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Popular pin-toppler game Polar Bowler lands on iOS
Polar Bowler first debuted as a Windows PC game ten years ago and became a long-standing hit for WIldTangent and its casual game network. After bringing the popular Polar Bear and his new sidekick J to iOS last year in the 1st Frame game, the company is back with a new PB & J title that retains the pin-toppler's original name, Polar Bowler. For those who haven't played it, Polar Bowler is a bowling video game featuring a sunglasses-adorned Polar Bear and, on iOS, his valet penguin J. PB rides an inner tube as he travels down various mazes knocking over bowling pins. Your role as the player is to steer PB and knock over as many pins as you can. As you speed down the lane, you can steer using the onscreen controls. You aim for the pins, while you avoid obstacles and use other items like ramps to move your Polar Bear along its way. Occasionally, crates will appear with bonus content like specialized inner tubes to help you in your quest to topple pins. When PB finally comes to a rest, the game tallies up your "Polar Score," which is based on how many pins you knock over, the speed at which you travel, and how many bumpers you hit. To complete a level and move on, you must clear every pin the maze. The latest version of this pin-toppler game is chock full of options with souped-up tubes, custom outfits and more for your Polar Bear. Gameplay is fast and fun with plenty of mazes to keep you engaged. There also are free goodies that you earn every day, encouraging you regularly to open the app to play. Polar Bowler is available in the iOS App Store for 99-cents. It contains in-app purchases that allow you to buy crates or coins, which can be used to buy xtras like fancy, new tubes for PB.
T-mobile, WildTangent to bring 25-cent game rentals to Android devices, harken back to arcade days
Test driving an app isn't entirely unheard of -- Apple introduced its lackluster "Try Before You Buy" system last summer and the Android Market's got a 15-minute return policy. Now T-Mobile's teamed up with mobile gaming outfit WildTangent to bring a novel approach to looking under the hood of gaming apps: rentals. The partnership promises to bring 25 cent game rentals to your phone or tablet (considering you're a T-Mo faithful rocking an Android device), giving you the opportunity to see what a particular game is working with before you commit. The new service also lets users play games for free with advertisements, and applies the cost of rentals to future purchases -- rent-to-own style. So it won't bring the same juvenile thrills as the arcade, but it will let you get your game on at 25 cents a pop. No word yet on when the service will go into effect, so don't go breaking that piggy bank quite yet.
WoW bundled with WildTangent software on new PCs
WildTangent is a company that started up around ten years ago (they originally made game plugins for Winamp, if you remember that) that's recently gotten a reputation for "bloatware." They've made deals with PC manufacturers like Dell, HP, and Acer to bundle in their software on the harddrive when you buy it. (Most users familiar with PCs find these software bundles more of a nuisance than anything else.) But nevertheless, WildTangent claims up to 20 million users worldwide, and they continue to make deals, the most recent one being with none other than Blizzard. According to a press release on their website [PDF], World of Warcraft's trial downloader will now be included with all installs of WildTangent's ORB software, which means that whenever you buy a new computer from a dealer WildTangent has hooked up with, there'll be a program already installed on your PC that will let you download and play World of Warcraft, among the many other games WildTangent has already included.This likely isn't targeted at you, dear audience -- odds are that you've already got the discs for WoW, and if you do buy a new PC, you'll probably still delete WildTangent's app and install WoW yourself. Instead, it's a stab at picking up new subscribers -- people who might not already know about World of Warcraft or PCs may see the icon on their new desktop, double click it, and find Azeroth for the first time. The press release even notes that WoW subscribers still in their trial month are counted as subscribers, so odds are this is a random attempt to pick up a few more subscribers from people who aren't willing to go get the game themselves.There's one more thing to note here: Activision isn't mentioned at all.
WildTangent to digitally distribute Kalypso titles
We know that you've probably been racked by worry since it was revealed last week that WildTangent, developer of the pseudo-successful Fate (and alleged spyware distributor), would be closing its internal studios -- however, the company hasn't quite kicked the bucket. Its digital distribution platform, Orb (which former CEO Alex. St. John assured us would eventually replace the modern gaming console) is still in operation -- moreover, its catalog was recently bolstered as a result of a deal between WildTangent and UK developer Kalypso Media.Kalypso, best known for its strategy title Sins of a Solar Empire, has given WildTangent the right to digitally distribute their entire back catalog, as well as the right to distribute all future titles they develop. Sure, it's not a giant step towards St. John's promised revolution, but it may be enough to keep the Grim Reaper from darkening WildTangent's doorstep for a while.
WildTangent game studio veers out of existence, St. John becomes 'chairman'
WildTangent has shut down its internal development studio and laid off about 20 people, reports TechFlash. Furthermore, CEO Alex St. John, currently best known for preaching that this is the last generation of consoles, will be "promoted" to chairman, while COO Mike Peronto will take over CEO duties. St. John is expected to spend more time on the road being "the public voice of the company."WildTangent's game studio, which may (doubtfully) have shown up on gamer's radars with Fate, isn't exactly a noticeable loss. The company has been surviving on its Orb digital distribution service and by managing advertising sales for several web sites -- oh yeah, and there's always its alleged spyware business.[Via GameDaily]
Alex St. John: We're playing the 'last generation of consoles'
Congratulations! You're now a part of history ... or at least, a part of Alex St. John's alternate reality. Spend enough time with "the guy who talked Microsoft into the console business" and you might start seeing a big red countdown -- the kind that ends in KA-BOOM! -- tattooed on your gaming console, the UK's Telegraph reports. "I think we're looking at the last generation of consoles. There's not going to be an Xbox 720 or a PS4, I'll make that bet, not going to happen," St. John predicts. Not surprisingly, St. John's grim prophecy doubles as a convincing plug for WildTangent's forthcoming virtual console: Orb. Orb will offer "enthusiast" games (BioShock and Assassin's Creed are two "possible" examples) for free on an ad-driven, session-by-session basis. In theory, this kind of digital platform could one day replace disc-based consoles, as it offers "free" gaming through an advertising model that consumers have accepted in other markets and cuts out the huge economic losses that console manufacturers can't seem to avoid (um, except for Nintendo!). "I'll take the heat if I'm wrong and don't mind being mocked in the future with people going 'Wow, was he wrong,'" St. John says of his market forecast, "But it doesn't happen to me very often."
