XBLA - Penny Arcade: Precipice of Darkness Episode 1 - 1600pts/ Episode 2 - 1200pts

It's not the amount of points that I'm bothered by, but it's the game. I'm just really not interested in this. As always I'll try the demo because it could turn out to be a really good game, but still.

I can't knock the game price since I downloaded My Life as a King and have downloaded some DLC already, :lol:
 
This week, you can take control of Gabe and Tycho from Penny Arcade in “Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode One,” Yes, this mouthful of a game will be coming to Xbox LIVE Arcade on Wednesday.
Guide your own customized character through the bizarre, 1920's world of New Arcadia.Use strange and unusual weapons to fight off weird monsters as you work your way through the crazed world.
“Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode One,” can be yours for 1600 Microsoft Points and is rated M for Mature.
Click to expand...
http://gamerscoreblog.com/team/archive/2008/05/19/559223.aspx

Out this weds...

Are any of you seriously considering spending $20 for an episodic XBLA title...featuring Penny Arcade?
 
So, will the next one be DLC or a whole new game? :whistle2:k
If it's a new game, are they gonna be $20 each?! :shock:


I'll df try the demo, but I REALLY am going to have to LOVE it to actually download it....
 
For 800 points I would have taken a serious look at it, despite a lack of knowledge of the Penny Arcade Universe.
For 1600 I'm out. It looks fun though.
 
I hope this isn't the only game we're getting this week.

I might try the demo to see what it's like but it's going to have to be amazing to justify me spending $20.
 
I will certainly try the demo, but most of the PA I have read is just...not that funny. Most of them seem to rely on excessive swearing to convey the message (and IMO, that usually means they couldn't think of something better to write).

Still, I have been in an RPG mood lately (thanks Lost Odyssey).

I don't really keep up with the XBLA demos...do they release today? Tuesday?
 
I have the points for it (thank you Target!), but I generally hate turn-based games... I'll give it a try though.
 
[quote name='Damian']Why? What is this fascination with how long a game is? No one says, "that new movie is only 90 minutes, I expect at least 2 hours before I'll pay to see it" or "that book is barely 300 pages, I won't even bother with anything less than 500 pages."

I can see wanting to know the average play length just to get an idea of what sort of time investment you'll need to have free to play it, but as a buy/pass decision making factor? Ridiculous.

The game is the length that it needs to be. I would much rather play 6 hours of excellent gaming than 10-12 hours of mediocre gaming brought down because someone dumped in filler crap to lengthen the game. Portal was one of the best games of last year, and it was only 4-6 hours. It's still worth every penny of its $20.

If Penny Arcade:OtRSPoD offers $20 worth of gaming, I'll buy it. Please stop bringing down the quality of gaming by clamoring that they be filled with time filling crap before you'll buy them.[/quote]

lol, I actually DO that with TV-on-DVD sets if its a tossup between a couple of sets that I want equally and they both have a reputation for awesomeness; I'll grab the one with more show for the money.

However, I'll probably end up waiting on this. I think that the PA guys are really funny, but $20 in Microsoft FunBucks for this seems a little steep until I know how awesome it will be.

Also, $20 for Act 1 of 3 means this is a full-priced 360 game delivered in 3 installments. Yikes.
 
[quote name='Slim Gatsby']Also, $20 for Act 1 of 3 means this is a full-priced 360 game delivered in 3 installments. Yikes.[/quote]

Actually, in the latest Major Nelson podcast they say it is the first of four planned episodes.
 
I'll pass on this game, unless it becomes discounted later. I don't want to support this type of precedent on XBLA, even though the game looks decent. Unless the demo blows me away, I'd rather buy two 800 points games that are good rather than one good 1600 point game.
 
*sigh*

All of you people complaining about episodic games. Episodic games are a good idea. It brought us more Half-Life in the past 2 years than we ever would have seen without it. It brought Sam & Max back from the dead, and keep in mind: 1 episode of Sam & Max is $9 and lasts about 2.5-3 hours -- Penny Arcade's game is right on target for it's length. For god's sake I've played $60 titles that were less than ten hours long. I plowed through Assault Heroes with a friend of mine last night in about 90 minutes, and I bought it for $10 when it came out. And how many games do you have in your backlog? How many of those will you actually play? Wasted money, right there. If you'd rather spend your $20 on four really shitty old arcade games that you'll play for a couple days, or just mine the achievements and delete it from your hard drive, I can't do anything to stop you, but I can sure as hell call you an idiot.
 
