Heavy Weapon next on XBLA News

Good?

Bad...

Very.

Can these game titles get any more generic?

Can your comments get any more generic?

So as good as Gears then?

I tried the PC version of the game - didnt think too much of it.
Levels felt overly long and drawn-out, challenge was fairly minimal and boredom quickly set in.

When are they going to get Alien Shooter on XBLA? That would be awesome.
(Well, Alien Shooter 2 would be better but still.....)

I thought Alien Homonid HD is coming out on XBLA.

Alien Hominid was cute.

this is lame - tried it for about ten mins and was bored

Not one of popcaps, but I would love to see the strategy puzzle game Oasis appear on XBLA.

I would pay for it again to play it my telly.

Well worth checking out the PC demo for anyone interested. Its like a cross between a CIV game and a minesweeper(?)

Actually, Heavy Weapon is quite a fun little game. I played the full version of the PC original and, while easy at first, later on it becomes deviously hard. No, really.

kiigan, you was supposed to say ugly. Pfffft!

I wish they would port the likes of Alien Breed TA and such. Would be ace with online coop. Played it again last month and it still entertains me ...and me 3 yo nephew but that most likely says more about me than him. ;p

AH IS coming to XBLa but that's not what you should look out for from those guys. It's Castle Crashers that should be on your wish list from the looks of it.

And why not port Metal Slug? Would be ideal for this kind of thing. :\


What's with sega porting the likes of GA to the wii while waiting for xbla btw?

Carlo - I know, I just didn't want to play along :)

Everyone's got a game they think should be on the Arcade. I don't give a fuck what crappy old 8bit/16bit/whatever crappy game you think should be on the Arcade. I actually want them to stop churning out games we played 15 years ago.

o_O

I know this isn't one of those games, but I just wanted to get that off my chest.

What the hell happened to Worms? They said it would be out the week after CES :(

I don't think we said that, but some sites did say that based on people's rumouring and assumptions.

The game was previewed (but not formally announced) by Microsoft at CES (I was there) for it's first public showing.

Microsoft have a policy of not announcing until the week of release and all I can say is "soon" - I've already had a kicking for saying too much on our forums and my blog :)

must_have_Worms_dammit

Another game that is only interesting because it is a shooter designed to be controlled with a mouse converted to the XBLA...

Had you played Heavy Weapon, you'd know mouse control was one of its low points.

I finished it several times, and have a pretty good record in survival mode.

The game is designed around mouse control, I don't see how it can be the same game without it. Surely you know the PC has other alternatives, like keyboard and gamepad?

Yes, but the all-in-one movement and shooting scheme of the PC version was really a bad choice and it's the most criticized aspect of the game.

Criticized by who? The skill needed to control the movement and shooting (both directional and targeted) at the same time with only the mouse _is_ the game. Any other control scheme makes it another game, and the enemies/levels must be redesigned to keep it balanced and challenging...

spadge: Soon? But that's not soon enough!

I've seen the control scheme criticized in several places, like Jay is Games/Casual Gameplay ("In many respects this game is similar to Heli Attack, with the main difference being Heavy Weapon uses mouse control for movement. This is something I thought should be different. When you are confined to shooting only in the direction that the tank is moving, difficult levels become frustrating and the fun aspect of the game slips away.") and Game Tunnel ("At first, this game seems a simple wacky mindless fun time. That's before you encounter THE GLARING FLAW. THE GLARING FLAW is so heinous, it turns the wacky fun time into a brain-smashing, mouse-throwing orgy of hate and pain - and it is, incidentally, compounded by blatantly unfair nastiness (example: an enemy that drops bombs that kill you instantly no matter where you are or how shielded you are, and said bombs take a fairly large number of direct hits to destroy EACH. and he drops 3! While you're trying to fight everything else!). What is THE GLARING FLAW? Simple: your tank moves towards the mouse cursor. It sounds so benign. And yet you face enemies like Kommie Kong, who jumps over you, forcing you to dodge by moving your tank, which of course means you can't actually shoot at him, because you're moving the cursor away from him to move. Trucks come at you on the ground - wanna aim at them? Great, you're also going to be driving right into them (luckily, and uncharacteristically, this is not lethal). Wanna dodge those bombs dropping on you? Go for it! But it means you won't be shooting at the planes dropping them! Pardon the lengthiness, friends. this game isn't terrible, it's even fun at first - but I'm just utterly aghast that something so broken is coming from Popcap Games, the masters of polish (incidentally, the art in this game is also unpolished and all over the place stylistically - so weird!).").

Granted, some people like its method of control, but I'm among those who absolutely detest it. Yes, changing the control method would mean changing the game, but, in my opinion, the resulting game would be just so much better. The XBLA port has the chance to do just that.

Ok insane_cobra, you (and the reviewers you mention) didn't like the control method, that's your right.

For me, OTHO, it was exactly the novel control method that made me play the game over many other "me too" shooters. It takes time to master, but you _can_ shoot in any direction without moving. If you put the cursor inside the tank it will stop moving, and then you can aim anywhere with very small and precise mouse movements. It is an essential technic to overcome some bosses. Those reviewers you mention probably never managed to master the game well enough to finish it. Instead they blamed the control method and moved on to other games...

Anyway, it can still be a great XBLA game, but it will not be the same game as the PC version. Maybe they should make a Wii version with pointer control.

LeD: can your mother get any more generic?

justMe, I did master its controls and managed to finish the game, I just didn't like them. But it's a compliment to the game that I still found it a lot of fun, despite of that.