Microsoft unveils Live Arcade trump cards

By Robert Purchese Published 14 July, 2008

South Park, GeoWars 2, Galaga, more.

Xbox Live executive John Schappert lifted the lid on Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2, Galaga Legions, UNO Rush and South Park for Xbox Live Arcade during Microsoft's E3 press conference.

There's also an Xbox Live Arcade-exclusive Portal release featuring new challenges, as well as the original single-player campaign from The Orange Box, to look forward to.

Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2 is due out next month and promises a "remixed version" of the original Xbox Live Arcade game along with five new gameplay modes.

Waves (an unlockable game in Project Gotham Racing 4) returns "supercharged and tweaked", while the original game's famous "Pacifism" achievement has been extrapolated into an entire gameplay mode, and newcomers King, Deadline and Sequence will also vy for attention. As well as solo modes for each, GWRE2 offers four-player co-op and competitive options on a single console, and there's also something called "Co-Pilots", where one person moves while the other shoots.

Graphics are in full 1080p and there's a new soundtrack, 12 unlockable Achievements "designed to encourage players to see the game from a different angle" and full XBLA leaderboard support. Check out our Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2 screenshot gallery to see what it all looks like.

Galaga Legions is also due out next month as well, and is being made by the team behind the excellent Pac-Man Championship Edition. It looked bonkers during its demo reel, with enemies swarming in from all sides and weird patterns of baddies - such as conga lines - swooping in for the kill.

There's also a South Park game planned for Live Arcade in 2009 as well, although we saw little more than the potty-mouthed quartet waving at us in a trailer.

UNO Rush is due out this year and builds on the original Live Arcade instalment with more of the same; more multiplayer options, more rule customisation, more variants.

It also has camera and avatar support. Microsoft unveiled a Mii-like avatar system that will launch alongside a redesigned Xbox Live dashboard this autumn and UNO Rush was the game chosen to show how "Live Parties" can be taken into multiplayer games at will.

Finally, the publisher said to expect the first Xbox Live Community games to launch in the autumn along with the dashboard update, and these will include Hot Potato Online, Word Soup and Colosseum according to the on-screen video reel.

Head over to our live text coverage of the conference to see how it all unfolded.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (10) Latest comment 4 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Dizzy #1 4 years ago

    /faints

    Gimme!

    /faints again
    Edited by 1 at 14/07/08 @ 20:15

  • Uncle_Fishboy #2 4 years ago

    cock bollocks

  • penhalion #3 4 years ago

    My take on the 3 based on the keynote footage

    Southpark....WTF you didn't show me nothing!
    Geometry Wars 2....WTF, with all the psychadelic explosions I couldn't see nothing!
    Galaga legions...WTF, There were so many enemies you wouldn't stand a chance!
    Uno Rush....er ok I like Uno so er this was actually a nice announcement.
    Portal.....isn't this just the orange box version with a new challenge mode?!?

  • evild_edd #4 4 years ago

    @penhalion - my thoughts on your post: you've lost the plot!!!

    GW2. Short of an announcement that they were release Shenmue 3 (I need to let this go......), this is an awesome announcement. Co-op gameplay for GW!!!! BRILLIANT!

    Need to see the vid for Galaga Rush.

    As for Portal, I've posted a comment on the 'Portal 2' news item on the main page. In short, if there's enough in it and it's like the budgie, then I'll be tempted despite having just finished Portal yesterday.......

  • penhalion #5 4 years ago

    @evild_edd

    lost the plot how exactly. By having a different opinion to you perhaps?

  • evild_edd #6 4 years ago

    Yes, you now understand!!!! (joking)

    I must say that failure to be unexcited about GW:RE2 can only be explained by one of the following:

    1. Death
    2. Insanity
    3. Death resulting directly or indirectly from insanity

  • Junglist95 #7 4 years ago

    Like the sound of a Galaga remake, but like penhalion says i hope it ain't to over the top, i always found the original to be a tuff challenge

  • poloman #8 4 years ago

    geometry wars doesnt excite me either
    looking forward to south park game if it is any good, hope it is

  • stevencole7 #9 4 years ago

    ........and not one of them will be less than 800 points!

  • dirtysteve #10 4 years ago

    If these are the trump cards, i weep for Live Arcade.