Xbox Live Recommendation Of The Week: Hydro Thunder Hurricane

This week's recommendation is for the racing fans. A truly retro franchise originally found in arcades, then later on the Dreamcast, N64 and Playstation, this newest Hydro Thunder sequel is a must-have, for established fans, or those wanting to enjoy racing on water.

Xbox Live Recommendation Of The Week: Beat Hazard

This week I am recommending the Xbox Live Indie Marketplace release Beat hazard, a game that combines both indie, and retro. This multi-platform (PC, Mac, Linux, mobile and console) game is a modern interpretation of the classic Asteroids style gameplay, with a really interesting twist... The game's soundtrack actually effects the gameplay!

Xbox Live Recommendation Of The Week: Game Room

Released back in 2010, this multi-platform (available for Xbox 360, PC and Windows Phone 7) download is an absolute essential for retro gaming fans, especially since it is free.

Agarest: Generations of War - JRPG for Steam?

It's not often we get a JRPG on the PC, so to see Agarest: Generations Of War up on Steam Greenlight made me all giggly inside! This is the PC version that's based on the Xbox 360 release and will feature Aksys Games' excellent English text translations with Japanese voice overs. You can choose the path of darkness or light through an epic story spanning a massive 5 generations, this will be up to 60 hours or more worth of game play. Agarest also features tactical combat against a vast array of enemies, so it's up to you how you fight them and what abilities you choose. This looks to be a JRPG on the grand scale and has to appear on Steam, but that's down to you!

Final Fight Gold - Champion Edition : Beat em up (REMAKE)

Some have already classed Final Fight Gold - Champion Edition as one of the best homebrew beat em up games released so far and it's not difficult to see why. With 7 characters from both Final Fight 1, 2 and 3 and even Street Fighter, kicking ass against 42 classic enemies/bosses, you will not find any other Final Fight remake of this magnitude.  The backgrounds and stages are set to a high standard with 28 backgrounds and 5 stages with multiple paths that's sure to keep you busy.

Metacell - 2D twitch puzzle shooter

Metacell is an immersive 2D twitch puzzle shooter with a hard sci-fi plot. Though we don't feature many puzzle shooters, this one peaked my interest. It's also the first installment in an epic five-game saga, with each game in the saga having its own distinctive gameplay tailored to its position in the story arc.  You play as a galactic hero with his crew fighting to save the universe from devastation. Just check out that huge eye, it's out to destroy us all ahhhhhhh!

Oliver and Spike Dimension Jumpers - HQ Adventure Platformer

Welcome to Oliver & Spike, developed by Rock Pocket Games. A beautiful Adventure Platformer with Puzzle and Exploration mechanics mixed in, that would look good on any screen. This Adventure Platformer is full of eye candy, it's amazing how far games of this type have come since I was a kid. You might ask, what does Dimension Jumping have to do with this game? Well, each world you play on has at least three parallel dimensions to explore and use. Each of these dimensions has its own storyline, quest-arcs, npcs, fauna and flora but most importantly: different physical laws. Each dimension is fully explorable, which opens up this Platformer to a huge amount of gaming possibilities

Axiom Verge - Action and Exploration Platformer

Axiom Verge is an upcoming indie game focusing on action and exploration. In the style of Metroid and other action platformers, this one looks awesome indeed and has a fantastic yet unique art style. You play as a guy called Trace, who awakens alone in a strange, labyrinthine world. You explore this world to find items and upgrades which in turn allow you to explore further

Pier Solar HD - epic 16bit J/RPG for xbox/pc/dreamcast/mac/linux

Pier Solar HD is a huge 16bit RPG though the developers call it an RPG it looks very much like a jrpg, the type of rpg games you'd being play on a SNES/SEGA (Chrono Trigger) for example and sure enough, the developer states. After 2 years, 3 prints, and 8 versions of Pier Solar for the SEGA Mega Drive & SEGA Genesis - we are pleased to announce we have been hard at work on releasing Pier Solar in HD for Xbox 360, PC, Mac, Linux & SEGA Dreamcast.  Pier Solar is a brand new HD remaster/remake and the only way this will be released is if you visit the kickstarter page and pledge to hit the $139,000 goal

Strike Suit Zero & The Oculus Rift

Strike Suit Zero will have support for the Oculus Rift VR Headset!

Imagine taking to a fully 3D cockpit, navigating space and looking about your environment as if you were actually there. The Oculus Rift will allow you to look all around you, letting you keep track of the enemy in a way that doesn't just rely on a radar. This will really change up the core dogfighting experience.

For those unaware, the Oculus Rift is a “virtual reality (VR) headset designed specifically for video games that will change the way you think about gaming forever. With an incredibly wide field of view, high resolution display, and ultra-low latency head tracking, the Rift provides a truly immersive experience that allows you to step inside your favorite game and explore new worlds like never before.” Oculus was also made possible thanks to Kickstarter.

strike-suit-zero Oculus Rift

If you have not heard about Strike Suit Zero here's a little snippet about the game and a kickstarter to help out!, which has already achieved it's goal.

Strap yourself into the titular Strike Suit – a mecha form capable of more than jet-like jousting – and dive into the civil war foiling humanity’s expansion efforts; Smith wouldn’t tell us all the details, but we did hear something about a mysterious third faction. But never mind that: you job is to shoot things and not drop your choice of joystick, controller or mouse and keyboard while gaping at the loveliness of thoughtful space combat.
Strike Suit Zero is due on PC via Steam, origin and other digital distributors in northern autumn, and is expected on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in early 2013.

 http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/43153532/strike-suit-zero