If you don’t normally check out Xbox Live Indie Games on your Xbox 360, then this little contest might give you some incentive to do so.

If you can set the world record score in the indie shmup You Will Die by August 1, you will be awarded 10,000 U.S.-based Microsoft Points (that’s $125).  Second place will be awarded 1,600 Microsoft Points while third place will receive 400 Microsoft Points.

All submissions will have to follow the Twin Galaxies guidelines and must be received by August 1.  The current high score is 10,538,510, set by Todaysforgotten.

If you don’t already own the game, you can download it for 80 Microsoft Points via this link.  Inquiries regarding the contest can be sent to info@deadpixelarcade.com.

Source: www.deadpixelarcade.com

So today is the last day for you to play Halo 2 online.  Depressing, isn’t it?

With only a few hours left until Microsoft takes down all Xbox Live services for original Xbox games, you may be able to get in a few matches before all of those hours of trash talking become nothing more than a distant memory (assuming you’re reading this article as soon as it’s posted).

I can just see it now.  Only a year from now 360 gamers will begin recounting tales of “vanilla” Xbox Live, much like WoW players regaling everyone with stories of the original Level-60 Naxxramas or countless Onyxia wipes.  “Oh yeah, well I remember when Halo 2 was online.  We used to play that all the time, back in my day….”

But, at least Bungie is having some fun before pulling the plug on Halo 2’s life support.  As you probably already know, we’re big fans of all things teabagging related.  That’s why one of the “Did you know?” posts by Bungie today gave us a good chuckle:

We definitely need some more factoids like that.

If you’re excited about Microsoft’s upcoming hands-free, motion-sensing peripheral, Project Natal, then you’ll likely jump for joy (like the kid pictured above) when the company finally debuts further details on the device at E3 in Los Angeles this June.  This information comes by way of a press email from the company.

The “world premier” as Microsoft is calling it, will occur on June 13 specifically at the Galen Center in Los Angeles.  This premier will actually precede the following morning’s usual Microsoft Press Event, which will be held at the Wiltern Theater.

The big three hitters, Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft, each hold their own press events each year at E3 immediately or shortly before the actual open-floor expo, which allows them to make their biggest announcements without journalists being distracted by sampling the plethora of new titles.  So, in a way, Microsoft’s premier will actually constitute a company press-event before the company press-event.  That ought to make the second company press-event slightly redundant if it reiterates Natal information at that time.

However, this should give journalists a chance to go hands-on (correction: hands-off) with the peripheral without being subject to absurdly large crowds typically herding at the June expo.  Microsoft should be showcasing a majority of the launch software at this event, as well announcing a price point and a final name for the device.

No further details have been provided, but the email states that more information will follow.

I knew it was going to suck and reality has proven me correct. The newly launched Arcade Room for the Xbox 360 had its high point yesterday when it launched and wouldn’t work. MS should have  left well enough alone, as the downloading and installing of Arcade Room was more entertaining than the games on offer.

I’m sure Arcade Room seemed like a great idea at some point but something went terribly wrong along the way, leading to an environment that doesn’t have a single compelling element. It looks like a 3D environment, similar to Sony’s Home, but you can’t interact with anything, nor can you even move freely within this environment. You simply swivel your view around and pick a section of game room that houses whatever game you want to play. There you see some very uninteresting arcade cabinets, followed by even worse versions of classic titles like Asteroids Deluxe.

I examined quite a few of titles on offer and was shocked to discover that many games are actually worse, in terms of graphics, than the original games. Asteroids Deluxe looks like a mess, verified by myself when loading up MAME, the arcade emulator, and checking out the original ROM, which has noticably higher resolution than the half-assed 360 version.

So, in the end, you have a bunch of lame classic games that are grossly over-priced. Why people would want to pay to play crappy Intellivision games is beyond me, especially when every Intellivision game can be found freely (and legally) on the net using nothing more than a JAVA emulator.

Arcade Room is really nothing more than a front-end for game emulation. Problem is, the front-end horribly designed, big, bulky, slow, unwieldy…and the emulation aspect is a joke. Do yourself a favor, go download a real PC front-end like EmuLoader, get yourself some ROMS, and enjoy these classic titles as they were. Better yet, with a front-end like EmuLoader, you can add great high-res shots of the original arcade cabinets, original gameplay fliers and historical information that puts Arcade Room to shame.

I have no idea what MS was trying to accomplish with Arcade Room, but if embarrassment was their goal then it is a resounding success.

Advertising wars in the video game industry always amuse me.  Perhaps it’s my overwhelming sense of nostalgia from the heated 16-bit war between Nintendo and Sega.  Or perhaps I just like seeing blood on the floor.

Either way, Sony is coming out with both arms swinging (no, really, watch the video) in its new commercial for the PlayStation Move controller apparently launching in November.  The video takes a few jabs at the competition (*cough* Wii, Natal *cough*) by mocking waggle and catching red balls that fall from the sky.  The commercial claims to come from the distant future of “December 2010″ wherein Move is a success, and Sony would like to thank you for making it so successful.  A bit of a bold claim, eh?

The video doesn’t really try to market to new users, instead falling back on amusing existing PS3 owners and touting allegedly superior hardware specs.  But it is an interesting watch nonetheless, and we’ll all have to check back in December to see if Sony’s marketing prediction was really as insightful as it claims.

In the mean time, you can probably bet on Microsoft launching its own marketing counter-attack soon.  That should be even more entertaining.

Microsoft made an announcement at the Consumer Electronics Show about the forthcoming spring release of Game Room, a new virtual space for players to hang out as their avatars and play classic/vintage arcade video games. Sounds fine as a basic description, but my intuition says this will be a bust.

There are several issues that will get in the way of Game Room’s success. First up we have the games themselves. Game Room wil be launching with approximately 30 titles, with a promised 1000 titles within three years. That is a ton of shit and I mean that quite literally. If you can name me 20 classic video games that actually withstand the test of time, let alone 1000, I’ll send you a virtual medal.

Then there is the pricing, an area where Microsoft really understands the fine art of screwing customers. Players can either pay $5 for a dual-license that allows for PC and Xbox 360 play, or $3 for a single platform. Finally, players can sink 40-points (50-cents) for a single play.

As someone who grew up with the dawn of video games, having played just about every classic arcade title when it was actually available at my local Shakey’s Pizza, I can honestly say the vast majority of those so-called classics sucked. Add classics from vintage home consoles like Intellivision and the Atari 2600 and you have a recipe for complete boredom.
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