GameMarx News and Reviews

GameMarx 2011 XBLIG Game Awards Recap

contact@gamemarx.com (Dylan) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT

Here is the recap of our personal Top 10 games of 2011 lists and our GameMarx 2011 Xbox Indie Awards. To hear the discussions behind each category, check out podcast EP71 - 2011 Game Award Show.

Videos

GameMarx 2011 Xbox Indie Game Awards

Dylan's Top 10 Games of 2011
Cicelie's Top 10 Games of 2011
Mike's Top 10 Games of 2011

Most Blatant Ripoff

Nominees: FortressCraft Chapter 1, CastleMiner, Total Miner: Forge, Fishcraft / Angry Fish, Avatar Farm

Fishcraft / Angry Fish

Most Misleading Box Art

Nominees: Akane the Kunoichi, Bunker Buster, Temple of Dogolrak, Off Balance, The Charge

Temple of Dogolrak

Weirdest Ironic Hipster Humor

Nominees: The Skyfish series, the GHXYK2 series

The GHXYK2 Series

Most Squandered Potential

Nominees: Crazy Hobo, President John America Saves America, A Pimp RPG

Crazy Hobo

Creepiest Attempt at "Sex-Sells"

Nominees: Spermatozoon, Can You Handle 2 At Once?, Moe Mekuri 2.5

Can You Handle 2 At Once?

Uncanniest Valley

Nominees: Incident of Dreamy Vale Church, Blackstone - Part One, Bureau - Agent Kendall, Colonies: Neociv

Bureau - Agent Kendall

Best Use of FMV

Nominees: Bloody Mary, Sword and Hammer, Hell's House

Hell's House

Best "With Avatars" Sellout

Nominees: Wacky Waving I. A. F. Avatars; Avatar's Rock Paper Scissors; Avatar Workout; Avatar Snake; Dude, Where's My Avatar?; Avatar Gold Grab X-mas Version

Wacky Waving I. A. F. Avatars

Best Finger To "The Man"

Nominees: Game Type, DLC Quest, Why Did I Buy This?

Game Type

Best 2011 Game Released in 2010

Nominees: Cthulhu Saves the World, Cursed Loot

Cthulhu Saves the World

Best Retro Throwback

Nominees: Ionball, Wizorb, Battle High: San Bruno, Insanity X

Battle High: San Bruno

Most Ambitious Design

Nominees: Avatar Adventurers Online, Alpha Squad, Raventhorne, Battle for Venga Islands

Avatar Adventurers Online

Best Use of Zombies

Nominees: Attack of the Zombie Horde; Dead Pixels; Undead Empire; Zombie Death Zone; I, Zombie; Zombies Ruined My Day

Dead Pixels

Best Looking Graphics

Nominees: Orbitron: Revolution, radiangames Ballistic, Lil' Demons: Splatter, Infinity Danger, Shifters, T.E.C. 3001, TIC: Part 1

Dylan's Top 10 for 2011

Cicelie's Top 10 for 2011

Mike's Top 10 for 2011

Game of the Year 2011 Runner-Up

Battle High: San Bruno

GameMarx Game of the Year 2011

radiangames Ballistic

GameMarx's 2011 Xbox Indie Award Show Tonight (and some charts)!

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 16:20:00 GMT

Tonight's podcast will be the live broadcast of the first ever Xbox Live Indie Games award show! We promise it will include more game related content than some other game award shows! Tune in to the live show at 10 PM EST at GameMarx.com/live, or catch it Saturday via the podcast or youtube. We will also be releasing special video recaps next week.

In the mean time, here are some charts from the data at XboxIndies.com. The first charts are the breakdown of the 743 games by price, genre, and month released:

This next chart shows the top 10 games by "world rating" - the weighted (by vote count) average of the game's rating across all regions, for games released in 2011, and then again broken down by genre. Some genres have more than 10 listed because of ties, and Microsoft Excel is a dick.

This next chart required a bit of explanation. For each region, Xbox.com shows a Best Selling Today list. Each day, the positions of all games are recorded at XboxIndies.com. I took this data and created a top 25 games list by sorting the games by average position on the best selling list for the days the game was available. I also weighted each region's list by the number of votes from that region. The purpose here, is if you take a large grain of salt, this list is the top grossing games by daily sales average (instead of all time total, which would heavily favor games released early in the year). I would love to compare this to the real revenue data for the games released in 2011 to see just how accurate this crazy method is!

