Worms problems and Worms humor and Worms entertainment and if that’s all well and good then get right on board the Revolution train, but for everyone else there’s a cache of new features to consider. Worms: Revolution adds a class and formation system, dynamic water, physics objects and several new utilities and weapons. There’s a lot going on in this Worms game, a lot of new things, all piled on top of a 17-year old foundation that still works. Well, it works for multiplayer, the AI still makes single player a chore. Read More