Ritual raps SiN, episodic, and Xbox 360

GameDaily talked with Ritual Entertainment's Tom Mustaine and Levelord (not his birthname... we think) about SiN Episodes, episodic content, and even their Xbox 360 plans. They have some valuable insights into episodic distribution, equating it to the popular shareware format, explaining, "Finally, let's remember the shareware model used by game developers not so long ago. It was actually an episodic delivery paradigm. With shareware, we would release the first episode, usually before the completed game was finished. Then the full game would be released, which usually was the second and third episodes. These would then, if the game was successful, be followed by a series of add-on packs, each of which to be called another episode."

Episodic delivery is gaining a lot of "Steam" in the industry thanks to games like SiN Episodes, Telltale's adventure game offerings like Bone and the upcoming Sam & Max, and the 800lb. gorilla in the gaming room, Half-Life 2. Figuring out how to offer episodic content over Xbox Live is something we're very eager to hear about. Ritual's Mustaine says, "[Microsoft does] have limitations on Marketplace download sizes. Since we are still in discussions with Microsoft about the 360 version, details about that product should appear in the near future."

Titles distributed via XBLM are expected to fit onto the Memory Unit, which is obviously out of the question for a game like SiN. Unfortunately, the hard drive, with only 13GB free, is another limiting factor. What's the solution: larger hard drive sizes? Streaming content? Or direct-mail episodes on DVDs? If anyone wants to drop specifics, send us a tip!