Can someone confirm that all these same issues exist for the PC? And if the PC is possibly worse?
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.
The Game Room Needs Renovating
IM surprised at how much I agree with your list, thats not to say that I didnt think you had the same nostalgia as me so much as I didnt think I'd remember the ones you mentioned and yet I totaly remember them!
I agree with you, i hope they get the bugs fixed as well as they really take you of it sometimes, although I must admit everytime I play in the game room I find the time disappearing just like the old days when I would stay in a chucky cheese arcade until they turned off the power an dmade me lose my quarter, or some other arcade in the topanga mall (among other various arcades in cali back in the day).
Games these days dont capture me the same way. I will play for awhile, but I dont get as engrossed in them as I do in these games, and I dont know why but I like to theorize. I suspect its because these games were made to keep eating your quarters so naturally they were made in such a way that made you want to keep playing, had challenge (often to challenging) but yet still remained fun and you just wanted to see what the next map was like. I dont know, there's a quality to the old arcade games you just dont see anymore and its why I love the idea and I reallly hope to see the games you mentioned as well as many others (the neo geo collections would be pretty cool).
I would also like to mention I hope they get more of the graphics for the games machines. Its a real shame that so many are left out (and just black) on the current selection. I know its nit picking, but those had some awesome looks (look at the crystal castles machine, that thing is awesome). Its just a cool factor I enjoy.
Anyway, I am talking to much but I really love the old arcade games and cant wait to see more. If they release more actual arcade games (not that I dont like the old consoles but as you said I still have alot of those that I dont really play anymore or can get somewhere else) I'll probably spend alot more money on it.
Great article.
I honestly wished Game Room ran a lot smoother right "out da box". I had a real problem with freezing in the few days I played it. It also doesn't really explain a lot of the systems very well, and I too have noticed the "hiccups" that can occur when playing. In a game like Tempest, where every split-second is crucial, this is a major problem.
My main problem with Game Room isn't its fault. I'm broke right now and can't afford to buy any more machines, so after a few days of playing some serious Tempest, I was kind of at a place where I didn't necessarily clamber back into playing.
I'll hopefully get into it again when I get some money that isn't devoted to Super Street Fighter IV, Wario Ware DIY, or Red Dead Redemption.
What should be in the game room are actual Arcade games, not piss poor Atari 2600 ports and certainly not El Generico 2600 games. Revenge of Yar was an awful game as so many were on the 2600. I think MS are really being the cheapest of assholes for proving such a pathetic lineup for the launch of the Games Room. MAME has so many perfectly emulated games from the mid 80s to mid 90s which haven't seen a decent port in years, let alone the hundreds like Exed Exes which haven't been ported at all. It's clear that MS has no fucking idea what to do with Games Room right now and I fear that it will be filled with extremely crappy, uber simple early 80s games for the forseeable future. Pooyan is nice and all Jeff, same with Bosconian but come on man, what about Blasteroids and Sinistar? What about a proper, Slapstick emu driven Marble Madness, Gauntlet II 4 player or any number of awesome late 80s games? The emulation community has been delivering so many great games since the the early 90s and I fail to see how MS could've missed the mark with their launch lineup. Surely the licensing deals can't be that hard to finalise.
Hell they could selll a whole series of proper trackball and other esoteric controllers (like the three tiered spinner from Deadly Discs of Tron, another classic which would tie into TRON Legacy's impending release) off the back of some really decent releases.
Honestly I think that Games Room is such an utter waste of such a great idea.
Total Carnage is a must, but I think I'd rather see it as an Xbox Live Arcade game instead of being in the game room.
Satan's Hollow is the shit, Also, Offroad is my third favourite arcade game ever - both would be great additions.
Frankly though I'm more interested in what they do if and when they branch out beyond strictly releasing old school arcade games like Pac Man.
I would love me some Primal Rage aka the best fighting game of all time - It's like Mortal Kombat except you're dinosaurs that eat people.
Game Room is definitely a sweet idea, but there are some things that bug me.
Why doesn't playing a game for a challenge count towards your medals, and why can't you submit that score to the leaderboards? I see no reasoning for that restriction whatsoever. You still play the same game in exactly the same way (assuming you set the challenge to highscore and start from the beginning).
