You may remember our
earlier post regarding
DoDonPachi: Dai-ou-jou and
Ketsui X, two of Cave's greatest shooters, and how they were headed for Xbox 360 on disc format. That's lovely, and well worthy of
yard sales, but it turns out the reason behind that move isn't something to get quite so excited about.
According to the latest issue of
Famitsu, Cave says that they originally approached Microsoft with the proposal that these two classics be released for Xbox Live Arcade, but were shot down. The reason? I'll let Cave's official statement explain after the jump.
"Our initial plan was to port lots of good arcade titles to XBLA. We talked to IP holders of these titles, and persuaded them. We secured these licenses, and finally talked with Microsoft. There they rejected all of our proposals saying, 'We are going to cut down faithful arcade ports.' We felt so frustrated. We wanted to show them that their decision was wrong. So we switched our two most promising projects into retail."
Cutting down on faithful arcade ports? You have a developer like Cave -- makers of some of the richest shooter experiences out there and founders of the Bullet Hell genre -- come to you in search of a home for two of their best titles, and you turn them down? To make way for what, Boogie Bunnies 2?
As sad as it is to think we could have downloaded these two games on the cheap for XBLA, sadder still is the idea that Microsoft wishes to cut down on arcade ports. The company has done a fairly decent job of selecting quality titles for its adopted library of classics, and there was an insane amount of potential there for the future.
While it makes sense to want to bring more original content to XBLA, (and I am in full support of this,) I don't quite understand the logic behind turning down such fantastic games when they would surely result in big bags of money for everyone involved. Furthermore, given Microsoft's track record for abysmal quality in its choices of original games, it makes even less sense.
[Via this thing]
Contest:
2:50 PM on 03.28.2008
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Arcade ports >>>>>>>>>> Negative Infinity >>> Yaris
Box.
Live.
Arcade...?
Also, Orcist is a huge Boogie Bunnies fan..he may not like that comment..lol.
Regardless of the genre, these are two really great, well-made games that could have been added to the XBLA selection screen, and now they've been forced into traditional retail format. Which means you're going to pay more for them if you want to play them, and the overall quality of XBLA remains shit when it could have gone up a notch.
Fail. Just fail.
80% was about XNA and user based original xbla games, the other 20% was shared between fable 2 and gears of war 2.
I personally think though they eventually need to stop regulating the flow of games not QA mind you just not limit the numbers of title released if 30 devs have titles ready to go on one day let them if they want to. Now I know why they don't do this they want a controlled flow of games that gives all title released a better chance to sell. Sort of like a flavor of the week club if there were 30 varieties most would buy one but spread out they get more sales on individual games.
Cave should approach Nintendo or Sony and then laugh at MS when these games sell well in Japan.
What I DON'T get is why they have to cease publishing good arcade titles as some kind of sacrifice. You can't tell me that stuff like Mad Tracks or Bliss Island are projects that microsoft is proud to have in its library.
Keep the new stuff coming, I damn sure want to play The Dishwasher. But if the new stuff is some piece of shit intern project that was thrown together so they could say they had a game for the week, wouldn't you rather play a quality arcade port?
I don't think the bags would be as big as you think...
I'd also rather have the titles as a hard copy anyway because I try my hardest not to support e-delivery methods like XBLA/VC/WiiWare.
Microsoft keeps talking about shifting towards digital distribution as the method consumers will gravitate towards.
If I have to go get it on a disc, then I'm not downloading it am I?
Bad because having two games, that have never been released outside of japan on consoles is a big coup for MS. What is the point of having Rez and SF2 on there then , MS? And who the hell is running XBLA? They need their head testing.
I'd love it and laugh, if Sony suddenly got these on PSN instead.
Its possible that what coould be happening here is that because of XBLA game size limit (post SSF2T) isn't helping ports of such games, so while XNA games are tiny in comparison, XBLA games are much larger and its causing problems for them. This is a shame as having them on Live, they can also be used and promoted as reference on how to make a great shmup.
On a better note, I also wouldn't mind owning an actually dvd with these games one, for a budget price though. The main thing is that we are getting them though. In fact, I'd love a sweet 360 dvd compilation with some of Cave's other games on there, with Ketsui and DoDonpachi. Perhaps stick In the Hunt and Progear on there too. Stir in some achievements and online play, leaderboards and it would be worth buying (even some japanese gamers might be tempted).
If you guys aren't happy, make your displeased voices be heard by MS. Either way, I'm glad we are still getting these games.
Screw you, XBLA.
seriously though, anyone can tell the difference between this and Frogger
Lame! I hope Cave makes it up to use and puts all these shooters on ONE DISC! I figure if they were going to sell them for ten bucks a pop on Xbox Live arcade then they could fit six on a $60 XBox360 disc...but they won't...they'll put them out one at a time for 30 bucks each and laugh all the way to the bank.
:(
I love how they call them faithful yet they're cutting back on those faithful games.
Microsoft STFU.
Maybe one of you guys at Destructoid could do a special investigation on it, write up a story about why XBLA is so awkward and nonsensical.
It's just...what the fuck? They let Discs of Tron through but not this?
Between this and the region locked Xbox Live accounts, I'm just about done with consoles all together.
Topher, you the man to confront MS about this bs. We want these games.