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X3F TV -- XBLA in Brief: Chime
There's something rather unique on XBLA this week: Coming from non-profit publisher OneBigGame and developer Zoë Mode, Chime is actually a game that benefits children's charities. It's a musical puzzle game reminiscent of Lumines, featuring music from several well-known artists including Moby, Paul Hartnoll of Orbital and Philip Glass. At least 60 percent of the game's 400 ($5) price will go to charity, so you can feel good about picking it up. You can also feel good because Chime is actually a pretty good game. Check it out in the latest XBLA in Brief. Shortcut: Download the trial version of Chime [via Xbox.com] [iTunes] Subscribe to X3F TV directly in iTunes. [Zune] Subscribe to the X3F TV directly. [RSS] Add the X3F TV feed to your RSS aggregator and have the show delivered automatically. [M4V] Download the M4V directly.
This Wednesday: Chime for charity on XBLA
Today's lone Xbox Live Arcade release is Chime, the not-for-profit project from Zoe Mode and OneBigGame. 60 percent of proceeds from the 400 ($5) game will go to Save the Children and Starlight Children's Foundation, so consider it a surprisingly entertaining chance to stop being such a selfish jerk. If you're looking for a pre-purchase glimpse, check out the trailer above or download the demo on Xbox Live. We'd ask you to chime in with your opinions, but that joke's been done. Just now. Shortcut: Add Chime to your download queue [Xbox.com] %Gallery-77193%
Non-profit XBLA game Chime dropping Feb. 3
Between your rampant donations to Child's Play and your support with Haiti recovery efforts, you've been stretching your altruism muscles quite a bit over the past few months. We just hope you're not all charity'd out -- Zoe Mode and OneBigGame's XBLA rhythm title, Chime, is due on February 3. In case you've forgotten, 60 percent of the game's 400 ($5) price tag will go to Save the Children and Starlight Children's Foundation. Best of all, the game actually looks pretty fun! Check out the explanation video above to see the title in action -- it's kind of like Tetris meets Lumines meets the beneficence of the human spirit.
Charity XBLA game Chime's gameplay explained in latest trailer
What's the only thing more satisfying than aligning colorful blocks on a rectangular grid while simultaneously recreating pleasant ambient tunes from musical artists such as Moby? Simple -- doing so while simultaneously donating to charity. That's the package that OneBigGame and Zoe Mode will offer on XBLA at some point this winter, when their music/puzzle game Chime lands on the XBLA. Though we've known about this non-profit puzzler for a month now, we've yet to see the title in action. Fortunately, OneBigGame dropped a gameplay demonstration video earlier today, which we've posted above. Yeah, sure, it's got a few aesthetic similarities to Lumines, but considering all the proceeds from the game go to Save the Children and Starlight Children's foundation, we're not going to raise a stink about it. We think saving children is like, the coolest thing you can possibly do.
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Zoe Mode creating not-for-profit XBLA puzzler for children's charity
click to enlarge OneBigGame, a non-profit games publisher founded in 2007, announced today that its first title will come from Zoë Mode, creator of games such as Crush (PSP), You're In the Movies (360) and co-developer of the SingStar franchise (PS3) with SCEE. Called Chime, the music-based puzzle game will launch this winter on Xbox Live Arcade. The first screens, while sort of soothing in their minimalism, don't exactly explain anything about how the game's played. Thankfully, Zoë Mode goes into detail about the gameplay on its newly launched Chime site.The developer is the first of what OneBigGame says are many others currently creating 15 titles, with at least 80 percent of all revenue made from them going to two charities: Save the Children and Starlight Children's Foundation. Zoë Mode developed Chime pro bono and has committed to giving all the royalties it receives from the XBLA game -- which it says will be around 60 percent of its purchase price -- to OneBigGame.Other developers signed on to produce games include Shiny founder David Perry, PaRappa the Rapper creator Masaya Matsuura and prolific adventure game designer Charles Cecil (Beneath a Steel Sky, Broken Sword). %Gallery-77193%
Rock Revolution for only $5, still not worth it
This is a warning to anyone out there enticed by the image to the right: The overlords at Best Buy actually expect you to pay them five dollars for taking a copy of Rock Revolution off their hands. At first, we assumed that the company was rewarding customers for freeing up much needed shelf space. Alas, it is not so. Rather, it seems that Rock Revolution has been relegated to but one, rickety step above landfill status. It has hit the very, very bottom of the bargain bin. We're not sure if this sale is going on at all Best Buy locations, but it might be worth checking your local store just for posterity. Bring a camera, because this may be the only time you will ever see a new, sealed game for five bucks. We're not suggesting you actually buy it, of course. [Thanks, Bryan!]
