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December Games with Gold freebies are Gears of War, Shoot Many Robots
Microsoft's Games with Gold program closes out 2013 with muscly shooter Gears of War (nope, no numbers at the end of that) and co-op run-and-gunner Shoot Many Robots. That means Gold members on Xbox 360 can download Gears of War for free between the 1st and 15th of December, then they can disembark the Cole Train and start to Shoot Many Robots on December 16, which stays free until the end of the year. Microsoft plans to continue the Games with Gold program on Xbox 360 as an "ongoing benefit," and is extending it to the Xbox One in 2014 on a monthly basis.
Aliens: Colonial Marines for Wii U 'no longer in development'
The Wii U version of Aliens: Colonial Marines is game overed, man."Sega can confirm that the Wii U SKU of Aliens: Colonial Marines is no longer in development," a company representative has informed Joystiq.Discomfort over the game's heartbeat rose this week after the title missed its first quarter launch window and publisher Sega was unable to confirm an updated status. Aliens: Colonial Marines currently stands as one of the worst-reviewed games of the year.
Aliens: Colonial Marines for Wii U misses launch window, Sega declines comment
The Wii U version of Aliens: Colonial Marines missed its first quarter launch window at the designated retail rendezvous point and its fate is currently in question. Gamespot asked Sega yesterday if there was a new debut date for the year's highest profile disaster (you're welcome, SimCity) for the Nintendo console and the publisher responded, "Still no comment on ACM, sorry!"Gamespot notes this is the third time the publisher has refused a status update and Demiurge, the developer tasked with the Wii U version, isn't talking. Randy Pitchford, CEO of Gearbox Software (which put its name on the box for the other console versions), was also unsure last month if the Wii U version was coming out, noting it was Sega's decision.
Shoot Many Robots available now on Android, coming soon to iOS
Demiurge Studios' Shoot Many Robots has gone mobile in an "endless gunner," with the battle against the chainsaw-wielding little jerks available now for free on Android devices. The iOS release will blast away in the "near future.""It's a simple, pick-up-and-play kind of game with unique features never before seen in an endless runner," says Demiurge CEO Albert Reed. The game was developed in collaboration with Owlchemy Labs (Snuggle Truck, Jack Lumber).Shoot Many Robots launched on consoles last year, finding a wider audience when it pulled the trigger on a Steam release.%Gallery-183254%
Surviving the Xenomorph offensive in Aliens: Colonial Marines
The stranded squad of space marines makes hasty preparations amid the flickering lights of a ruined former colony's command center. A scrounged sentry turret sits idle in a corner of the room, slowly scanning for signs of non-human life. Raging storms outside mask the sounds of creatures scuttling through air ducts, but the ever-present rhythmic beeping of motion trackers fill the air with ferocious frequency as the alien menace approaches.Murky shapes take form as they leap into the light, slick, inky-black creatures with pronounced ridges lining their bodies. A shotgun burst drops the first attacker in an instant, its inert body slumping to the floor as a burst of acid blood sprays over a nearby squaddie.Gearbox Software is a studio of many talents, but the developer's biggest success on Aliens: Colonial Marines may well end up being how accurately it's managed to nail the feel of the famous sci-fi series. This is vital, as anyone who has seen the movies can understand. There's nothing in the science fiction genre quite like the franchise's Xenomorphs, a race of highly aggressive and agile beings with acid for blood and the ability to reproduce through something akin to a cross-species infection. Xenomorphs in Aliens: Colonial Marines slide through the environment with the same sort of ease that they do in the movies, as we learned during a recent hands-on demo of the game's campaign. An unseen network of air ducts connects every room and corridor, so any alien that slips out of sight will eventually emerge elsewhere. Probably behind you.%Gallery-173092%
Shoot Many Robots: Arena Kings is a standalone F2P competitive shooter
Self-explanatory action game Shoot Many Robots is branching out. Developer Demiurge Studios has announced Shoot Many Robots: Arena Kings, a brand new free-to-play title for PC. Arena Kings is a competitive 2D shooter, casting players as kings that "murder each other to collect their crowns, and flush them down a teleporting golden toilet."Players will be able to customize their characters with the same kinds of gear found in the original Shoot Many Robots, and more is on the way. While the official release date is still under wraps, interested players can sign up for the closed beta here. Check out a pair of screens – sans any robots that we can see – in the gallery below.%Gallery-160934%
Disasterpeace makes music out of many robots being shot
The soundtrack for Shoot Many Robots is a blues-infused rock compilation that sets the perfect tone for riding off into the desert sunset, entering a room dramatically, driving around the city at night with your sunglasses on and, yes, shooting many robots.This melodic amalgamation was thrown together by Fez composer Disasterpeace (Rich Vreeland), and the whole album is available now on Bandcamp for $5.Give it a listen before you buy right here, and all the best of luck with those pesky robots. We hear there's a lot of them.
