Work on Breath of Death VII is going well. Most of the game’s graphics are finished as well as a good chunk of the game engine. We’re hoping to have a beta version of the game done within a couple of weeks at which point we’ll have many more screenshots to show off.
Sorry about the lack of reviews lately. Between working hard on BoD7 (trying to get it finished in time for the Dream-Build-Play contest at the beginning of March) and some problems with my computer (going to get a new one soon), it’s been difficult to get on. Hopefully, this will change shortly.
I wanted to take a moment to talk about BoD7’s pricing. It was a hard decision, but in the end, we decided to go with the lowest price point and place it in the 80 MS points ($1) bracket. Now, some could argue that with a game in a popular genre that is poorly represented on the service, we might be able to make more money with a higher price point, but in the end, my analysis of sales data from other games seems to indicate that the average consumer views XBLIGs as a place to pick up $1 game diversions. Sure, there are a few exceptions (like the music creation software, ezMuze), but for the most part, good games get ignored unless they’re $1. So the pricing decision is part altruism (let’s give everyone a great game for a really low price) and part self-interest (the increased sales should more than make up for the lowered amount of profit per game sold).
And to go with that, I’d just like to comment on the thought that the race to the bottom with pricing is a bad thing. I hear developers talk about how they can’ t afford to price their games at lower prices and then watch them crash and burn as their game fails in the marketplace, largely due to their price. It’s not that you can’t afford to price your games at a lower price, it’s that you can’t afford not to. Take Pixeljunk Monsters Deluxe for the PSP. Fantastic tower defense game with tons of content that you could easily spend week after week trying to master and finish. $20 price tag. It’s failing big time on the PSN and I’m sure the price tag is the primary reason – people see the high price tag and are scared away, even though if they actually bought the game, they’d probably find it to be well worth the money.
With all of the many options available to gamers (both free and otherwise), your average gamer is going to be looking for ways to justify against buying your game. Your job is to remove his excuses. Picking a low price point is a great method to that end.
Zeboyd Entertainment is proud to announce their upcoming game, Breath of Death VII: The Beginning for the XBox 360. Join Dem the Skeleton Knight, Sara the Ghost Historian, Lita the Vampire Techie, and Erik the Zombie Prince as they explore a world filled with the undead, searching for the secrets of the past. Some game features include:
Fast turn-based combat!
Retro visuals reminiscent of the best of 8-bit & 16-bit RPGs!
720p!
World map filled with several dungeons & locations to explore!
Frequent LVing up with a deep, yet easy to understand character upgrade system!
Special multi-character techniques & a combo count system add strategic depth to combat!
All this for the low, low price of 80 MS points ($1 USD)!
Breath of Death VII will be coming to XBox Live Indie Games in March-April of 2010.
Hi everyone. This is just a quick announcement to let you know that there will be an announcement about Zeboyd Entertainment’s next game later today. Just a couple of teaser pieces of information.
1 – It’s not going to be the Mulan RPG idea because an even better idea came up shortly after I posted that earlier announcement.
2 – A new member has joined our team. W.C. Stiernberg is a talented artist and will be providing the artwork, graphics, and animation for the game as well as work on level designs.
Look forward to the announcement, box art and visuals shortly (probably within the hour).
Crosstown - a rather enjoyable retro Action/Shooter/Maze game – has recently had a price drop to 80 MS points. I thought it’s initial price of 400 was a bit much compared to the competition, but at its new dirt-cheap price, I highly recommend it.
VVVVVV
for PC & Mac
When I saw my first screenshots of VVVVVV, I was a bit incredulous. Someone wants to charge $15 for a platformer with graphics that even I could draw? There’s retro and then there’s RETRO and VVVVVV definitely falls under the latter category. Still, I was willing to give Distractionware the benefit since I enjoyed one of their earlier freeware titles (Don’t Look Back) and I’m glad I did, because VVVVVV is one of the finest platformers I’ve had the pleasure to play.