Go Grease Lightning (to the Wii and DS)
Listen up, musical theater majors! Your time of reckoning approaches. Sure, your friends can easily best you at Halo 3 or Call of Duty 4 -- but in a short while, a title which will finally allow you to invoke your unique skill set will hit store shelves. We speak, of course, of Grease. The movie. The video game. For Wii and DS.505 Games recently picked up the rights to adapt the musical film in conjunction with Paramount Digital Entertainment. The game will put players in the gaudy, unfortunate shoes of one of Sandy or Danny's cronies, forcing them to sing and dance using motion controls, microphones or the DS touch screen. Further gameplay details or a release date for Grease are currently unknown. C'mon, 505! Tell us more! Tell us more!
Zoe Mode expands to US, takes along two Sony vets
From Brighton, to London, and now San Francisco, Kuju Entertainment's Zoë Mode studio (developer of You're in the Movies, Crush and Rock Revolution) is ever-expanding. All this, despite initial foreboding that hovered over its parent company earlier this year.At the helm of the new US Zoë Mode office in San Francisco are two former SCEA employees: US SingStar Senior Producer Sarah Stocker and former EA/SCEA employee Mark Danks. With a team like this, it seems likely that this new ZM studio will have a strong focus on music games, although ZM worldwide general manager, Ed Daly, told GamesIndustry.biz: "In addition to the increasingly crowded singing and dancing, peripheral-based music games, we are interested in exploring some new territory." Aw, and we were so looking forward to Rock Revolution 2.
Kuju Entertainment confirms staff layoffs
(For the sake of the blogging community, we're going to set up a template for posts describing gaming industry firings, a topic which has depressingly comprised about one-third of everyone's news coverage as of late. By copying and pasting the following paragraph and swapping in the appropriate company name, information and nautical metaphors, we'll save time and effort which we can spend on more uplifting endeavors.)Representatives from [Kuju Entertainment], [developer] of [Batallion Wars 2 and Geometry Wars: Galaxies], confirmed today that they have laid off [a number of employees] across a few of their studios, including [Kuju America, Chemistry, and their corporate headquarters]. In addition, [ten] employees at their subsidiary, [Zoë Mode], the minds behind [You're in the Movies and Rock Revolution], are ["at-risk"]. As always, we wish the recently unemployed the best of luck, and hope that [Kuju Entertainment] can [stay afloat in these tumultuous economic waters].
BYOG: Konami not making Rock Revolution guitar, bring your own
Forced with making up for lost time in the battle for rhythm game supremacy, Konami is evidently taking the curious path of removing bullet points from the back of Rock Revolution's future box art. First, despite a corporate lineage that includes Karaoke Revolution, Konami axed the expected vocal portion, leaving just guitar and drum tracks. (Wouldn't want to cannibalize those Karaoke Revolution sales, would we?)Now, Konami has axed the axe, telling MTV that they'll only be offering the unwieldy drum kit in mid-November, about a month after the standalone game launches October 14th. The full peripheral lineup from the Guitar Hero and Rock Band games should work just fine with Rock Revolution but, something tells us Konami's going to have a tough time leading this revolution. Well, there's always a chance of a legal payday!