[quote name='redgopher']*sigh*

All of you people complaining about episodic games. Episodic games are a good idea. It brought us more Half-Life in the past 2 years than we ever would have seen without it. It brought Sam & Max back from the dead, and keep in mind: 1 episode of Sam & Max is $9 and lasts about 2.5-3 hours -- Penny Arcade's game is right on target for it's length. I plowed through Assault Heroes with a friend of mine last night in about 90 minutes, and I bought it for $10 when it came out. And how many games do you have in your backlog? How many of those will you actually play? Wasted money, right there. If you'd rather spend your $20 on four really shitty old arcade games that you'll play for a couple days, or just mine the achievements and delete it from your hard drive, I can't do anything to stop you, but I can sure as hell call you an idiot.[/quote]

DON'T YOU DARE fuckING TALK SHIT ABOUT MS. PACMAN. EVER.

YOU'RE ON THE fuckING LIST, BUDDY.
 
Barring a horrible experience with the demo I'll probably pick this up this weekend. Even if it wasn't PA I'm a huge fan of RPGs but don't have the time for the longer ones (I never did finish Lost Odyssey, got to the beginning of disc 3 before I lost track of what I was doing), so the 10 hr~ range is perfect for me.

Pretty psyched for this one, actually.
 
I never followed any of the Penny arcade stuff so I'll download the trial and wait on some reviews to see if I'll like this enough for $20.
 
[quote name='redgopher'] If you'd rather spend your $20 on one really shitty new arcade game that you'll play for a couple days, or just mine the achievements and delete it from your hard drive, I can't do anything to stop you, but I can sure as hell call you an idiot.[/QUOTE]

See how easily I turned that around? To each their own. One could play Robotron, Time Pilot, Joust and Frogger for that price.

Even the title tries too hard to be clever. Will I have to read an excessively verbose blog post to understand each "joke" in this game, too?
 
I'll definitely give the demo a shot before I think about putting any money on this.

Good to see it also coming to the Mac also.
 
[quote name='Darkside Hazuki']See how easily I turned that around? To each their own. One could play Robotron, Time Pilot, Joust and Frogger for that price.

Even the title tries too hard to be clever. Will I have to read an excessively verbose blog post to understand each "joke" in this game, too?[/QUOTE]

I will concede that PA hasn't been the greatest web comic lately -- that award goes to Fanboys -- but when they put a good strip up, lawls are had. As for the title, it's just Tycho's style to make shit overly complex.

I got my money's worth out of those arcade games, too, but those were on XBLA 2 years ago. Anyone who's had a 360 that long has surely played those games, and at this point there's been nothing but shit... Tempest anyone?

I'd also like to stress that the PA game is not strictly an XBLA game. Yes, it's on XBLA but it's not limited to that service alone, it is also being released on PC, Mac and Linux. Why should the XBLA version cost less than those other platforms?

PC gamers, at least, have voted with their wallets in favor of episodic content such as HL2 episodes and Sam & Max. Aside from Tomb Raider Anniversary (dumb idea for them to split an already whole game which was not developed in episodes) the PA game is the first real episodic title to hit consoles, so we'll see how well episodic content works for console-only gamers soon enough. I'd imagine that after the initial bitching of cost/playtime and people buy the game, they'll open up to the concept.

Episodes are like crack... they're cheap and short and leave you craving more. Pretty much a win-win for gamers and developers alike, if you ask me... especially in the case of Half-Life 2, because we wouldn't have jack shit until late next year if it weren't for Valve going episodic.
 
Bottom line is this: $20 for an XBLA title is NUTS...I don't care if it's a "complete" game or ends up being the GD Game of the Year, this release is looking to set up a VERY dangerous precedent on XBLA.

I mean for those of you that like PA and can afford to pick this up then more power to you, but personally I hope that this one BOMBS (at this price point).
 
1. How about we play the damned game before bitching if its worth 20 bucks. Shit, one of my fav games is Ren and Stimpy for Genesis. Damn thing is very short, but been playing it for over 10 years. PA can be the same thing

2. Who said Bionic Commando releases next week? Thanks
 
I can't really see this game selling very well. With the niche supporters and high XBLA price point, I don't see the average gamer spending the time or money. Which I think would be helpful to deter more 1600 point games.

but I still hold judgment on the actual game until I get my hands on the demo.
 
Bullshit prices like this is just encouraging MS to make the limits higher. For once i gotta say "fuck you penny arcade"

Soon well see $20 Xbox originals and $10 will then be $20 games. Thanks for starting a shitty trend!!!!
 
For those who think $20 is too much for an XBLA title, would you feel different if, say, overnight Microsoft added a new Marketplace section called something like "Xbox 360 Digital Originals" where you could download new full titles (similar to PS3's Warhawk)? Is it the classification that's the problem? What if the same exact PA game was sold in stores for $20? Do you think the price (which is the same) is too high on the PC/Mac also?
 