The premise is simple – you’re the captain of a spaceship, something goes wrong, and you have to rescue your scattered crewmates, using only your ability to run and flip gravity whenever you’re standing on a solid surface. The game is part exploration game (in addition to your main goal, there are twenty trinkets hidden throughout the game), part puzzle game (one optional puzzle in particular really impressed me as being very creative), but mostly it’s a reflex-driven action game where you’re trying to avoid spikes (hence the name) and enemies. It’s very hard, but more importantly, it’s very fair. Respawn spots are littered generously through the game, teleporters to get around the map are frequent, and all of the game mechanics were very obviously presented to the player so if you can’t solve a puzzle, it’s your own fault.
VVVVVV’s level design is masterful. Rarely is there a wasted moment and the player is constantly being introduced to new challenges. The game is largely non-linear, although there are a few levels in set points like the beginning and end. Generally non-linear games suffer from uneven difficulty, but here it works out just fine. Each level has its own unique feature (like gravity reversing trampolines or automatically scrolling rooms) with each level starting out easy and getting more and more difficult the further you get in.
Despite my initial hesitation, the graphics grew on me. Sure, it’s low tech, but it’s got style and reminded me a little of ZZT (an old favorite of mine). The music, on the other hand, was simply fantastic and would have done even the best NES game proud.
The game took me a little over 2 hours to complete and about 30-60 minutes extra to acquire all twenty trinkets. That’s admittedly short, but after beating the game, there are some extra modes like time trials and a very difficult action-packed survival mode so you could end up spending far more time if you like chasing high scores.
Is VVVVVV worth your money? That depends. If you’re low on cash and looking for a game that will last you a long time, then probably not since there are many games that are much longer or have more replayability. On the other hand, if you’re looking for a great memorable experience like Braid or Portal, then I highly recommend VVVVVV. I thoroughly enjoyed it from start to finish and I’m sure I’ll return to it later this year to work on my time trial scores.
Recently, I’ve had a trial of faith when it comes to game development. Let’s look at the sales statistics of my first two games, shall we?
Epiphany in Spaaace! (released Oct 20th) (Purchases/Trials)
October – 322/2418 = 13.32%
November – 96/284 = 33.8%
December – 90/263 = 34.22%
Total 2009 – 421/2965 = 14.2%
Molly the Were-Zompire (released Dec 10th)
December & Total 2009 – 355/3651 = 9.72%
Now, on the one hand, I know I should probably be pleased with these figures. I’ve made two interactive novels that are almost entirely text based on one of the most powerful gaming systems available at the moment and I’ve sold several hundreds of copies of each, which is far more than some games on the service has sold. On the other hand, you have other games that have made their creator’s over $100k so as someone who was hoping to turn independent game development into a viable part-time job and maybe even a full-time job, making around $500 for your first quarter is disheartening.
Even moreso than the money, Molly the Were-Zompire’s reception has been discouraging. Despite my thinking that it was the superior game, it’s getting worse ratings that Epiphany in Spaaace and is selling slightly less despite getting more trial downloads. Still, there’s no point in getting too depressed about the matter. Rather, I’ve been trying to figure out what I did wrong with Molly so that I can do better with the next game. After much thought, here are some things that I think may have caused its poor performance.
1 – The pictures may have thrown people off. In Molly, I put in around a dozen intentionally bad pictures as a joke. I’m afraid that some people may have found these pictures to be less funny and more bad.
2 – Less focused. In Epiphany, I received some complaints that the humor was too focused – all sci-fi cliches and not much else – so with Molly, I tried to do a wider range of humor. So in Molly, you got some 4th wall jokes, RPG cliches, various gaming references, undead stuff, and just random silliness. People knew what to expect in Epiphany (Star Trek & other sci-fi cliches) whereas with Molly, there was less certainty.
3 – It’s essentially a stand-alone expansion pack. Sure, the plot & characters are all new (like many expansion packs), but nothing else is substantially different than Epiphany. In both games, you read a story, make choices, and see what the result of those choices are and that’s it. Either game can be experienced in a single play session of an hour or two. Had the second game had substantial improvements like beautiful artwork, new gameplay elements, more content, or drastically better writing, I think it would have been received much better.