Aliens: Colonial Marines Wii U version overseen by Shoot Many Robots studio
Don't count out that Wii U version of Aliens: Colonial Marines, despite Gearbox pushing its launch to an unknown spot beyond the 360/PS3/PC version's February 2013 date. Gearbox head Randy Pitchford says that Shoot Many Robots studio Demiurge Studios has been overseeing the Wii U version for the past nine months, alongside both Nerve and Timegate.Pitchford couldn't speak to many specifics of the game, but he did extol the Wii U controller. "When I play with the controller, I immediately realize that for the types of games I like to play and make, this is the best controller I've ever had from Nintendo." He also teases one potential use for the WiiPad, saying, "For Aliens: Colonial Marines, it's really exciting to have that screen there because I can do things that are very unique to this universe. For instance, we have a motion tracker in this universe. Now our motion tracker can literally be in our hands and we can see and hear it –and scan the room in 360 degrees, since it's a motion device."Aliens: Colonial Marines launches on February 13, 2013 for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. The Wii U version is expected some time beyond that date.
Shoot Many Robots through Steam April 6
Shoot Many Robots will be downloadable as a prime directive for humans using personal computers on April 6. Demiurge's co-op shoot-every-metal-thing-that-moves title will be available for $10, with an option to buy three copies of the game and receive the fourth for free.Steam-specific bonuses include gear that lets avatars dress like Half-Life's Gordon Freeman and the addition of Portal's turrets as robots to shoot. The Chopper Bot backpack for the Pyro and Medic classes in Team Fortress 2 is also available exclusively through Steam."We rebuilt the controls for PC and overhauled the user interface so it won't feel like you've turned your keyboard into a gamepad that makes clicky sounds – every detail has been considered to make this an optimized and seamless experience," said Demiurge CEO Albert Reed.Demiurge will also host a "Control Scheme Throwdown" at next week's PAX East to resolve some control issues with the non-mouse and keyboard set.%Gallery-150740%
Shoot Many Robots boots up launch media
If the title of Shoot Many Robots didn't make it expressly clear what the point of the game is, Demiurge has provided a video and some screens for the game's launch that will help those of you still not catching on. Let us know if you still have any questions.
Shoot Many Robots review: Robocalypse now
Now that 2012 is here, bringing with it the impending doom of modern civilization under the talons of Quetzcoatl, let us look back fondly on our foolish visions of how the world might have ended.One of my personal favorite apocalyptic theories concerns the robot uprising. And wouldn't you know it, Shoot Many Robots is here just in time to remind us of what a glorious end we could have faced at the unfeeling hands of machines gone mad. I can think of no better way to celebrate the end of the world. Actually, strike that, I can.%Gallery-137723%
Shoot Many Robots starting March 13
Your pathological hatred of robots will finally have an outlet on March 13, when Ubisoft and Demiurge Studios release Shoot Many Robots on PSN for $10. An XBLA version follows the next day. The previously announced PC version was not mentioned in the press release -- but it'll be later, because it's an Ubisoft game.A new dev diary (above) traces the evolution of the game, from its humble beginnings as "Throw Rocks at Two Robots," into its transitional "Swing a Heavy Pipe at Several Robots" period, to the delivery of the prototype version, "Shoot A Couple Dozen Robots." We're kidding about all of that except the existence of a dev diary.
Shoot Many Robots introduces squirrely, hot and gassy robots
It's nice to know the names of the things you kill, and Demiurge wants you to have the most pleasant experience possible in its coming title, Shoot Many Robots. In the video above, meet Hot Rod, Hummer, Gasbag, Six-Pack and Dirt Screw. One of them "screws dirt." We'll let you deduce which one.
Shoot Many Robots gets M rating, peek behind the developer's curtain
Demiurge's still dateless Shoot Many Robots may be closer to release than it seems, as the Metal Slug-esque shooter has been granted an "M" rating by the ESRB for sexual themes, strong language and the use of alcohol. Now, we're not going to put the onus of that rating squarely upon the shoulders of a certain fruit-fetishist robot, but all of those things do sound right in his wheelhouse. The rating was revealed by the above trailer, which details the game's rendering engine and the various effects that can be achieved by removing certain layers of the game's visuals. While developed primarily for debugging purposes, some of these effects may make it into the finished product as bonus levels or unlockables. Personally, we're keeping our fingers crossed for the Lighting Mode shown at 02:11 and the "Limbo mode" at 02:32.
