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Motion-controlled rail shooter Blue Estate coming to Xbox One
HESAW, developer of the on-rails, motion-controlled shooter Blue Estate, is well aware that a Kinect is bundled in every Xbox One owner's purchase. The studio is bringing its adaptation of Viktor Kalvachev's comic book series to the gesture-friendly console, noting in a press release that they'll be using the "unprecedented accuracy and precision of Kinect" to let players rack up kill combos. News of the Xbox One port follows last month's reveal of a PS4 version, which will be controlled with the gyroscopic abilities of the Dualshock 4 instead instead of camera-tracked hand movements. Fans of the comics may be all set, but our own Jess Conditt wrote that the game has a "natural ability to turn sexiness into exploitation, humor into humiliation and my own enjoyment into exasperation." Beyond that, Jess' review found Blue Estate to be structurally troubled, wondering if the audience is to "forgive poor gameplay mechanics because the game is supposed to be crass." [Image: Focus Home Interactive]
Former Leap Motion exclusive Blue Estate heading to PS4, more platforms
Blue Estate is switching the gesture controls of Leap Motion for the gyroscopic functions of the DualShock 4, after developer HeSaw revealed it's bringing the on-rails shooter to the PS4. HeSaw is showcasing the PS4 version at GDC this week, and revealed on Twitter it's bring the former Leap Motion exclusive to "more platforms to be announced soon." In our review of the Leap Motion version released last year, Jess Conditt gave Blue Estate two stars out of five. While Jess noted fans may enjoy a new way of experiencing the Image-published comic the game's based on, she said, "Blue Estate doesn't give its audience enough credit, assuming players will get a kick out of shooting enemies in the crotch, watching a strip show and making fun of how people look – assuming we'll forgive poor gameplay mechanics because the game is supposed to be crass." [Image: @BlueEstateTheGame]
Blue Estate prologue review: Bleak motion
Everything about Blue Estate is pared down to the lowest common denominator. At its core, it's a straightforward, on-rails shooter exclusive to the Leap Motion gesture control device, and it's based off of the Blue Estate comic series published by Image. Blue Estate runs with this premise and nothing more, scraping only the topmost layer of what a "shooter" can be, what motion controls can do, and how a rich comic universe can be translated to the screen. The characters are flat and stereotypical, the humor isn't deep enough to make up for its off-color overtones and the gameplay is painful – literally, my arm cramped after holding it in front of the screen for so long.
Blue Estate prologue shoots up Leap Motion for free
The prologue of Blue Estate, Hesaw's dark comedy shooter, is out now for free on the Leap Motion Airspace Store. It costs absolutely nothing for a "limited time" and will eventually be $4. The prologue includes the first two levels of the game. Blue Estate is a rails shooter based on the Image comic series of the same name, and features a cast of gritty characters saying funny things while doing dirty deeds. With the Leap Motion controller, Blue Estate is played with one finger, swiping and holding steady to dodge and shoot. We got our hands on Blue Estate at Gamescom and found it to be unapologetically raunchy – for better or worse.
Opinion: Blue Estate's humiliated mermaid won't leave me alone
When the embargo for Blue Estate lifted last week, I had two options: write about the game and include that I felt excluded while playing it, or don't write about it at all. The second choice is hardly an option when it's my job to provide feedback on games the world hasn't seen yet, and I take my job seriously. Unfortunately, my personal response to Blue Estate is so overwhelming, even one month later, that I can't write about it without including these reactions, even though I find it embarrassing and extremely stressful to share my emotions – gah, gag me with a spoon – in a public forum. So, here we go. Blue Estate is a boiling bevy of extremes – it's based on the Blue Estate comic series published by Image, which tells the sordid tales of drug lords, mafia men, scantily clad women, has-beens and sarcastic jerks of every flavor dumped into the back alleys of LA. Blue Estate the game focuses on one of these caricatures, Tony Luciano, who is – you guessed it – a mobster and son of the Godfather of West Coast Cosa Nostra. I played a demo of Blue Estate at Gamescom. In the demo, it's clear Tony is a sarcastic, fumbling racist with a gun and a lot of luck. He's greedy, inconsiderate and narcissistic, and I can practically feel the grease building up in my hair as I point his gun at enemy after enemy. Tony is every bit the stereotypical, jaded mobster, with that cliché's most obvious traits pushed to the extreme. Another character featured prominently in the demo, but not playable, is Cherry Popz. She's a stripper, and in the same way Tony's macho stupidity is enhanced, Cherry has enhancements – when she's introduced, the narration focuses on her jaw-dropping beauty while the images focus on her body. She has a problem and she's seeking professional help from an overweight, unshowered, male private eye (who is privately eyeing her through a pair of thick glasses). During playable moments, Cherry wears a tiny black two-piece and heels, and at one point she gives me a full-on pole dance. Now – I've been to strip clubs and I don't find the notion of a woman in lingerie offensive or disgusting, but Blue Estate has the natural ability to turn sexiness into exploitation, humor into humiliation and my own enjoyment into exasperation, with a neon sign flashing the philosophy that I don't need to feel comfortable here. I've never felt unwelcome in a strip club.
Blue Estate jumps from comic book pages to Leap Motion
Blue Estate is a first-person, on-rails shooter controlled with the player's hovering pointer finger, coming to PC via the Leap Motion Controller. The prologue is expected in the Leap Motion store "soon." Players control Tony Luciano, a bumbling, sarcastic mob boss from the Blue Estate comic series published by Image. The game takes place in the comic's world, complete with violent gun fights, humor in questionable taste, crime and strippers. With Leap Motion, players point a finger at the screen, over the controller box, and hover over enemies to shoot. Other simple gestures, such as swiping that finger down, make Tony reload or take cover. Blue Estate comes from HeSaw, a new indie studio based in France and composed of former Ubisoft and Darkworks employees, with series creator Viktor Kalvachev as creative director. At Gamescom, HeSaw told Joystiq that Blue Estate is in the vein of Quentin Tarantino or Guy Ritchie films, and it will eventually hit PlayStation 3's Move and Xbox 360 Kinect. There's no deal yet for next-gen systems.