I think that last reason is the key. It’s evident from these two games that there’s an audience for straight Interactive Fiction on the XBox 360, but it’s not a horribly large one. If I drastically improved my writing skills or art skills, that audience would probably increase, but I imagine not drastically. On the other hand, if I was to expand my games so that they’re not just interactive novels but also traditional RPGs with all the character building & strategic combat that a good game on the genre entails, I think I would hit a much larger demographic. RPGers aren’t necessarily attached to great graphics – just look at the niche popularity of text-based roguelikes – so I think that a quality entirely text-based RPG could go over very well.
So that will be my next project – a text based console-style RPG. My working title is “Mulan vs. the Zombie Apocalypse.” I’ll talk about some of the gameplay specifics in my next post.
Hi guys. Sorry for not posting much lately. Christmas was distracting as expected. This week, when I was planning on getting back in the game, I not only got fairly sick, but fairly injured (head injury – bloody and painful, but thankfully not a concussion).
XBLIG have been pretty quiet as far as interesting games go of late. I guess it makes sense – if you had a game that was almost done, you probably wanted to release it before Christmas rather than right after.
Anyway, here are a few games released recently that I thought were worth checking out:
Tobe’s Vertical Adventure – Here’s a platformer where you descend into caves, grab the treasure and then have to hurry back out before the cave collapses. Fun with cute graphics.
Twin Blades – This sidescrolling action game where an anime nun runs around killing zombies with melee & gun attacks has some of the most gorgeous graphics I’ve seen on the service. Gameplay seemed a bit repetitive, but the developer has said that they plan on adding to the game so it might be worth keeping an eye on.
Pixel Whirled – It’s basically playing 2 games of Space Invaders at the same time. Kind of fun, but what really got me was the pitch perfect replication of the 8-bit NES era in the presentation (check out that box art!).
Arkedo Series 03 – Pixel! – Arkedo is the XBLIG developer to watch IMO. This 2D platformer has a unique minimalist look, a good sense of humor, and fun run & jump gameplay.
I’m not sure when it’ll go up, but Samurai vs. Zombies was quite the fun 3D brawler when I played it in playtesting. Hopefully, it’ll go up soon so that all can enjoy it.
Anyway, that it’s for tonight. In my next entry, I’ll be talking about my current game project. Stay tuned!
We’re at the end of 2009 so I thought I’d present my top 10 favorite games of the year (parenthesis indicates the platform I played each one on). In no particular order…
1 – Batman: Arkham Asylum (360) – This game reminds me a lot of Persona 4 in that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Persona 4 was a decent dungeon crawler combined with a decent anime life sim, but when you put the two together, you got one of the best games ever. Similarly, Batman: Arkham Asylum is a good brawler, good stealth game, good exploration game, and good Action/RPG, but put it all together and you get one of the best games I’ve ever played.
2 – Plants vs. Zombies (PC) – A unique take on the tower defense genre that also happens to be one of the funniest games of the year. I loved the game, even though I found it overly easy, but it quickly became my wife’s favorite game ever. For a game to thoroughly entertain both of us, despite our vastly different tastes in games, is no small feat.
3 – Defense Grid: The Awakening (XBLA) – Great graphics, excellent gameplay balance, and well designed levels all make this the tower defense game to beat for hardcore strategy.
4 – Splosion Man (XBLA) – Another hilarious game that also ends up being one of the most enjoyable fast-paced platformers ever. Forget New Super Mario Bros. Wii, this is the game you want for both single and multiplayer platforming action.
5 – Torchlight (PC) – Titan Quest has long been my reigning champion for Hack & Slash RPGs since it’s arrival in 2006. Torchlight doesn’t overthrow it, but it’s nearly as good and different enough to be worth playing.
6 – Devil Survivor (DS) – A great branching story combined with an unusual take on the Strategy/RPG genre made Devil Survivor my favorite DS game this year. In the end, I grew tired as the battles became more tedious than fun, but for the first 20 hours or so, I was completely captivated.