X3F TV -- XBLA in Brief: Elements of Destruction and Sea Life Safari
XBLA in Brief examines two unusual Xbox Live Arcade titles this week. First up is Elements of Destruction which has players essentially playing as nature itself, using tornadoes, earthquakes, and lightning to destroy everything in sight. Sea Life Safari on the other hand, is a game about taking pictures of fish. See? Kind of different for XBLA, isn't it? Watch the new episode and decide if either is worth your hardearned MS Points.[iTunes] Subscribe to X3F TV directly in iTunes.[Zune] Subscribe to the X3F TV directly (Zune Marketplace link coming soon).[RSS] Add the X3F TV feed to your RSS aggregator and have the show delivered automatically.[M4V] Download the M4V directly.
WildTangent unveils 'PC game console' Orb, Sierra and THQ pledge support
WildTangent announced today Orb, a new PC service aimed to give a game console experience. Orb will act as a portal for "console games," defined here as games designed for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, and let you download and play games in its entirety or in play sessions, which will cost you via tokens or free through watching advertisements. THQ and Sierra have signed on, with Sierra promising to bring titles to the service "day and date" with console launches, according to WildTangent CEO Alex St. John.In an interview with Joystiq, St. John explained how the cost per play session will depend on the game, but that it would be priced "fairly" based on statistics they derive in testing. That said, he presumes most will opt for the advertiser route. (In their casual portal, he said, 98% of the users opt for watching advertisements and playing for free.) Games can be queued up for download in the background, but there's also an option for taking the games you want to play and having them sent to you for the cost of burning the DVD and shipping. The program will be offered in eight languages, including Chinese and Korean. No community features will included at launch, but St. John said he'd consider it in the future. It's a shame, too, because we think it's a key reason that programs like Steam and GameTap thrive. The developer version will launch this week, with a consumer version poised for tomorrow. For users of the current WildTangent portal, which largely consists of what St. John calls casual gamers, they will be offered the client free for download when it launches. Orb will also be packaged with Dell and HP computers. Orb will be officially unveiled during a session tomorrow at GDC. We'll have more from our interview with St. John later this week.
Vista casual game problems are 'grossly overstated'
Earlier this week, WildTangent CEO, Alex St. John, lashed out against Windows Vista and claimed that most casual games were drowing in the moat surrounding the operating system's impenetrable castle. With many downloadable titles lacking official ESRB ratings, St. John suggested that Vista's security architecture was blocking all manner of family friendly games, including titles from MSN, AOL and Yahoo. In a communication with TG Daily, Microsoft has responded to these claims, labeling them as "grossly overstated." Rick Wickham, director of Games for Windows, notes that "a fraction of casual games are encountering temporary upgrade issues - a situation we have largely corrected and are committed to fixing within days." He goes on to say that out of the 100-plus MSN casual games available, only five have displayed problems in working with Vista. Those issues are expected to be resolved by the end of the week.
Vista security too tight on casual games, claims WildTangent
DirectX creator Alex St. John says Windows Vista "breaks" casual games. The WildTangent CEO recently described the arduous process of patching his company's network of games to ensure Vista compatibility. The effort reportedly took a year of working closely with "nearly every major casual game developer.""Parents who choose to use Vista's parental controls are likely to accidentally block access to hundreds of very popular family friendly games that happen not to have ESRB ratings," explained St. John. Casual game networks hosted by Yahoo, AOL, RealArcade, and even Microsoft (MSN Games) could all be affected, according to St. John. Microsoft has yet to comment on the allegations.It should be noted that WildTangent's software is often denoted as spyware by antispyware applications. While the software is generally regarded as harmless, it's often installed without express consent (and remains self-updating); WildTangent also reserves the right to collect personal information for use in tuning its products.
PAX: Alex St. John's keynote of infamy
Alex St. John breaks Washington State laws by smoking onstageAlex St. John, the creator of Microsoft's DirectX API and founder of Wild Tangent, delivered a bizarre, and borderline unbelievable, PAX keynote yesterday. With equal parts alien spaceships, hostage negotiations, enormous 10' vaginas (courtesy of GWAR), Bill Gates embarrassing promotional video career and, of course, Microsoft's Julia Child's Wine Guide CD-ROM, I'd be doing a serious disservice to Mr. St. John if I attempted to encapsulate his performance.What a performance! The keynote began with St. John tossing out large balls (that later took on an infamy all their own), mini glow-in-the-dark frisbees, and ping pong balls before he began his sordid tale. St. John began playing with decaptitated moose heads in Alaska as a child and ended up being the creator of DirectX at Microsoft as they entered the increasingly lucrative video game space. Of course, this journey was wrought with crazy situations (see aforementioned 10' vagina) and a fair amount of trepidation on the entire software community's part (a Windows blue screen at a developer's event was met with chants of "DOS, DOS, DOS!"). Despite these difficulties, the successful launch of the DirectX-Box means that Alex St. John has left an indelible impression on the gaming industry.Here's our question: instead of doing keynotes and running software companies, why isn't this guy writing a tell-all book to prove that gaming has its own wild, rockstar tales?[Thanks to Philip Palermo for the classy pic]