[quote name='splintercell']For those who think $20 is too much for an XBLA title, would you feel different if, say, overnight Microsoft added a new Marketplace section called something like "Xbox 360 Digital Originals" where you could download new full titles (similar to PS3's Warhawk)? Is it the classification that's the problem? What if the same exact PA game was sold in stores for $20? Do you think the price (which is the same) is too high on the PC/Mac also?[/quote]

Well, if I didn't like it or it became rare, I could sell it. Do that with an XBLA download. I don't like downloading big games I can't touch or sell. Also, these are the same people that bitched about ridiculous pricing on the arcade. $20 isn't a cheap alternative. How many episodes are there going to be and how much will the others cost? $10-$20? What is the benefit for the end user?
 
[quote name='splintercell']For those who think $20 is too much for an XBLA title, would you feel different if, say, overnight Microsoft added a new Marketplace section called something like "Xbox 360 Digital Originals" where you could download new full titles (similar to PS3's Warhawk)? Is it the classification that's the problem? What if the same exact PA game was sold in stores for $20? Do you think the price (which is the same) is too high on the PC/Mac also?[/QUOTE]

The problem I have with the XBLA system is there is absolutely no give and take between buyers and sellers in this "marketplace"...MS sets the pricing and THAT'S IT. We have no input or influence into this process whatsoever.

The way I would like to see this changed is to allow users to be able to "re-sell" (for MS points) their XBLA titles at whatever price they set. For me, I could sell games I no longer play and buy more games I might be interested in. This would also allow the "market" to set pricing of new games (via supply and demand).

I know this will never happen though, because what we have now is a black hole where all ms points go towards ms pockets. I do remember reading (before the 360 came out) that the marketplace was suppossed to allow users to be able to sell user generated content for ms points...I do hope that we will at least be able to do that (or find other ways of earning ms points, besides cash) in the future.
 
$20 for a 8 hour XBLA game is a regular bargain considering that Nintendo is charging $10 for a 5 minute Wiiware game ("Star Soldier R").

Then again, it feels a bit like a rip-off when I bought Blue Dragon last week for $20. I've played for ~12 hours and I'm still on the first disc!
 
[quote name='CAG 79']I think I'll save my points for next Wednesday when Bionic Commando Rearmed comes out.[/quote]

Don't play with my emotions:bomb:
 
[quote name='redgopher']
Episodes are like crack... they're cheap and short and leave you craving more. Pretty much a win-win for gamers and developers alike, if you ask me... especially in the case of Half-Life 2, because we wouldn't have jack shit until late next year if it weren't for Valve going episodic.[/QUOTE]

A lot of PC people I talk to actually hate the fact Valve is doing episodes, because it takes them forever to get out one 6 hour episode, they end it in a cliffhanger, and they *still* don't answer ANY of the questions in the series. I know a ton of people that wish Valve just waited, made a full Half Life 3, and gone that route. Episode 2 was a monumental disappointment imo, because it took them that much time to come up with that? And we don't know shit about Episode 3, still?

Sam and Max is the better example, because each episode comes out when it's supposed to in a quick amount of time.. I think it's three months? And they had a contract with Gametap, IIRC, so you knew you'd see the entire story and get all the episodes.

The big problem with episodic content is that what if this game doesn't sell, and PA decides to scrap future installments because it wasn't worth the money? Then you've got 1/3 of a game on your hard drive, and nothing in the future. Look at the Sin Episodes for PC... they got out Episode 1, then the company got assimilated into something else, and now Sin Episodes for PC is dead, we'll never know what happened after Episode 1.

Episodic content is a good idea if there is guarantee they will finish what they start in a timely manner, but there isn't. We meet see the new next PA episode in 4 months, a year, or never... at least those other games I can get for $20 have a pretty clear ending, and I'm not stuck holding the bag if PA bails on this project.

IMO, so far episodic content has had two failures, and one huge success... so the odds aren't really stacked in PA's favor. Knowing them, they'll have some sort of falling out with MS, and we'll never see the final episodes.
 
[quote name='toper']MS sets the pricing[/quote]

No, you're wrong, the developers set the pricing. PA's game is $20 for every platform, not just XBLA. It was their decision to price it at $20. XBLA even gets better pricing on PopCap titles like Zuma, Astropop, Heavy Weapon, etc. Those are 800 points on XBLA, on PopCap's website they're $20.

[quote name='Roufuss']I know a ton of people that wish Valve just waited, made a full Half Life 3, and gone that route.[/quote]

I haven't heard that from anyone I know... we're all happy we're getting more Half-Life faster than we would have if they hadn't gone episodic. Besides, bitching about cliffhangers in episodes is kind of stupid... better not watch anything on TV like BSG, Lost, The Shield, etc. or anything else that's worth watching or you'll be disappointed.
 
