Game Room
Game » consists of 6 releases. Released Mar 24, 2010
A downloadable portal for official emulation of retro video games for the Xbox 360 and PC, featuring offerings from the Atari 2600 and Intellivision as well as early arcade games by Atari and Konami.
About the "Game Pack 001" and "Game Pack 002"...
I don't know if this has been asked yet, but I just want to get this clear:
On the Game Room download screen from the Xbox Dashboard, there is the Game Room and then there is "Game Pack 001" and "Game Pack 002" that are able to be downloaded for free. Are those the actual games, or are they like the Burnout Paradise and Midnight Club L.A. "compatibility" downloads?
I just don't wanna waste time downloading them if they aren't the actual games.
" @thekrunch said:Well, the idea that you have to download 73MB files in order to even enter the Game Room, let alone the fact that you are downloading those 73MB files in order to download OTHER files is a bit of a joke." What a joke. "What is? Care to clarify? "
My bigger problem is the fact that each of these things are 240 points A PIECE! I mean, forgive me if I'm wrong, but can't I buy most of these games at a garage sale for about...50 cents? Maybe less? Maybe not the arcade cabinet games, mind you, but the Atari 2600 and Intellivision games DEFINITELY. I understand that there are some features built into these games, such as leaderboards and rankings and challenges and the ability to use them to unlock achievements for Game Room...
...but still, 240 points per game is a bit pricey.
Nonetheless, if they end up releasing Gyruss for this, then I'll probably be more interested. Until then, there's not really any games that appeal to me from the arcade days.
If you love those prices, you should buy the Play Anywhere versions. :P
Yeah, it's quite the rip-off.I got several of the Atari 2600 games for free from compilation disc I found in a cereal box. Play the demos first, and only buy the games you're absolutely certain you want to play. In other words Jungler.
Dont forget that some of these games have control schemes that dont work well with the 360's analog stick. They'll map the buttons to the controller, but once it hits the service, it'll more or less stay that way on the Game Room service forever. They probably wont fix the control scheme, and I doubt they'll make specific controllers for any of the games.
Also, its been brought up; these game packs are about 80 MB a piece. You also have no clue as to which game is included in which pack when it comes time to download the next pack. Microsoft may aim for about 1,000 games, but if each pack is about 80MB, that's about....80GB worth of content on your system. So if you want to hold onto a certain game, you have to know which game is in what game pack, and delete the ones you don't have, making their demo play kind of worthless. Plus you have to mind the other things on your hard drive as well, unless you're willing to fork over a couple hundred dollars for another hard drive.
Suddenly Game Room is starting to sound a lot more cumbersome than it should be for whats essentially a front for a number of games that only take up a few measly kilobytes. I love the idea of Game Room, and I'll totally get some games for it, but I think they need to work on a few things with the service...
Nonetheless, if they end up releasing Gyruss for this, then I'll probably be more interested. Until then, there's not really any games that appeal to me from the arcade days. "I think this is pretty much exactly what they are hoping for. Spam enough old games, and you'll eventually find enough someone(s) who have fond enough memories of a certain game for them to spend the money.
Proving my own point: I had an intellivision when I was growing up, and loved it. Playing Astrosmash, or Space Hawk now though, I can't imagine spending money on them. But if Sinistar comes out for game room, I would totally drop the money on that, day one.
Sh'eah, i know right...i mean it's not like an outfit, ya know, that my avatar can actually wear and everything....but still, 240 points per game is a bit pricey.
Seriously though, you're right about the atari/intellilvision games being overpriced as some of them don't even feature the leaderboards. all non scoring games that only come with 1 medal should only cost $1 at most; $3 for 3 medal games - $1 for 1 medal games...how did they fuck that up so badly? I'd gladly pay $3 for these virtual cabinets as collector's items but then some of the cabinets (Konami) don't even feature original cabinets and art...so if they're half assing the effort there why am i still paying $3? yeah, there's a lot of things that are really fucked up about Game Room but i remain hopeful and can at least look at it as a virtual retro gaming museum if nothing else.
M'eh. There a ripoff I guess but they barely cost more than a cup of coffee.
Unlike the harddrives, this is a type of "premium pricing" I can deal with.
That being said I don't see me using any of it until the blockbusters start showing up.
"Also, its been brought up; these game packs are about 80 MB a piece. You also have no clue as to which game is included in which pack when it comes time to download the next pack. Microsoft may aim for about 1,000 games, but if each pack is about 80MB, that's about....80GB worth of content on your system."This. I'm really liking what Game Room is doing, but if they persist with these huge game packs us owners of measly 20G drives are going to start having huge problems. It just seems crazy to expect people to have several hundred gigs of their space eaten up for the sake of a few 20-30 year old games.
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