If you follow the happenings of Xbox LIVE Arcade as religiously as I do, you'll know that Lode Runner (1200 Microsoft Points)has been in the pipeline for a considerable amount of time. For whatever reason (certification-related?), it was held back, but the game will finally see the light of day on Wednesday of this week.
As was the case with the 1983 classic, Lode Runner XBLA has a full level editor, but this time around you can host matches over Xbox LIVE using your own levels and even download custom creations from the community. User-generated content in an Xbox 360 game? That's unpossible!
There's also co-op and competitive multiplayer functionality, as well as a mode in which you come back as an enemy should you be killed, which sounds intriguing. It's a shame other games like Left 4 Dead don't allow you to become a zombified survivor upon dying, but I'll take what I can get.
Head after the jump for some footage of Lode Runner's co-op.
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Hey cool. I'll place this squarely in my list of things when I find spending $15 on games that should be $5 to be worthwhile.
Where's the whole price tier thing gone? This ain't a $15 game, MS. And it's not as though suddenly you started roping in games that are of some higher caliber than you did a year ago. Castlevania SOTN is EVERY CENT worth the $10. This is NOT worth the money any way you slice it.
I don't like MS' new 1200 is the new 800 price scheme, and I won't buy games that aren't worth the money.
This pricing stuff is EXACTLY what Naia and I were worried about when Braid came out. Yes, Braid may have been worth the price, but the larger issue is that it represented the beginning of the general price inflation MS has decided to implement.
I would have instantly bought this at 800 points. Even at 1200, I'm still tempted (assuming it has all the promised features like online level sharing), but I'm thinking that it's time to take a stand against MS's price jacking.
The part where players come back as enemies sounds problematic, at least for the original levels as many of them depended on the enemies behaving a certain way for completion. Maybe that's why the levels in the video have multiple paths.
800 sounds like a better a price point. I don't think any quality platform-puzzler is priced at 1200.
1200 points!? Fuck, I just spent 800 on Outrun. I wanted to say that the level editor justified the extra 5$, but it better play well before that's true.....
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Contest:
1:20 PM on 04.20.2009 | 
Where's the whole price tier thing gone? This ain't a $15 game, MS. And it's not as though suddenly you started roping in games that are of some higher caliber than you did a year ago. Castlevania SOTN is EVERY CENT worth the $10. This is NOT worth the money any way you slice it.
I don't like MS' new 1200 is the new 800 price scheme, and I won't buy games that aren't worth the money.
I suppose I should be pissed that it costs a quarter of the cost of a mainstream game for about the same amount of content?
800 sounds like a better a price point. I don't think any quality platform-puzzler is priced at 1200.