Crush developer Zoe Mode opening new office in London
Did you play the game Crush? We did -- and we loved it. Now the developers, Zoe Mode (previously Kuju Brighton), are expanding their offices into London and are seeking new faces to help their staff grow. They've got two projects lined up already for their new office opening in September. It's not like this new studio is full of empty faces -- the office already has their current Zoe Mode executive producer, Nick Rodriguez, as well as a core team from their Brighton office. If you're in the London area and are qualified for the positions of producer, art manager, or senior programmer, check out their website. [Via Gamespot]
Crush gets smashed to $15
Unfortunately, the incredibly innovative 2D/3D PSP-exclusive puzzle game Crush never met the sales it quite deserved. That's a shame, because we really enjoyed the detailed graphics, the quirky story, the impeccable presentation ... and most importantly, the gameplay. Check out our review, and some videos of the game in action. If you haven't checked out Crush yet, maybe this $15 deal on amazon.com will convince you to pick up one of the most original PSP exclusives ever. [Via CAG]
Joystiq hands-on: Rock Revolution
click to enlarge biggie-size In the latest round of the great "our drum kit is better – or at least bigger – than your drum kit" conflict of ought eight, Konami definitely comes out the clear winner with Rock Revolution. However, we don't necessarily know if that's a good thing, based on our experience playing the title at its formal unveiling.Despite the fact that it will offer support for lead and bass guitars, Rock Revolution is very much a drum-centric game. The behemoth of a drum controller has six pads and a pedal, looking like something Darth Vader would have lying around in his hyperbaric chamber.%Gallery-22989%
Konami announces revolutionary Rock Band competitor, Rock Revolution
As if the Rock Band copy-catting market wasn't getting saturated enough with Activision's Guitar Hero IV and it's peripheral additions, Konami thought it to be a good idea to get in on the musical fun by announcing their own clone of sorts called Rock Revolution. How revolutionary.As far as specifics go, we know that Rock Revolution is being developed by SingStar creators Zoe Mode and is planned for a Fall release on all major platforms. Details are light though, but we we can confirm the game will feature at least 40 tracks, the ability to record your own songs, online co-op, online versus, some money making DLC is planned and a behemoth of a drum set (which we're calling "the beast") will be included. Really, this drum peripheral has six pads, a pedal and looks like ... well, we aren't sure what it looks like but it looks daunting. Go ahead, check it out for yourself. Revolutionary, no?[Thanks, Matt H]
Konami's Rock Revolution drums revealed
If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, Harmonix must be beside itself with this last week finding not one but two companies hopping on the developer's coat tails and revealing a pair of drum kits that bear more than a passing resemblance to those used in Rock Band. However, while Guitar Hero IV's kit still carries some basis in reality, the kit revealed by Konami for the company's newly announced Rock Revolution looks to be designed for players with extra appendages or other rhythm enthusiasts who are not quite human.With six face pads of three different sizes, as well as a kick pedal, Konami's kit is certainly the most complex of the three. However, according to MTV Multiplayer blogger Patrick Klepek, the drums carry what sounds like a much more forgiving difficulty curve than those in Rock Band, which while great are almost unapproachable by rhythm game newcomers even on the easiest setting. By contrast, and according to his admittedly brief time with Konami's offering, the game doesn't penalize players for improvising during a song, and also features five difficulty settings with the lower two removing the foot pedal entirely. Still, the question remains as to if there is room enough for another peripheral-heavy rhythm game, not so much in the genre but in our own living rooms.
Rock Revolution bringing the whole band to DS
In a bid to capture itself some of the lucrative Guitar Hero/Rock Band pie, Konami has announced Guitar Freaks Rock Revolution for the Nintendo DS and numerous home consoles. The game, currently in development at UK-based studio Zoë Mode, was revealed at the opening of Konami's 2008 Gamers Day, and is expected to hit stores this October.Understandably, the DS version differs somewhat from the home console editions, relying solely on stylus-based play for each instrument, and with vocals being handled by the handheld's built-in microphone. It also lacks the online play and track creation mode that appears in the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions, but does support local multiplayer battles and cooperative play, much like Guitar Hero: On Tour.We've heard nothing about the track listing yet, though a Gamers Day demonstration of the (PS3) title reportedly included covers of (note: Rock Revolution won't contain any master tracks) of "Blitzkrieg Bop" by the Ramones, "Chop Suey" by System of a Down, "Run to the Hills" by Iron Maiden, "Cum On Feel the Noize" by Quiet Riot, and Wolfmother's "Joker and the Thief."