GameMarx Giveaway Survey Results

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 23:28:24 GMT

The GameMarx Indie Mega-Pack Giveaway is over now, congratulations to MaxShrek, scion of tea, Ruebals, Forenzik xx, DittosWorld3910, and Will Tomorrow! Each person that entered the completed a short survey. After cleaning up the results, there were 168 surveys completed - you can download the results at http://static.gamemarx.com/assets/GameMarx_Giveaway_Survey.zip

Below are some of the results. Keep in mind that there is a bit of selection bias in the results - the giveaway was only mentioned on Xbox Live Indie Game sites. To hear some of our thoughts on the results, check out the latest podcast starting around the 56 minute mark.

The survey also had a few open ended questions, however the system used to record the results truncated the responses. I really wish there was a way I could go back and fix this as many respondents provided great answers. Some hilights (all answers are in the download above)

Favorite Xbox Live Indie Games?

Blocks that matter, Arkedo series-Pixel, Total Miner, Apple Jack

Pretty much all of the titles from Radiangames, as well as a burning love for milkstone games.

I maed a game with zombies in it, Soulcaster, Dead Pixels, Avatar Legends.
This is all based off of playing demos. I'm still trying to decide where my meager amount of points should go :P

Cthulhu Saves the World,Weapon Of Choice,Streets of Fury,Shoot 1UP,Score Rush,Plague,Nasty,Laser Cat,Explosionade,Half Brick Echoes,Decimation X3,Apple Jack

Inca Blocks!!! (Really don't have a large history w/ downloading Indies)

Groov. By a long shot. It's easy to pickup, it's always different, and I love the element of being able to create my own music through the way I play the game. It hits all the right buttons, and I can't get enough.

try not to fart is hellarious

Breath of Death VII, Epic Dungeon and Protect Me Knight

Anything SKA Studios, Dishwasher, Dishwasher Vampire Smiles, CANT Wait for Charlie Murder!!!

Any comments on XBLIGs you want to share?

Great platform for upcoming developers that's sadly over-saturated with poor titles making the gems hard to find in the sea of mediocrity.

Finding great XBLIG games is like finding a diamond in the rough. Theres a lot of games that I would never touch but there are some real sparks of creativity that grab me.

Price is important. With weekly deals dropping professional XBLA games down to the 200-600 point range, it can be hard to justify 240 or more points for an XBLIG. These days I personally don't consider buying them if they are above 80 points.

I enjoy Indie Games as not only can I buy lots of them without breaking the bank balance, they often offer unique gameplay, which AAA titles are afraid to diverse into. Many have surprisingly good art work and it's good to support the effort that goes into

For as much garbage as there is on the XBLIG marketplace there are quite a few gems but too it's a shame the best games don't get enough spotlight.

I hope that XNA SDK and community continues to progress with Windows 8 and the next Xbox

If XBLIGs had achievements I'm sure I would have downloaded loads of them by now.

XBLIGs have so much potential if only the average Xbox owner would take them seriously. Even just a more respectable position in the marketplace could make a world of difference.

I think Microsoft had squandered its opportunity with XBLIG in a way that ultimately benefits noone. As much as I love some of the titles that have come about it

My God.. it's full of crap.

The survey also asked "Favorite Gaming News Sites?" and "Favorite Mainstream Xbox Games?" and you can fine the response to these in the full results above.

Announcing the GameMarx Indie Mega-Pack Giveaway!

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 15:36:40 GMT

Head over to http://giveaway.gamemarx.com/homepage/register/ to enter to win a collection of over 50 Xbox Live Indie Games!

Why are you doing this?

GameMarx.com is changing focus and no longer doing XBLIG reviews. We’ve loved covering the XBLIG scene, but now it’s time for us to go back to being game developers and stop playing at being game journalists. GameMarx.com focus will become more developer centric for indie and hobbyist game developers. We’ll leave the reviews to the many qualified sites on the internet, many of which can be found at http://www.xboxindies.com/, which we will continue to host and support.

But this has left us with a stack of review codes! So we contacted the developers to get permission to give them away. We could give them out one at the time, but where is the fun it that? It’s a Thunderdome-winner-take-all giveaway! We did have some duplicate codes left over, so we’ll give these out as "mini packs" leading up to the big giveaway Friday December 30, 2011.