Also, not having a quick way to see what games your friends own is annoying too.
Great list! Zoo Keeper is classic. Why not provide a level to display and play existing XBLA games (doesn't need the same online interaction, rewind, etc.) or, at the very least, the arcade classics I already purchased like Track and Field, Frogger, Pac-Man, Contra, Gauntlet, etc?
As it is now, it's pretty weak. And how about pinball games?! And a real claw game? Sandbox exploration maybe? Forget all that. How about simply listing the game name on the screen instead of trying to make out the name on the cabinet from a distance with annoying avatars in the way??
And sorry, but Atari 2600 and Intellivision are NOT arcade games!! I lived in the era of those consoles, and while fun at home, they SUCKED compared to the arcade games of the day - we went to the arcade to get AWAY from the home systems, NOT to play them!
This is a video game museum , not the fun arcades of the 70s & 80s I experienced.
Damn straight I want Elevator Action!
" I don't know about the Wii, but I like the PS One classics. Especially since you can transfer them to the PSP. Anyways, I understand your pain. "I agree, but I don't think Jeff dislikes them, he was merely saying that he's already got all the games in his garage, seeing as he reviewed them back in the day.
Reactor, huh? I remember playing that to death on the Atari 2600. It would be cool to see that in the Game Room in its arcade version glory.
Seems pretty clear that they ended up releasing early for Block Party, and it's going to end up hurting them. Tons of bugs and server problems, and only about 3 good games released for the first two months. I'm not filling my game room with crap just because they haven't released anything of interest yet, and it's likely I'll have completely lost interest by the time they get around to releasing more.
I'm holding out for S.T.U.N. Runner. Played that ALL the time.
I'm thinking of another arcade game as well but can't remember the name. This was back in late 80's early 90's. It was a four player game where everyone controlled their own tank. The HUGE cabinet was set up so that everyone sat around in a circle. It was very colorful,(cabinet and game), and people could choose from different types of tanks-slow with powerful weapons, fast with weaker weapons. I can remember always choosing the blue tank. The controls consisted of two sticks that controlled each side of the tank-ie both sticks pushed forward to go straight, left stick down right stick up to turn left. You played in a arena type setting where it was a last man standing rule.
I LOVED that game, and was very good at it. For the life of me I can't remember it's name.
Jeff, good call with Congo Bongo. Although they better go with the arcade original and not any one of the home ports, or so help me...
I want it to have: Jumpman. Not sure if it was on an arcade machine, but I remember playing a version on the Commodore 64.Props for Epyx love. The "modern" version is Jumpman Lives! from Apogee. There's another console game of that era that is familiar but I can't remember where I saw it the other day.
Check out MAH LIST: Arcade Emulation I will gladly pay for. I added a ton of images because I can't stand empty boxes. :)
How buggy Game Room is doesn't surprise me. It was developed by Krome. QA is not one of their strengths. Their "Hellboy: The Science of Evil" is one buggiest games I've played on the 360. It crashed constantly. Don't know why they didn't choose Backbone Entertainment to do this since they've handled most of the retro games on Xbox Live Arcade.
i want the original streets of rage and the simpsons arcade (the 2nd game i probly locking in a seqof licencing) i doubt they will relses the originol pac man with out takeing out off XBLA
Forgot all about Venture. I think they had a 2600 version of that as well. Zaxxon would
be good as would Qbert. There are some other Zaxxon-style games that I remember
out in the mid-80s, but sadly I can't recall the name of the game I played back then,
it was great better than Zaxxon...I wish I knew what it was called.
I'm an older gamer and I'm hoping they get Berzerk, Pengo, Bagman, Bump 'n Jump, Arabian, Kangaroo, Crazy Climber, Mr. Do!!!, Q*Bert, Space Invaders, Burgertime and Zaxxon in the Game Room. Kind of worried, that of the 1100+ games, they will be old console games mostly. Since the Game Room was announced, I've actually started thinking about the gameshow Starcade for whatever reason.
I'd totally buy S.T.U.N. Runner if it were available.
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