Konami reveals Rock Revolution
If Guitar Hero is the result of crossing Konami's original GuitarFreaks game with Frequency, Konami's newly-announced Rock Revolution is a hybrid of GuitarFreaks and Guitar Hero/Rock Band -- which looks as derivative as it would sound.Rather than localizing Guitar Freaks, Konami and developer Zoe Mode have created a new game that combines the graphical look of Rock Band with the vertical scrolling interface of the Bemani series. The new game features drum and guitar gameplay, but the Wii version is not slated to use any peripherals. The screen above is clearly not from the Wii version, but we wouldn't expect it to look too different (just lower-res). Rock Revolution is expected to release in October.
Konami jumps on the 'band' wagon with Rock Revolution
click to enlarge When Guitar Hero first hit PS2, we thought: "Wow, this is like Konami's GuitarFreaks ... and that's been around since the original PlayStation. Why don't they release it here?" Well, our question was answered at yesterday's Konami Gamer's Night 2008 with the unveiling of Rock Revolution. Taking the "Revolution" suffix naming scheme of its other music genre (bemani) cousins, the game, from SingStar developer Zoë Mode, is set for a fall release on PS3, Xbox 360, Wii, and Nintendo DS. We have the first screens of the HD offerings, along with some salient details:The PS3 and Xbox 360 versions will feature: 40 songs on the disc, with DLC tracks planned Record your own songs in a "Jam Session" (8 separate tracks) Online co-op, versus, and battle of the bands modes Crazy big drum set with six pads, plus pedal The Wii version adds the ability to play "air guitar" using the Wiimote and nunchuck; and the DS version includes a "Vocalist" mode using the built-in microphone. Check back for our hands-on impressions of Rock Revolution for Xbox 360 -- and be sure to peep the debut trailer after the break!%Gallery-22989%
Playboy: Crush one of '07's most innovative games
There is perhaps no other PSP title as innovative and quirky as Zoe Mode's Crush, a puzzler that successfully implemented 2D and 3D gameplay like we've never seen before. And although the game never sold as well as it should have (Boo Sega's marketing department!), it has received the proper recognition from the critics that it deserves. To add one more accolade to the list, Playboy has chosen Crush as one of its runners-up for 2007's most innovative game. Being included among such wonderful games as Rock Band, Portal, Super Mario Galaxy and Assassin's Creed is no joke ... well, maybe the joke is that Assassin's Creed actually made the list in the first place. Nevertheless, it's great to see one of our favorite PSP titles getting a little more love. If you still have yet to play Crush, then shame on you. However, there's still time to rectify this gross oversight by picking it up today and experiencing one of the most original games ever to grace a handheld.
Zoe Mode further explains their name
We've talked about Kuju Brighton's Zoe Mode name change before, but a new interview with studio head Ed Daly sheds even more light on the decision. Ed knew that some gamers (and even some staff members) would find a girl's name as company moniker a bit silly, but he wanted to have a drastic re-branding. A name that would have gamers sit up and take notice. The decision to use the image of a real model as the company icon was done because Zoe Mode wanted to emphasize that they were real, and their games were for real people. How did the female embodiment influence their game creating decisions? "We make games for Zoe and her family. Zoe is our conscience that signs off on what we do. We ask 'What would Zoe do? and 'Would Zoe like that?' kind of questions. It does help have a reference point, even if she's imaginary" claims Ed. We don't mean to judge, but maybe Ed and his team are as crazy as the world they created in Crush. [Via Gamespot]