We also thought it would be fun to run a survey with the contest. Many of the items on the survey have been the basis for debates among the XBLIG scene. We don’t expect this survey will settle any arguments, but it will be interesting to see the data!

Tonight on GameMarx: Matthew Leigh of Firebase Industries

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 14:49:01 GMT

Tonight’s guest is Matthew Leigh, Founder of Firebase Industries, a boutique video game development and publishing studio in Vancouver, Canada. Their recent release, Orbitron: Revolution, has been called “gorgeous” by Kotaku, described as Defender meets Wipeout by Destructoid, and “A Shmup That Should Have Been An XBLA Title" by OtakuDante’s Gaming Inferno. It was built using the SunBurn Engine, so expect some framework talk tonight!

Firebase Industries: Website | Twitter
Matthew Leigh: Twitter

The podcast is recorded live at 10 PM Est. Friday night. Join us at http://GameMarx.com/live and chat with the show cast and other viewers. If you miss the show don’t worry, it will be posted to the GameMarx YouTube Channel and the GameMarx Podcast.

Watch GameMarx on your Xbox 360

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 19:34:50 GMT

You’ve been asking for it, and now it’s finally here! You can now watch all the GameMarx videos on your Xbox 360!

(okay, maybe that are not that many people asking, but I’m sure someone did even if they never asked us directly)

To watch GameMarx on the Xbox, go to the Apps section of the Dashboard and install the Youtube App. I know you want to have quick access to GameMarx video, and not have to search every time you visit, so with the Youtube app open go to the “my Youtube” section. You will need to link your youtube account with your Xbox – this only takes a moment. Once you’ve linked accounts, while you’re still in the web browser, visit the GameMarx Channel and subscribe.

Now GameMarx will be under the “my Youtube” / “view all” / “subscriptions” tile.

Now lean back and watch some great GameMarx Youtube videos!

Xbox 2011 Dashboard: The Movie

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 15:50:38 GMT

The previous Dashboard update, Microsoft buried Indie Games under "Speciality Shops", I made a bunch of blog posts to raise attention. Thing is, Microsoft does not listen to developers and the only thing Microsoft has responded to is issues that hit mainstream. So this year, I decided on a video approach.

In case anyone still reads blog posts, here is the list of items from a year ago which are still true today:

XBLIG can not connect to the Internet
XBLIG can not have Achievements, nor use the term
XBLIG can not have high score Leaderboards
XBLIG can not charge more than $5 for a game
XBLIG can not be played offline
XBLIG can not be played by a non-Live account
XBLIG box art / titles do not show in the friends list when you are playing an XBLIG title
XBLIG titles do not show in your game history
XBLIG titles are separated in the Marketplace from other games

If I was a consiperacy nut, I'd think Microsoft does not want Indie games to compete with their partners, and the $15 price for a new XBLA or $60 price tag for a new game has no threats. However, I'm a sane person and can see that Steam has no problem mixing AAA and Indies, and I'm sure Microsoft sees this too.

If it's not intentional though, does that just leave lazy and incompentent?

Update: The new iOS app doesn't list Xbox Indies either.

Tonight on GameMarx: Adam Spragg of Adam Spragg Games

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 18:54:06 GMT

Join us tonight as celebrate the launch of Adam Spragg Games newest release Hidden in Plain Sight! Check out the trailer below:

Adam Spragg Games: Blog | Twitter

Tonight on GameMarx: Steven Hurdle of Writings of Mass Deduction

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 20:47:28 GMT

Join us as we help Steve Hurdle celebrate the one year anniversary of Writings of Mass Deduction. For the past year Steve has chosen a worthy game each day to review. That’s 365 Xbox Live Indie games reviewed. You may question his sanity but you cannot question his commitment!

Writings of Mass Deduction – Website | Twitter

Tonight on GameMarx: Alex Jordan of ApathyWorks

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 16:33:09 GMT

Developer of XBLIG titles Cute Things Dying Violently and Around The World, Alex Jordan of ApathyWorks will be tonight’s guest on the GameMarx podcast. Alex works a mysterious “government job” by day, but “every now and then, he is overtaken by fits of ambition that has yet to be stomped out by cubicle drudgery. Armed with 15 years of game development knowledge, Alex has decided to stake out his corner of the indie scene by using Microsoft's XNA platform to market games for Windows and Xbox Live Indie Games.”