7 – Half-Minute Hero (PSP) – Best RPG parody I’ve ever played. I’ve been trying to figure out how to do a great mini-RPG since the start of XBox Live Indie Games and Half-Minute Hero finally showed me one way to do it. Take all the essence of a standard RPG, cut out the filler, and speed the whole thing up about 100 times and you’ve got one frantic game that’s a blast to play.
8 – Rock Band Unplugged (PSP) – When I first heard of this game, I thought it sounded like a waste of space. Then I tried it and was instantly hooked. Whereas Rock Band on the home consoles is a great multiplayer game, Rock Band Unplugged is a far better single player game. Having to control all 4 instruments throughout the course of a song makes for much more interesting gameplay and a good deal of immersion.
9 – LocoRoco: Midnight Carnival (PSP) – I never got into the first 2 LocoRoco games because they seemed far too slow and easy. LocoRoco: Midnight Carnival fixes all that by being one of the hardest games on the system. At first, the controls were confusing and unintuitive (couldn’t do wall jumps consistently) but after messing around a bit with the demo levels, everything clicked and I was hooked. If you’re the kind of person who liked Mirror’s Edge for its time trials & speed runs, this is the game for you.
10 – Shin Megami Tensei: Persona (PSP) – At first I held off on this one. $40 for a game I’ve already played where most of the graphics are still the same? I’m glad I finally decided to get it. Despite the old graphics, this version of Persona has been drastically improved in many ways. The music is fantastic, the new cutscenes gorgeous, and the translation drastically improved, but what really got me was the increased speed. Load times on the PSN version are next to nothing and with the option to skip animation in combat, the whole game is a much faster and more enjoyable game. I’m really looking forward to trying out the restored content (Snow Queen Quest) once I finish with the main game.
Honorable Mentions – FF4: After Years, Droplitz.
Best Pre-2009 game that I finally got around to playing this year – Tales of Vesperia
Most Disappointing Game – Resident Evil 5 (Adding multiplayer really threw off the delicate mixture of excellence that RE4 had going for it. Still fun, but I expected more. Oh well, at least Mercenaries was better than ever)
The latest week in review is up. Check it out here.
Herman has a lot going for it. The beginning (which parodies Braid) made me laugh. The graphics have a lot of style (alternating between cartoony and surreal), the music is good, and the story is amusing. The problem is that the game just isn’t very fun.
Herman wants to escape the drudgery of his life, but various office staff stand in his way. The gameplay is reminiscent of old arcade maze games like Lode Runner or Popeye. Each level has 4 floors connected with ladders and full of a whole lot of enemies. Using jump kicks, a shovel, and tangerines, Herman needs to get through each level to the door at the end. At the end of each level, you’re graded on your performance and gain points which can be used to upgrade your stats.
Herman isn’t a very capable hero. Herman is slow. Really slow. There’s an upgrade to speed him up, but it’s the most expensive upgrade in the store so you’re looking at several levels of skipping other upgrades to save up for it. Herman is also weak. There’s an upgrade to improve the power of his jump kicks, but that’s the second most expensive upgrade in the store and if you purchase it, you’re not purchasing the speed up upgrade. Even if you do power-up the jump kick, the hit detection isn’t the best up close so it’s not as useful as it could be. And as far as I can tell, there are no upgrades for the tangerines (which do little damage) or shovel (which is slow) so they’re going to stay meh the whole game.
Herman’s clunky controls and general weakness are all very frustrating, but what’s especially frustrating is that the game feels like it’s on the verge of being fun but never quite makes it. Despite its flaws, I felt compelled to keep playing the game even though I wasn’t having much fun. The real shame is that with a bit more work, we might have had a game worthy of the hype here. Tighten the controls, increase the speed, add some more variety in level designs, lower the cost of upgrades, and make some tweaks here and there, and you’d have a good game, but as it is now, I can’t recommend purchasing Herman, especially at a 400 point price tag.