Lumines Live! on XBLA

By Tom Bramwell Published 18 October, 2006

Contra, Gyruss etc. to follow.

Xbox Live may have been down since Tuesday, but when it pops back up in the (very) near future, you'll be able to download Lumines Live! via Xbox Live Arcade. (Update: And now it has.)

The previously PSP-only puzzle game costs 1200 Microsoft points (GBP 10.20 / EUR 13.96), and for that you get classic puzzling, a time attack mode, online head-to-head play, and 12 different skins to work through. Skins of course change up the gameplay as well as the backgrounds.

On top of that, you will soon be able to spend 600 Microsoft points (GBP 5.10 / EUR 6.98) on an "Advance Pack" which adds 22 new skins (as well as adding a golden yacht to Tetsuya Mizuguchi's berth at Tokyo harbour, presumably).

Microsoft also revealed this week that we can expect to see Contra, Gyruss, Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, Mutant Storm Empire and Small Arms among others within the coming weeks of Xbox Live Arcade.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (37) Latest comment 5 years ago

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

  • InfiniteFury #1 5 years ago

    £10s worth of good? Is it, anyone?

  • Eighthours #2 5 years ago

    Finally!

    There's hope for Duke Nukem Forever after all...

  • jlaakso #3 5 years ago

    Contra!

  • haowan #4 5 years ago

    It's a rip.

  • escapedape #5 5 years ago

    As expensive as it seems, at least they haven't gone with what was rumoured to be the original plan of charging for vs. modes and so on.

    Don't forget that the PSP version cost like £34.99 when it came out - I think that this just seems ridiculously expensive when compared to all of the other Arcade titles - there are lots of 800 point games that provide real longevity (Marble Blast, Cloning Clyde, Outpost Kaloki X to name a few), and even Geometry Wars only costs 400 points.

    For me, Lumines is a no-brainer - it's a great game, and £15 doesn't seem too steep for me to play the game with all of the extra skins and so on when I can play it on the TV in glorious 5.1 sound.

  • mentat #6 5 years ago

    MK3?

    /Excellent!

  • Aretak #7 5 years ago

    Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 should be good. I bet it's at least 1200 points though.

  • Chester #8 5 years ago

    Well, 1800 MS Points seems reasonable to me...not bad...

    Anyway, I knew there was a reason for writing...oh yes, that's it...

    LUMINES!! AVAILABLE!!! NOW !! (or soon, anyway...) Yippee, Yippee!
    Edited by 1 at 18/10/06 @ 09:45

  • HyperShadow #9 5 years ago

    This may sound daft, but why didn't they just charge 1800 for it from the start as a full game?

    I can't see the reasoning for this price structure at this point.

  • haowan #10 5 years ago

    It gives people the chance to play the game for 'less' and if they don't love it and want more skins then they don't have to get 'em. Seems good to me.

  • Dodgymat #11 5 years ago

    I'm guessing they used this structure as the full pack with 34 skins may have been over the desired 50MB for XBLA games.

    Still, £15 for one of the top puzzlers with live multiplayer is a bargain. Cash me in !

  • Foundry #12 5 years ago

    Xbox Live is back up. Downloading Lumines now, and I've just noticed a Splinter Cell demo, how long's that been there.

    Ta.

  • Dodgymat #13 5 years ago

    SC:DA went up Saturday morning.

    Looks like I was right, the game is 50.61MB. I haven't seen the size of the extras pack as Live went back down.

    But I'm playing Lumines !

  • Sl1pstream #14 5 years ago

    Am I the only one who gets disconnected from Live when I'm playing Lumines?

  • optimusprym8 #15 5 years ago

    damn you all! am at work and not going to be able to play it for ages, damn crunch time.

  • coojam #16 5 years ago

    I get disconnected too. What happened to the exciting changes when Xbox Live went back up anyway?

  • #17 5 years ago

    Way to overprice the hell out of it.

    At 800 points this would be a no-brainer.

    At 1200, having played the PSP original, I am not very tempted.

  • haowan #18 5 years ago

    And that's with only 12 skins man, you can probably unlock that shit in about 10 minutes.

  • stormuk #19 5 years ago

    Confused about the overpriced comments as its not one of the raft of 15 year old arcade clones and is a commerical game

    Loved it on the PSP so will def get this - roll on 6pm so I can get home to play it!

  • haowan #20 5 years ago

    It's not the only non-retro-rehash game on the arcade you know. at 1800 points it's 50% more expensive than any other title on there.

  • t8yman #21 5 years ago

    I heard the ps3 version comes on 2 bluray discs, reckon theres any truth in that?