ApathyWorks: website | twitter | facebook

Tonight on GameMarx: XNA MVP Jim Perry of Mach X Games

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 15:30:00 GMT

Our guest tonight is Jim Perry, “a code monkey that writes boring business apps and website code during the day and indie games at night and Microsoft XNA MVP”. If I have to write an intro for who Jim Perry is, you must be very new to the XBLIG scene =)

Mach X Games: Blog | Twitter

Tonight on GameMarx: Matt Davis of Barkers Crest Studio

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 15:30:00 GMT

Barkers Crest Studio is a small game development team based out of Houston, Texas. So small in fact there is only one member of the team: Matt Davis. That didn’t stop them from releasing The Avatar Legends, quite possibly the largest RPG featuring your Avatar!

Barkers Crest Studio: Website | Twitter

Tonight on GameMarx: Mark Harvey of Checkmark Games

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 15:30:00 GMT

Checkmark Games was created in 2011 by Mark Harvey as a means to promote games he has made. The studio is a one man show and Mark is a professional .NET developer by day with nearly 20 years of experience as a software developer.

Checkmark Games just released Dark Delve (GameMarx Review), a first person dungeon crawler where the player explores a sinister dungeon and engages deadly monsters in exciting turn based combat.

Checkmark Games: Website | Twitter

Dive into Dark Delve

contact@gamemarx.com (Dylan) — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 11:00:00 GMT

GameMarx Rating: Try

CheckMark Games threw down the gauntlet and offered us our first shot at a pre-release review with Dark Delve:

Dark Delve is a first person dungeon crawler where the player explores a sinister dungeon and engages deadly monsters in exciting turn based combat. Create a custom group of characters to dissolve a centuries old curse in the 6+ hour campaign or test your skill in one of several unique challenges available. The dungeons abound with secrets to uncover and enemies to defeat.

At first glance, Dark Delve reminds me of classic 3D dungeon crawlers such as Bard’s Tale or Eye of the Beholder. Old-school fantasy gamers will feel at home with the basic mechanics of exploration: treasure chests, secret doors, monster encounters (planned and wandering), traps, and puzzles.

The combat system throws in a few twists, including a chain/break system and performance-based rewards and healing. As a fan of older turn-based RPGs (such as the original Final Fantasy and Dragon Warrior), this was more complexity than I initially expected. However, it encourages faster, riskier kills over long, drawn-out strategies, so I spent more time on exploration than on combat (which is my preference).

The class system offers an excellent range of abilities without being excessive. Three core classes (warrior, mage, and rogue) keep character creation simple. Each class has three skill trees (such as Knight, Paladin, Assassin, and Druid), which offer a wider range of builds.

Exploration will likely make or break this game for most people. As an Explorer, I spent around 5 hours thoroughly exploring the first dungeon, and barely scratching the surface of two others. Suffice it to say, the 6 hour campaign is an underestimate for me.

However, if you’re into combat, the exploration aspect may not entice you. The first dungeon doesn’t give many hints and it’s not a small map. In addition, features like the “rest” meter can be frustrating–I didn’t keep track of the altars that act as resting points, so I found myself making trips back to the surface often.

I rate this game a Try. If you like old-school fantasy RPG, this is everything you love in a more modern package. If you’re not a fan of the genre, it probably won’t change your mind. But it’s definitely worth a try–or even two, as one eight-minute trial may not be enough to fully get a handle on all of the mechanics.

Tonight on GameMarx: Niklas Hansson of Defrost Games

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 15:30:00 GMT

Deforst Games has described their upcoming game Project Temporality as “Portal meets Braid on crack, with avatars.” Do I really need to write more of a teaser to join the show tonight than that? Okay, here is the trailer:

Deforst Games: Website

Tonight on GameMarx: Daniel Steger of Stegersaurus Games

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 12:20:04 GMT

Stegersaurus Games is a longer time developer of Xbox Live Indie Games, including Baby Maker Extreme (and sequel), Can You Handle 2 At Once, and one of my personal favorites This Is Hard. Stegersaurus Games has even been mentioned a few times on G4TV:

Stegersaurus Games current project is Pixel Animator 3D. Pixel Animator 3D will be an animation studio for the Xbox 360 using voxels (think Minecraft blocks) as the basic drawing unit. A glimpse into what is possible is below:

Daniel Steger and Stegersaurus Games: Twitter | Website | Youtube

Also:

Happy Birthday Steger!

