1:48 is still the best part ever.

I don't know about voice chat in multiplayer, but from what I've seen, the second should work.

It's a nice game for 800 pts.

Is all the praise coming from the multiplayer? I only play games for the single player. Is the story any good or is it a type of Serious Sam old school kind of game? I like both but prefer the former over the latter.

The single player is good, so far. I've only played a few hours, though.

I almost never play on xbox live. Too many 12 year olds talking smack for my tastes.

The SP is alot of fun, but I get lost quite a bit. You definitely realize how much "hand holding" there is in today's games.

Yeah, I'm so used to checkpoints, that when I died at the end of a lengthy mission on Special Agent I swore at my TV.

There's a difference between "hand holding" and clear, competent level design. I'm not sure which side of the line this game sits. Still it's impressive enough and for 800 points and with full MP, how can you say "no"?

Now I'm back to Scrap Metal. I'm still not digging the demo too much, but if it's "only" going to cost me 800 points net, maybe it's worth it. I still don't know. Anyone here have it? Like it?

Perfect Dark has plenty of fun stuff to do as a single player outside of the story mode. There's the shooting range in Carringtion Institute, 30 challenges in the combat simulator or you can create costume matches just with bots.

Listening to Major Nelson's latest podcast and there's an interview with Frank Pape (the big brain behind Game Room) and they're making Game Room sound very impressive. At least from the technical and passion sides behind it.

There's some great leaderboard type stuff in there about seeing banners on your cabinets if a friend has beaten your score. You'll be able to see "red" take over your arcade unless you man up.

No talk about Windows Phone 7 support, but they do talk about server-side save states where you can start switch back and forth between the 360 and PC playing the same session of the same game. That's pretty neat and very dangerous for my productivity.

I'm looking forward to checking it out on Wednesday. Oh, and if you buy in on release date, apparently you get a lot of free "mascots" that would otherwise be 40 points. Pitfall Harry, Red Baron, etc. We'll have to see what that's all about. Mostly decorations for your arcade.

What do you buy in on? Does the Game Room itself cost something? Does it come with games?

I assumed the Game Room would be free but empty. Then you would buy individual games within the Game Room app through microtransactions. Is this not the case?

DotW is the Avatar: TLA game

The way it sounded is that it comes with a bunch of games already there and you get a small set of "tokens" with which to play/demo those. I think it comes with all 30 launch games in the "shell" already. You'll basically be paying the 240 or 400 points to unlock the rights to play a game in an unlimited fashion.

Also you can visit a friend's arcade and play every game they own for free. Once.

I am as well. They got the cost right and the leaderboard and achievements will get me playing these enough to be worth the small cost per game.

Apparently one thing they got right was getting one ESRB rating for the whole Game Room and not bothering the individual games with it. That way each game can skip the 10 to 20 thousand dollar expense. This ESRB cost is apparently what really hurts WiiWare and Virtual Console publishers.

So what are people thinking here : 240 for single license or springing 400 for the dual-license? I'm leaning toward the single license so I can stock my game room with more games, and it's only an extra dollar if you buy them seperately.



Don't forget about the free avatar item : download either the trial or full version of all the Block Part titles (Toy Soldiers, Scrap Metal, Perfect Dark and Game Room and you'll receive a section of a download code for each one as an individual panel on your dashboard. Put them all together after the Game Room comes out and redeem them for a free avatar item (as yet unannounced and if I could harbor a guess, probably disappointing). Hey, free is free, right?

How does that work? Do they email it to you each section?

No, it's right there on the dashboard at the back panels of the Game Marketplace section. I have my first three set of five characters already (one for Toy Soldiers, Scrap Metal and Perfect Dark). What I don't know is how the last one will go -- whether it'll be ten characters for Game Room or five for Game Room and then a "competed" bonus. Either way, the message said it was a limited offer, so I'm getting online Wednesday morning to download and then redeem the code.

I don't know. Most of me thinks just the bare 240 since that feels so damn cheap. But the rest of me thinks that the extra $2 isn't that bad, especially if I can put in on the computer as well. 0% of me holds out hope to be grandfathered in to a 3rd (or more) platform if they ever expand for the multi-platform license.

It's a $2 difference, not $1. And I don't think you can upgrade for the difference. I'm not exactly sure if that's what you were saying, but just so you know...

240 points for 360 game ($3)
+
240 points for PC version if purchased later or seperately ($3)

= $6

vs.

400 point dual license = $5
_________________

$6 - $5 = $1, last I checked.

edit: Oh, now I know what you meant about the $2 difference. You can now see what I'm saying about the dual license. It saves you $1 per game over buying them seperately. If I knew it were compatible with a Windows 7 phone, I'd go that way since I'll be getting one at year's end. Otherwise, I don't know...

I gotya, I wasn't even thinking about two different 240 purchases. Yeah, that makes shelling out for $5 upfront kind of silly unless I knew I was going to always do it. I'd rather waste $1 later than $2 now.

Raskulls looking on-point!

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Actually, listening to the interview again, it does sound like if you've bought the $3 version on one platform, if you go to that game on the other platform it's "ghosted-out", meaning you don't have rights. You can pay 40 points ($0.50) to play it once or pay $2 to upgrade it right there.

That's paraphrased. Either I misunderstand or he misquoted the price. Guess we'll find out soon enough.

thanks. I hadn't noticed that before but there it is! All my codes start and end with 9 so far, which I find strange. Thanks again for pointing it out. Whatever it is, like you said, free is free.

What do they all start with? Also, what's the middle character of each section?

Scrap Metal.

I played the trial. I like the concept. Very Twisted Metail-ish. However, the controls stink! Does it get easier the more you play? Are the RC controls that much better? Those clown cars who drop the mines and I were doing a circle dance for 15 minutes. Very frustrating!

The middle section of the 1st one is A, 2nd one P, third one Z. Or did you mean the middle section between the end and the middle? So the next to last one for the first section is N, the 2nd R, the third 3. Or did you mean the middle section between the beginning 9 and the middle? Well, then, that's Q in the first, E in the second, 4 in the 3rd.

Tomorrow when the I get the rest of the code, I'll be sure to rush here first thing before I redeem it and post those answers to your questions as well to sate your mere curiosity.