[quote name='redgopher']No, you're wrong, the developers set the pricing. PA's game is $20 for every platform, not just XBLA. It was their decision to price it at $20. XBLA even gets better pricing on PopCap titles like Zuma, Astropop, Heavy Weapon, etc. Those are 800 points on XBLA, on PopCap's website they're $20.[/QUOTE]


I'll meet you halfway and change my previous statement to "MS CONTROLS the pricing". :)
 
[quote name='toper']I'll meet you halfway and change my previous statement to "MS CONTROLS the pricing". :)[/QUOTE]

You're not meeting me halfway at all, you just reworded your previous falsity. The only monetary thing Microsoft controls is the value of Microsoft points, which has never changed.
 
[quote name='redgopher']You're not meeting me halfway at all, you just reworded your previous falsity. The only monetary thing Microsoft controls is the value of Microsoft points, which has never changed.[/QUOTE]


WOW, somebody takes message forums WAAAY too seriously!?!


I stand by my observation that MS (works with devs) to CONTROL XBLA pricing...I mean, it is THEIR marketplace. If devs had complete control, then we would see price points other than 400 and 800 for XBLA releases (which is OBVIOUSLY not the case). Unless you work for MS, are a dev, or are Major Nelson in disguise, then your previous explanation makes NO SENSE.


Anyways, welcome to my ignore list!
 
Like roufuss said, I hope this doesn't turn into something like Xenosaga. That was supposed to be five or six games and ended up being three because the second one bombed.
 
I downloaded My Life As King last week and it was the most boring game we have ever played. My friends and I were dying trying to find a save point just so we could end the agony.

So I might have to wait on this.
 
[quote name='Slim Gatsby']I downloaded My Life As King last week and it was the most boring game we have ever played. My friends and I were dying trying to find a save point just so we could end the agony.

So I might have to wait on this.[/QUOTE]

Then you clearly were playing the game wrong as each day only lasts for 5-8 minutes and it saves every day.
And it's meant really for one person, not so much a group event.
 
[quote name='Roufuss']

The big problem with episodic content is that what if this game doesn't sell, and PA decides to scrap future installments because it wasn't worth the money? Then you've got 1/3 of a game on your hard drive, and nothing in the future. Look at the Sin Episodes for PC... they got out Episode 1, then the company got assimilated into something else, and now Sin Episodes for PC is dead, we'll never know what happened after Episode 1.[/QUOTE]

That, unfortunately, sounds like Shenmue.
 
[quote name='lilboo']Then you clearly were playing the game wrong as each day only lasts for 5-8 minutes and it saves every day.
And it's meant really for one person, not so much a group event.[/quote]

Oooooh someone's offended!

The first day or two lasted forever. We were hoping it would save after the second day but NO ITS A fuckING PENGIUN CATCH IT.
 
No, not offended. But like any game you have to know what to expect. It's a FF and a Sim game mixed so it's bound to be a total bore to some people, and yes that stupid fuckin penguin IS annoying.

But it saves every day so there was never a point in getting mad "looking for a save point"?
 
[quote name='toper']I stand by my observation that MS (works with devs) to CONTROL XBLA pricing...I mean, it is THEIR marketplace. If devs had complete control, then we would see price points other than 400 and 800 for XBLA releases (which is OBVIOUSLY not the case). Unless you work for MS, are a dev, or are Major Nelson in disguise, then your previous explanation makes NO SENSE.[/QUOTE]

Yeah, cos I've never seen $5 or $10 games for sale before... -- and didn't you just contradict yourself by saying if the devs had control, we'd see prices other than 400 or 800? PA Episode 1 is 1600...
 
What time do Arcade games normally drop? I haven't got one at launch before and I figure this one I would. 4 am? 5 am? Maybe I just will get it tomorrow when I wake up.
 
Just tried the demo. The combat system seems more interesting than your typical RPG.
I feel like I could kind of get into this, and I certainly wouldn't mind supporting the PA guys.

However, for some reason Microsoft isn't accepting my Credit Card that I always use.

Anyway, it's definitely worth checking out the demo.
 
They had the PA guys on the Vagina Clown's podcast this week. Their main reasons of the pricepoint were "We think its worth it" and "Bejeweled is $20, thats just moving jewels around"

if you guys are worried about the pricepoint, just use the $10 off 360 game coupon on the MS points at Target.
 
The demo gives me an interesting feel for it. I'm kinda turned off by the black borders, as it's not full screen. The combat, although your standard turn-based RPG, seems a bit hectic as it's hard to see when you can perform actions and you can choose who acts when.

I don't know...playing the demo I was got the urge to fully play the game all the way through in one sitting (cuz I wondering how long it could go), and when it ended, I was left scratching my head.

So...I really don't know. $20...1600 points...I'm torn.
 
[quote name='KingBroly']The demo gives me an interesting feel for it. I'm kinda turned off by the black borders, as it's not full screen.[/quote]

You can go into Options and "Zoom in" the screen.
 
[quote name='CheapyD']You can go into Options and "Zoom in" the screen.[/quote]

I guess that's one complaint out the window. The load times confuse me a bit though.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
bread's done
Back
Top