Tonight on GameMarx: Colin Totten of ThotLab Games

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 10:11:05 GMT

Colin Totten is half of a two man team at ThotLab Games, creators of the Xbox Live Indie Game G.O.R.K, and currently working on their next title (codenamed: Thunder in the Sky).

ThotLab Games: Website | Blog

Tonight on GameMarx: Scott MacKintosh of IndieCity

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 12:45:40 GMT

Scott MacKintosh is the community manager for the upcoming site IndieCity.com. The site aims to be more than just another eCommerce portal, but a full indie game destination. And yes, they plan to have Achievements and Leaderboards (you’re on notice Microsoft!).

Scott MacKintosh, in his own words:

I’m Scott and I’m the community bod for IndieCity, I previously worked at Eurogamer. You might know me more as PiD, or not at all! I’ve been a gamer all my life, starting off with a ZX Spectrum +2 which graduated onto a 286 monster PC where I pretty much stayed, though my machine has had a slight upgrade since then. I’m normally found on my Minecraft Server, playing ARMA 2 with the fine gents from RPS or trawling the internet for new random games to find.

IndieCity: WebSite | Blog | FaceBook | Twitter

Tonight on GameMarx: Guillaume Boucher-Vidal of Nine Dots Studio

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 11:22:13 GMT

Instead of starting out with the “about” info, I’ll just post their latest trailer for Brand, an upcoming XBLIG title:

That looks awesome!

About Nine Dots Studio: Nine Dots is currently a team of five indie developers working full time with no salary. The company was founded by Guillaume Boucher-Vidal last November after quitting his job at Activision. The studio intends to release self-published titles through digital platforms such as Xbox Live and Steam.

Website: www.ninedotsstudio.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/NineDotsStudio

New Gameplay Trailer of Cell:emergence

contact@gamemarx.com (Mike) — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 11:04:24 GMT

Last month we had Sheldon Pacotti as a guest on the GameMarx podcast. In the podcast we talk about Sheldon’s current project, Cell:emergence and the big question – what is this game?! This was a common question, so Sheldon has released a new trailer explaining the gameplay in detail. Below is the video, and press release from New Life Interactive, LLC.

For immediate release:

"Cell: emergence" Extended Gameplay Video Introduces "Massively Reactive Gameplay"

New Life Interactive, LLC, announced today the release of an extended gameplay video for its first title, "Cell: emergence" (PC, XBLIG). (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOu9QhWGla0). The video shows off unusual game mechanics based on "dynamic voxels" -- voxels which contain not just visual data but also game-state.

These mechanics layer arcade-style action on top of a "cellular automata" simulation of the human body. Fast-paced yet tactical, the resulting game challenges the player's mind as well as his reflexes.

"Massively reactive" describes game mechanics that leverage massive processing power for game interactions, rather than just visuals. New Life Interactive believes that massively reactive gameplay will be a fruitful area of innovation for the next generation of games, which will be able to leverage GPGPUs for much more than just visuals.

ABOUT CELL: EMERGENCE

View the trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6aJKNBxris
Platforms: PC and Xbox Live Indie Games
Release date: targeting August or September 2011

In "Cell: emergence," players pilot a nanobot through the body of a sick little girl, melting infections with self-replicating colloids, building shields and pathways with buckyfibers, and shredding germs with monofilament "daisycutter" depth-charges.

The game also offers a lean but provocative story, arresting illustrations by Lindsay Rigling Smith of L R Studios (lrstudios.blogspot.com), visionary sound design by Robin Arnott of Wraughk (http://www.wraughk.com/), creator of Deep Sea (http://www.wraughk.com/show.php?title=DeepSea), a game made entirely from sound which won this year's Independent Propellar Innovation award at SXSW, and professional voice acting cast and produced by Adam Hilton.

Also, musician and composer Logan Middleton of The Laughing (http://www.wearethelaughing.com/) has created a genre-bending soundtrack, excerpted in the trailer, which maintains a constant tempo throughout the entire game experience. The tempo remains tightly synced from the moment the game is launched to the moment it ends, inducing a state of entrainment in the player's mind. Enter the world of Cell, and you may never return.

ABOUT NEW LIFE INTERACTIVE, LLC

New Life Interactive, LLC is an indie game studio based in Austin, TX that specializes in experimental game concepts and technologies.
http://www.newlifeinteractive.com