See the Fruit F**ker ply its dark trade in Shoot Many Robots
Even if you were on the fence about Demiurge's upcoming Shoot Many Robots, Penny Arcade's Fruit F**ker (a collectible headpiece in the game) is here to help make up your mind. Oh, did we say "make up"? We meant "extract the nutrient-rich liquids from."
Ubisoft to publish Shoot Many Robots on XBLA, PSN and PC in 2012
Demiurge Studios has a lot of experience with the Unreal Engine. The current makeup of the company includes people who've worked on BioShock, Mass Effect and other Unreal-powered titles. Today, the company has announced that it's found a publisher for its upcoming game, Shoot Many Robots -- Ubisoft. The publisher will help bring the game to Xbox Live Arcade, PSN and Windows PC sometime in 2012. "Ubisoft is excited to be working with Demiurge Studios on the release of Shoot Many Robots," said Adam Novickas, director of marketing at Ubisoft, in the press release past the jump. "Ubisoft is focused on providing players with a strong and diverse portfolio of digital titles, and Demiurge is set to bring another amazing game to the digital space with Shoot Many Robots." Shoot Many Robots will be on-hand at PAX Prime in Seattle later this week. We last checked in with the game at GDC, so if you're late to the party be sure to read our preview. %Gallery-131345%
Vote on Shoot Many Robots' prospective user-created designs
Demiurge Studios asked fans to "Design Many Robots," and they've done just that, submitting potential designs for a new enemy robot to be added to the studio's upcoming downloadable title, Shoot Many Robots, through a DLC expansion. Demiurge has now narrowed down the submissions from "many" to "five" and posted the finalists for voting on. You can browse through the five finalists in our gallery below and decide whether "Chopter," "K.R.I.B.," "Trikey," "J0TN4R" or "Gnash Britches" would be the ideal robot to shoot. Then, head to Demiurge's site and vote for one robot. The winning designer won't just contribute to the game, says Demiurge, but will get a trip to Boston "to help us bring their design to life!"%Gallery-122381%
Shoot Many Robots preview: What it says on the tin
Shoot Many Robots reminds me of classic 2D shooter Metal Slug, but with the addition of leveling and upgrade systems. Or it could be like a linear, 2D version of Borderlands -- beyond exhibiting a similar color palette, SMR's constantly popping out XP numbers and loot notices. Or maybe it's more like Contra, given the steady flood of enemies and enormous mini-bosses. Okay, let's just call it a mixture of all those things, melded with its own southern-baked main character -- the gaming equivalent of Zombieland's Tallahassee character. That all makes SMR sound pretty derivative -- which it certainly is, to an extent -- but the game's developers show a ton of heart going into the project. Also, tutus.%Gallery-117003%
Indies react: PAX East as a showcase for small studios
Like so many PAX shows before it, this year's PAX East showcased a ton of indie games -- the gaming equivalent of a Williamsburg dubstep show, if you will. In our experience at this year's event, larger industry players like EA and Bethesda showed off their titles with hired hands and private theater viewings, choosing to exhibit older demos rather than new content. The indies and smaller studios, on the other hand, were out in force. Beyond bringing playable versions of their games to the show -- even Fez was playable, for the first time in several years of development -- the indie studios brought themselves. They continued the tradition of directly engaging with attendees and, often, solicited game-testing feedback on the fly. "I approached PAX East as a three-day playtest session. I learned so much about what works and what doesn't just from standing in the back and observing how people played the game," Fez co-developer Phil Fish told Joystiq. "It's also an amazing morale boost to be told by so many people that your game is great."
The many hats of Demiurge Studios
Shoot Many Robots is Boston-based Demiurge Studios' first original game, and my hands-on with it at GDC was the first time that anyone at the developer ever gave a press demo. Studio head Albert Reed was, unsurprisingly, excited to delve into the studio's origins. "We got our start doing mods for Unreal Tournament. It was me and two other college buddies doing mods in the frickin' computer cluster at Carnegie Mellon. I'm not kidding!" Reed told me before showing off Shoot Many Robots last week. "Then one thing lead to another and those companies that were licensing Unreal Engine started hiring us," Reed added humbly. It turns out that the folks hiring Demiurge were developers like Gearbox Software, Irrational Games, BioWare, and Harmonix. "We did some work on the first level -- the lighthouse and that sort of descent into Rapture," Reed told me, casually explaining that his studio clandestinely assisted with one of gaming's most iconic openings: the beginning of BioShock.
