more racing

Besides trying those indie games I also found some more racing time. Here is some more footage of the GT3 RS in Need for Speed Shift.



Another great release this week was the Forza 3 Demo on Xbox Marketplace. The demo isn't very feature rich. There's only five cars, one for each car class and only one track, although with a very beautiful scenery. Should help over the waiting time until the Forza 3 release by the end of october.

more xbox live indie games

Today I found some time to check out two more xbox live indie games.

The first one is Pixel Man. Very simple and classic and basic and oldschool jump n run game. It reminds me of the eary C64 games which would only take up a few blocks on one side of the big floppy disks.

Without trying to distract the player with fancy graphics, Pixel Man focuses on very basic gaming mechanics instead.

Pixel Man is 348kb in size and costs 80 MS points for the full version.




The next game is also a jump n run and it is called "On a roll". It's a little more colorful than pixelman and works like a sonic the hedgehog clone.

It's download size is 38mb and it costs 240 Microsoft points for the full version.

NFS:Shift Nordschleife

Taking my new Porsche 911GT3RS for a testdrive on the legendary Nordschleife:

Need for Speed Shift: Settings

This game has a lot of glitches and minor bugs. But the thing that upset me most was the silly handling and sloppy controls. Luckily it has to do mostly with the default control settings. In the need for speed forums I came across a very helpful post that makes the game much more playable and brings it much closer to forza for example:

There is now a 2nd fix for the sensitive steering/oversteer problem this game exhibits in its default settings. And let me tell you it is a NIGHT and DAY difference.
Please use 2nd fix along with the original thread suggestions on turning down sensitivity in the control options.

I have posted the original sensitivity config here:

Steering Dead Zone-15%
Accel Dead Zone-10%
Brake Dead Zone-10%
Steering sensitivity-5%
Acell Sensitivity -5%
Brake sensitivity-5%
Speed steering Sensitivity 100%


On to the 2nd fix:

At the main menu enter CAR GARAGE----> TUNING, press 'Y' to enter quick tuning mode.
Under the heading 'balance' move the slider all the way to OVERSTEER. That's right oversteer. Apparently the developer labeled this slider wrong or its a glitch. Turning the slider to oversteer will actually add understeer.

From: http://forums.xbox.com/29123795/ShowPost.aspx

Need for Speed Shift: getting rid of rival drivers

After playing for some hours now, I am having nearly enough of this game. Physics are crappy, controls are horrible, graphics aren't that much overwhelming eiter. But maybe this is all due to the xbox version.
Still it delivers some funny moments:

Need for Speed Shift

Finally my copy of Need for Speed Shift has arrived.

Just had a first go in a BMW 135.



Need for Speed Shift seems to be a great racing game again like in the eary days. Maybe they are trying to make the upcoming Forza 3 and GT5 obsolete? Well, I doubt that it's THAT good but still looks like a lot fun.

XBOX LIVE INDIE GAME: STREETS OF FURY

Finally, the weekend has arrived and while I am waiting for the postman to deliver Need for Speed: Shift I am once looking what's new in the XBOX marketplace, especially in the indie games section.

Today I found a nice fighting game, much in the tradition of double dragon. The Beat em up "Streets of Fury" was a finalist of Microsoft's 2008 Dream Build Play Contest and features a lot of fighting action in single player as well as coop mode. Instead of making 3d models or 2d drawings for the fighters the developers chose to digitize the graphics of the fighters which adds another level of funny nonsense to the game and makes me remember this fine tradition from a lot of games in the 90ies like M+rt*l K+mb*t or Phantasmagoria for example.

Looks to be a very entertaining game although I didn't check out the coop mode yet.

The game size is 138mb and it costs 240 Microsoft Points for the full version.

XBOX LIVE INDIE GAME: MINER DIG DEEP

My exploration through the indie games section of the xbox live market place continues with a mine digging game. "Miner dig deep" is a retro mine digging game, niceley done, only 10mb in size and only 200 microsoft points. It has a very relaxing soundtrack and gameplay is ...well.. also quite relaxing. But nice if you like this style of game. For old times sake or just for a calm break from reality.

XBOX LIVE INDIE GAME: VEKS AND SILENCE

This morning I uncovered another game with zombies inside the indie games section of xbox live market place.
Veks and Silence is 2.5D jump n run shooter with zombies, gore, insanity, zombies and more zombies. Your mission is simple but fulfilling, pass each of the 13 levels, kill a lot of crazy modelled zombies with the help of bombs and several devastating weapons and be rewarded with lots of cartoonish craziness. Great game for lunch breaks. Or for whenever you feel the need to kill zombies.

The game is 156mb in size and costs 400 microsoft points for the full version.

XBOX LIVE INDIE GAME: I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES!!!1

I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES!!!1

No, sadly, I didn't. But that's the title of another XBOX LIVE Indie Game I found in the XBOX marketplace this morning. Very funny game, in my opinion. It looks homemade retro, but in a very good way. I especially like the soundtrack and the funky screen effects. Interesting journey through killing zombie land. I will have to practice a little though...

Only 13mb in size and only 80 microsoft points for the full version.

XBOX LIVE INDIE GAME: BAILOUT!

When I checked the Xbox marketplace this morning for new releases I stumbled upon this, err, very interesting game. I'm not quite sure what to make of it yet, but I could resist buying the full version so far. Let's see how much fun I can have with the demo.

But make up your own mind, here's a video of my second go:

iTunes 9 Horrors

Despite the fact that Steve Jobs was healthy enough again to get back on stage yesterday's apple media event was not very satisfying. First of all I'm not the perfect audience for new differenct colored ipods anyways. Neither do I embrace the fact that I can now buy ring tones for even more money than the songs they are based on.
Still I was looking forward to the the event because of the announcement of iTunes 9.
There were three major areas for great improvements over iTunes 8.

• Speed/Cocoa
  
  Responsiveness is not one of iTunes major strengths. After I saw the rewritten finder in Snow Leopard, I was very much hoping Apple would go for a similar rewrite for iTunes using the Cocoa API for gaining such an incredible speed improvement over its predecessor like they did with finder.
  
  
• iTunes Store/AppStore
  
  With now about 70.000 apps in the AppStore of which over 20.000 are games an improvement in visibilty and usability would be a great benefit for users and iphone developers alike.
  
  
• Watched Folders
  
  Since I started using iTunes I was hoping for iTunes being one day able to watch a local drive/folderlist or a network for changes and add songs to the library if I just copy some mp3s to those locations instead of always having to add new songs through iTunes which becomes extremely annoying if I have several computers using that same network drive as a music storage.

I am quite aware of the fact that the last point on my list "Watched Folders" is never likely to happen because apple wants the users having to use iTunes for music management.

So let's see what iTunes 9 can help me with my other problems.
After installation I see the new design. All very bright and shiny, even the background of the album view is now a horrible bright color. Looks like they hired a designer from Microsoft who do a very streamlined design but with a little bit too much everywhere so the look gives you the creeps either instantly or after two weeks the latest. But that's just my personal taste or distaste. So what's up with my other wishes:

• Speed/Cocoa
  Umm... nope... It is still as slow as its predecessor and it's no Cocoa.
  
  
• AppStore
  After I am totally blinded by enourmous wallpapers of the iTunes Store I finally find my way into the new Appstore. Let's look for games. Umm... Staff picks here, staff picks there... Let's just assume I don't care that much what the staff is picking for me. Ahh... there in the upper menu under a small arrow the AppStore the categories are hidden... Games, there it is. Let's go...
  No, nothing goes. All they changed is actually flatten the hierarchy. The sub categories of games are nowhere to be seen no more. I can see the top 20 paid games, the top 20 free games and then, (right now) 657 pages of games. What the fuck??? They managed to even worsen the already bad experience. If I am looking for racing games or adventure games or puzzle games or whatever I now have to go through ALL AppStore games (right now about 20.000) to find what I might be interested in...
  

This is what I would call a total failure. Whoever was responsible for the development of iTunes 9 did a horrible job. Sure, there are very few improvements. I can now manage the apps on my phone and buy ringtones for enourmous amounts of money.
But for the moment I am an angry customer. Seems I start the wait for iTunes X in September 2010 probably...