Casual Gaming and Games for Windows - LIVE Written Tuesday, July 22, 2008 by David Creech
Casual Connect Seattle 2008 doesn't have quite the same draw as E3 this year...but
then again, E3 didn't have the same draw as in the past either. And arguably, PC
gaming has a much broader audience than all of the consoles combined. Casual Connect is focused on the non-hardcore portion of PC gaming, such as IM games, Flash games, etc.
Why does anyone here at x360a even care? Well, because the Xbox Live Arcade is a
huge participant in Casual Connect. Microsoft is pushing XNA as an easy entry point
for game designers to bring quality titles to the Arcade and make money sooner and
easier than other methods of going to market. With the latest release, XNA games can support achievements, and the next release should provide support for paid DLC. All of this means good things for us gamers, because we get more games to choose from.
There was nothing hugely exciting about the Arcade unless you are a coder, although
MS did confirm that Uno has made them far more money than any other Arcade title,
and continues to be the top played Arcade game in both sessions played and time
spent in game. Bomberman LIVE was number three in both for the last 12 months.
The best part of the day for me personally was the news about Games for Windows -
LIVE. While most of you are not PC gamers, I am confident that those of you who are
will agree with me in saying that the GFWL dashboard is among the ugliest,
unfriendly, and uninspiring pieces of gaming software ever written. It is grey, and
ugly, and even earning an achievement is almost depressing because the familiar
bloop is overclouded with a grey square box. That is completely going away with a
brand new interface re-written from the ground up, designed for the PC rather than
trying to make the PC look like an Xbox. Unfortunately, we are not allowed to share
screenshots, but the preview I saw made me very happy.
As was mentioned at E3, they will be linking the Xbox 360 marketplace with the
website, so you will be able to queue up games on the website, pay for them on the
website, and they will download on your 360 the next time you log in. They are also
extending this to the GFWL platform, so that games can be extended, extra content
added, etc., all with one familiar interface. The downside is that up to now most -
as in 99% - of additional content for PC games has been completely free, and that
will definitely change. The upside is that developers and publishers will be more
motivated to properly support and extend PC games when they see potential for future income from the titles.
Something that most of us take for granted is that patches usually come out to fix
problems on the Xbox 360, but not one of my GFWL titles has been patched as far as I can tell, leaving games like The Club with multiple achievements completely
unattainable. I have asked Sega about this title many times, and as soon as they
find out I am asking about the PC game rather than a console, they close the door
and walk away. I even told them I was planning on mentioning their game in this
article, and they still decided that no response was the best choice.
The announcements today about the GFWL interface help overcome some of these
hurdles, making it much easier for developers to add achievements, chat support,
dashboard support, etc., to any title. Better documentation and one third fewer
technical certfication requirements are intended to encourage more developers to
adopt GFWL.
The last "technical" hurdle has been the unwillingness of PC gamers to pay for Live,
leading to a dearth of players online in the GFWL world. Effective immediately, all
GFWL titles are allowing all Live accounts to access multiplayer features, including
ranked playlists, leaderboards, chat, friends, etc. This means that on the PC at
least, Silver = Gold.
Two GFWL titles were also confirmed today: Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War II and
Battlestations: Pacific are both coming to GFWL. Dawn of War II is a sequel from Relic Entertainment (Company of Heroes, The Outfit), and features a non-linear FPS experience and a fully cooperative multiplayer campaign. Based in Games Workshops very popular Warhammer 40,000 sci fi universe, this will be a GFWL exclusive and should seriously kick ass. Battlestations: Pacific is from Eidos (Kane & Lynch, Tomb Raider, Just Cause) and
has two complete campaigns. For the American side, you start where Battlestations:
Midway ended and head toward Okinawa. The Japanese campaign actually starts at Pearl Harbor and then gives you a chance to wrest control of the entire Pacific Ocean,
changing the course of history. Definitely a game I am looking forward to playing!
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