  • Dr.Mott #22 5 years ago

    Dammit, I need more points...

  • Jimster71 #23 5 years ago

    It's just like having a huge PSP :o)

  • riz23 #24 5 years ago

    Is the music the same as the PSP version? Also I used to play Lumines obsessively but I never noticed that the skins changed the gameplay in any way. Perhaps you could mentally sort certain skins better than others but they are all the same essentially no? As much as I love Lumines I don't think I'll be paying a tenner to play it again on a different games machine with achievements. If you've never played it however, by all means go get it!

  • Almyn #25 5 years ago

    Well i'm am certainly disappointed with this.

    1200 points for 12 skins and multiplater.The puzzle, Mission and vs CPU modes are locked after a couple of lvls.Requiring another content pack to unlock them.

    I thought it had been confrmed long ago that we would ge tthe full game for 1200 points, With further skins to be added in content packs.That would be fine, But puzzle and mission modes should not be premium extras.

  • bloodflowers #26 5 years ago

    Well it worked long enough for me to grab the demo, but then marketplace died, preventing me from buying the full version.

    Now seeing the above comment about how much is disabled - I'm glad, and will save 10 quid.

  • #27 5 years ago

    Gyruss! Gyruss!

    That pushes my funny bone no end! (In a good way)!

    Shame I can't buy a 360 for just the Live Arcade offerings.

  • haowan #28 5 years ago

    Oh, did they really lock the other modes as well? I thought it was just the skins in that exra pack? That's one extra dose of lollerskates here.

  • lennon #29 5 years ago

    Wheres my £15

    /oops I mean 1800 points

  • HenryMancini #30 5 years ago

    +1 for effort maybe, but -5 for tedium...

    Got it, love it to bits. Nearly went blind playing this to death on my PSP - best thing off marketplace to date, and that's saying something because I've had some great fun off there lately.

    @ riz23 - "never noticed that the skins changed the gameplay in any way" - odd! I find that the appearance of certain skins freaks me out, thus totally changing the gameplay. The red/white balls skin did that for ages until I cracked it, and now it's the circles/squares on pastel backgrounds that makes me twitchy...

  • trevd72 #31 5 years ago

    they should let you know up front what is disabled. i guess its in a hope that gamer gets a "shit i'll hang for killing one man i may as well kill'em all mentality" if you know what i mean. its cynical to make you think you get everything then ask for more money to continue.

  • Matooine #32 5 years ago

    they are really milking it:-

    The base game will ship with 12 skins in Challenge Mode, as well as additional content downloadable via Xbox Live Marketplace. Then, within an unspecified time, several more game packs will get released. They'll include three package types: 1) a Music/Video pack, 2) a Mission/Puzzle/Skins pack, and 3) an Advanced Difficulty pack. The core game will include Warner Brothers' artists such as Madonna among others. The addition Music/Video pack will feature more artists and seamlessly integrated interactive videos. The Mission/Puzzle/Skins pack will offer gamers new mission types, new puzzles and additional skins to complement the experiences. And the Advanced Difficulty pack will give the deepest, hardcore players a new set of challenges.

    Each additional pack costs 600 points!
    Edited by 1 at 18/10/06 @ 15:45

  • haowan #33 5 years ago

    Source?

  • Steroyd #34 5 years ago

    so £5 for 3 different sets of packs, ontop of the £15 quid you've already spent.

    Guess it works out pretty much even between XBLA and PSP version then.

  • haowan #35 5 years ago

    Lumines PSP £16.99 (thanks tiddles)

    Of course, this is only relevant to those with PSPs and who would like to play the game on handheld rather than on their big HDTV. Most PSP owners will probably have at least played Lumines anyway.

    It's certainly a good purchase for 1200 points but if the real truth is that the full whack is going to be 2,500 points...
    Edited by 1 at 18/10/06 @ 16:02

  • schoozzzmmii #36 5 years ago

    I’m fine with the slightly inflated cost compared to other live titles. Have never played the PSP version but got hooked on Lumines Mobile a while back before my handset broke and the damn digital rights management locked me out of transferring it to my replacement.

    However, it’s a bit much if other users of my 360 can’t upload their hi-scores because of Microsoft’s policy that users can only upload scores if they’ve purchased the game. Fine, I’ll buy a second copy of Pac Man for my better half because, at a couple of quid, the bank’s not broken for her own place on the Live scoreboard. But getting the whole Lumines 360 package is nearer 15 or 20 quid. Being made to buy it more than once is a ridiculous proposition and it’s a shame because she, like many others out there I’d wager, is exactly the target of Live.

  • Rambaldi #37 5 years ago

    Urm, another block gamzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz....