mjn writes "Game designer and academic Ian Bogost announces Cow Clicker, a Facebook game implementing the mechanics of the Facebook-games genre stripped to their core. You get a cow, which you can click on every six hours. You earn additional clicks if your friends in your pasture also click. You can buy premium cows with 'mooney,' and also use your mooney to buy more clicks. You can buy mooney with real dollars, or earn some free bonus mooney if you spam up your feed with Cow Clicker activity. A satire of Facebook games, but actually as genuine a game as the non-satirical games are. And people actually play it, perhaps confirming Bogost's view that the genre of games is largely just 'brain hacks that exploit human psychology in order to make money,' which continue to work even when the users are openly told what's going on."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

[In his latest GameSetWatch interview, Mike Rose sits down with two of the principals from super-quirky independent developer Dejobaan Games -- creator of AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!! A Reckless Disregard for Gravity and The Wonderful End of the World - to reference upcoming title ooo! ooO! oOO! OOO! and their unique way of approaching game creation.]

Founded in 1999, Dejobaan Games spent the first half of the 00's developing games for PalmOS PDAs. In 2005, the team switched their efforts to PC gaming, developing shareware titles for Windows.

In 2008, Dejobaan released The Wonderful End of the World, which received good reviews and was eventually published by Valve via Steam. Riding on this confidence boost, the team released their next game in 2009. Named AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!! – A Reckless Disregard for Gravity, the game was very well received and shot Dejobaan Games into the spotlight.

Since then, the Dejobaan team has branched out into many parts of indie gaming, interviewing other developers and creating a fan club for its followers. We sat down with co-founders Ichiro Lambe and Leo Jaitley to talk about their rise to indie fame, the Dejobaan fan club and what the future holds for them.

Who makes up the Dejobaan Games team, and what do you each do?

Ichiro Lambe: The core team comprises three people -- Dan Brainerd, Leo Jaitley, and me. By "core," I mean "if any of us die, we stop being substantially the same company, and possibly go out of business." Dan's our Narrative & Gameplay guy. He breaks into team meetings and says things like this:

"Hey, how about a player feedback button in our game that, after you enter your text and hit SEND, it does one of those 'sending e-mail' animations, where it packages the text up, brings it across the screen, crumples it up, and throws it into the trash?"

Then the whole room laughs. Video games need more of that. Life needs more of that. Leo's on Marketing and Strategy. He has an especially good handle on how Design and Marketing are two sides of the same coin. The "M" word isn't evil -- when applied properly, it helps us become more creative: "How is this game so remarkable and different that people will talk to their friends about it? What was that? No way -- '15 distinct musical tracks' doesn't cut it. Yes, 'mooning people for food' is awesome."

Leo's also my downstairs neighbor, with whom I co-own the Dejobaan House of Excitement. We have The Garden out back, where we grow eight different types of lettuce, swiss chard, five varieties of tomato, and so forth. When we need to center ourselves, we'll go out into the garden and gape as the beans grow.

Leo and I ask many of the same questions of gardening that we do of game development. "What do we want to grow next year?" "What's our goal here?" "What's more awesome -- yellow watermelon or a huge plantation of Scotch Bonnet peppers?" If you ever end up in Boston during the summer, you are welcome to walk The Garden with us.

I am the handsome one. As with anyone in a small studio, I do the "many hats wearing" thing. During the week, I'll plan the team's goals and tasks, wrangle legal agreements, and stay up until 3am trying to implement quaternions correctly.

You've been conducting interviews with various indie developers and even created your own site, indiesuperstar.com, to keep them all together. What's it all about?

Leo Jaitley: It occurred to us that we are uniquely placed to share some behind-the-scenes info on Indie devs because we know so many devs through various secret societies...you know, the usual stuff. We then figured that some gamers might actually be dying to learn these secrets, possibly for money. By the time somebody mentioned subliminal messages, and millions of dollars, we were sold on the idea.

Right now we are working on softPIRATEware tDEJOBAANhat inGAMESSserts subliminal messages into text so that we can write articles about being indie that will sell games. Until we perfect it (did it work?) we will just interview our fellow indies and attempt to build credibility and a vibrant community around our collective indie brother (and sister) hood.

You've recently started a Dejobaan fan club, releasing short, free version of Aaaaa! to those who sign up. What made you decide to start doing this?

Leo: Again...subliminal messages in gameplay is known to make people fork over cash, or at least buy you a beer :-)

More seriously, we wanted a way to connect with our fans so that we could get their help with beta-testing and prototype selection. Right now when someone buys a game on Steam or D2D, we don't really have an opportunity to engage with them, unless they choose to use forums.

With the Fan Club, we hope to offer people free but awesome games from Dejobaan, and even other Indies, in exchange for an opportunity to pick their brains and see which games are worth turning into larger projects. If we give them games they enjoy, they will help get the word out and hopefully increase gamer awareness of us and other Indies.

One point worth noting - we see Indiesuperstar and the Fan Club as mechanisms through which many indies can benefit. We are starting through humble projects, but hope that these mechanisms will grow such that multiple indies can benefit from them in the same way that small farmers benefit from a co-operative.

An iPad edition of Aaaaa! was originally on the cards early this year. Is it still in development?

Ichiro: That's something we're still working on -- I can tell that it'll take longer than we'd expected. Everything always takes longer than we expect. Someday, we'll internalize this lesson.

There was talk of procedural level generation for Aaaaa, allowing players to basejump through different objects each time. Is that still going to happen?

Ichiro: Yes! 2010 is the year of algorithmic content generation for Dejobaan -- in fact, we're betting the company on it. And for us, it's more than just a way to generate endless forests or city layouts. I want our content designers to be able to tweak knobs and wave their hands, and weave these fascinating, beautiful worlds rather than having to create everything piece-by-piece.

If we do it right, our tools should help them become mind-bogglingly creative and inhumanly powerful. Here's a bunch of media surrounding our work:

Media link 1
Media link 2
Media link 3
Media link 4
Media link 5

While this is primarily for our next project, some of it has already made its way back into our dev build of Aaaaa!.

From the stylings of your games and your website, your team appear to have a great laugh making games together. Is it important for you to enjoy what you do?

Ichiro: It's like crack, Mike. Game development is a nearly spiritual experience for me...

Sounds euphoric. If you found yourselves not enjoying development on your next game, what steps would you take to change that?

Ichiro: ...and, yet, what you say here does happen at least once in every sizable project. Our upcoming title, "ooo! ooO! oOO! OOO!" (Ooo! for short) is something that really inspires me because it shows how beautiful math can be. But earlier this year, after four months of hacking away at it, I lost sight of it. What could possibly be fun about this damned thing? When is it going to be a game? Why are we even doing this?

They say that time (away from a project) heals all wounds, so my 3-step plan was:

1. Switch to another project.
2. Complete that project.
3. Take a week off.

By the end of that process, I couldn't help myself "sneaking" in time to think about Ooo!. It was exciting again. The ideas flowed like ice wine from a Canadian vintner. The tough thing for me is identifying when I've burned out on something and need to recharge.

It's been a long road for Dejobaan Games, launching in 1999 with MarbleZone - a shareware title for Windows 95 - and now more than ten years later, nominated for an IGF award. What has been the highlight of the last decade?

Ichiro: We've found our voice. The past ten years have seen Dejobaan go from a hobby business to (mostly) a genuine one. During that time, we've tried creating games all sorts of ways, and what's resonated with gamers most is adding character around a solid core. Aaaaa!'s core mechanic is straightforward (creating stunts and flipping people off for points), but we've added things like an honest-to-goodness guided meditation and an anti-meditation to make players smile.

We want Dejobaan to be about clever gems of games that ooze personality to the point where you are compelled to climb Mount Everest, take a lungful of rarefied air, and scream our name.

What's next for Dejobaan Games? Can you give us any details regarding your next big release?

Ichiro: Yes! Ooo! ("ooo! ooO! oOO! OOO!" for long) is an anti-sequel to Aaaaa!, where you fly through dangerous worlds, then tweak that world's genomes to organically grow new ones. We're ironing out the elevator pitch for that, but our latest Fan Club freebie game points in this direction -- it all fits into algorithmic content generation. The Fan Club freebie, for example, was mostly generated using piles of Trigonometry. Right now, we have an intern using Conway's Game of Life expressed in three dimensions to create a level. I love this stuff.

We're also trying to finish off an Aaaaa! postmortem, which I have owed Gamasutra for about 6 months. Please don't hate us.

AppStar Games, the iPhone studio headed by game industry veterans like Garry Kitchen (Super Battletank) and David Crane (A Boy and His Blob, Pitfall!), have released a new action title combining ping pong balls and photos of our solar system to the App Store.

In Fling Pong, players tap their touchscreens to bounce a ping pong ball into a target hole -- represented with moving planets in this release. The game's graphics are based on actual Hubble Telescope imagery, and it also offers a dynamic soundtrack featuring excerpts from famous classical score Holst: The Planets.

Fling Pong takes advantage of Open Feint's social gaming platform to provide high score leaderboards for each of its 32 levels, achievements, and friend-to-friend integration through Facebook/Twitter. You can download the game now for both iPhone ($1.99) and iPad ($2.99).

[Via FingerGaming]

Just as nightmarish as XKCD's vision of Tetris hell (and the game someone created based on that torturous idea), Not Tetris adds physics to the Russian puzzler and removes the ability to clear lines, removing the satisfaction that comes with locking shapes into place and efficiently cleaning up the area.

This demented version of Tetris' Game Boy edition instead scores you by how many tetrominos you can stack without reaching the top of the screen -- my high score is 32! You can download the PC game for free here. Developer Maurice has also released Not Tetris' source code (written in Lua with LÖVE).

[Via Albotas]

Along with unveiling Darkspore and NFL Training Camp at its EA Studio Showcase yesterday, Electronic Arts finally gave gamers a look at Alice: Madness Returns, the follow-up to American McGee's third-person action game released in 2000 and based on a twisted version of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

EA showed off this bloody mouthed trailer and revealed some story details behind Madness Returns:

"Alice: Madness Returns takes place 10 years after the conclusion of the original game, with Alice struggling to recover from the emotional trauma of losing her entire family in a fatal fire.

After spending a decade institutionalized in an insane asylum, she is finally released to the care of a psychiatrist who just may be able to help her conquer the nightmarish hallucinations that still haunt her. Alice embarks on a mission to root out the true cause of her family's mysterious death, jumping from a gloomy and stark London to a rich and provocative Wonderland."

McGee's Shanghai-based studio Spicy Horse is developing the title through a deal with EA Partners, and will release Alice: Madness Returns on PC, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3 some time next year. You can see screenshots for the horror/action game after the break.

Stoobalou writes "Sony has recently published patent applications which will allow two-player 3D gaming on a single screen. The new technology could spell an end to split-screen gaming, but is unlikely to see the light of day for a few years at least. Sony's method would allow player one to see frames one and three whilst player two would see frames two and four. Current technology requires a display with a 120 Hz refresh rate so it seems likely that we'll have to wait for 240Hz screen technology to become commonplace before two-player 3D becomes a reality. PDF versions of the two applications are available."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

[Analyzing June's NPD U.S. retail console numbers, sister site Gamasutra's analyst Matt Matthews looks at the Xbox 360 Slim launch -- has it sparked a hardware boom for Microsoft, and how well are the system's software sales keeping up?]

Microsoft's Xbox 360 system sales leapt ahead of the Wii in June, driven in part by uptake of the new Xbox 360 S (Slim) model introduced on June 14, 2010 at Microsoft's E3 press conference. The newer system was officially available for 15 days during the 35-day period during which the NPD Group measured what we refer to here as June sales.

Simultaneously Microsoft cut the price of older Xbox 360 hardware by $50, dropping the price of the top-end Elite model to $250 and the entry-level Arcade to $150. Some retailers stacked offers on these prices (e.g. a $50 gift card) which essentially dropped the system's bottom price to $100, equal to the PlayStation 2 MSRP.

According to Wedbush's Michael Pachter, most of the Xbox 360 systems sold during the month were actually these older, discounted models.

As he wrote in his notes following the release of the NPD Group's data: “The slim version accounted for only 40 percent of Xbox 360 sales, with over 35 percent of sales captured by discounted Arcade bundles and the balance captured by discounted older models.” Total sales of the system – across all models – was just over 451,000 systems during June.

The NPD Group's key game analyst, Anita Frazier, noted that June 2010 marked the system's second best non-holiday monthly total since September 2007 during the launch of Halo 3. In terms of a weekly rate, June 2010 (a 5-week month for the NPD Group) was actually slower than many other months, including February of this year and February 2009.

Given the figures above, it would appear that 180,000 Slims were sold during a 15-day period, a figure that deserves some consideration. Were that pace just for the Slim model to continue through July (a 28-day period for NPD Group purposes), we would expect Xbox 360 sales of about 340,000 units, the best July in the system's history.

However, the system need not maintain that pace to set a July record. Rather, if the system were to sell just 210,000 units, a mere 30,000 more than the number of Slims sold in June, then it would beat the figures for every July since the system launched in 2005.

Going forward, Microsoft is expected to release an updated low-end model at $200 to replace the discontinued Arcade model. Since we believe these models have historically made up a majority of Xbox 360 sales (see, for example, our analysis from February 2010), we expect that Microsoft will not know the full effect of the Slim redesign until consumers can again purchase this low-end model.

At this point we'd conservatively expect the Xbox 360 to hit sales of over 250,000 systems when the July estimates from the NPD Group are released next month. As the launch of the next Halo game approaches and a new $200 system is introduced, that rate could increase significantly.

As shown in the figure above, Xbox 360 sales are already 18.5% ahead of last year's first half (1.92 million vs 1.62 million), and we believe the redesigned system is positioned well to appeal to consumers for at least the rest of the year.

Just as the PS3 Slim led Sony to unprecedented sales, so might Microsoft expect to see another year of growth. For example, if the Xbox 360 demonstrates just 5% growth year-over-year in the back half of 2010, the system will break 5 million systems in annual sales. The actual figure for 2010 we expect to be as much as 5.5 million.

As usual, we think that strong hardware sales foretell stronger software sales in the near term, but June provided no evidence of that fact for Microsoft. In its press release about May 2010 sales the company reported software sales in excess of $156 million. Yet for June the company touted only $151 million in Xbox 360 software sales, a decline of about $5 million.

Since the NPD Group uses a 4-week period for May and a 5-week period for June, the decline last month was even more steep than the figures above would indicate. Taken as weekly averages, the company saw about $39 million per week in software sales in May and only $30.2 million per week in June, a drop of over 22%. The industry overall saw only a 9% decline in the average weekly software sales, month-over-month.

What to make of this shift? We would point to a comment made by NPD's Frazier, on the topic of sales of top 10 titles and the titles that fall beneath the chart: “[Industry software] sales are down, but the top 10 SKU's for the month sold comparably to what the top 10 did last June – game sales are more concentrated this year on the top-selling games.”

The Xbox 360 had the top-selling game of the month (Red Dead Redemption) and four other titles in the top 20, but the decline we see in its software revenue figure in June may be an indication that sales of older titles (catalog sales) demonstrated weakness both in unit sales and perhaps also in pricing.

Fortunately for Microsoft, the year-to-date software revenue for the Xbox 360 is not as grim as the figures from the last couple of months. Given the revenue figures Microsoft has published in its press releases in several months along with comments made by analysts, we estimate that Xbox 360 software revenue is down only 3.9% so far this year, which compares rather favorably with the 8% decline for the industry overall.

Today Electronic Arts announced Darkspore, an action RPG in development from Maxis that is inspired by Spore's creature creator technology. The game is due to launch in February 2011, and a teaser is available on the official website. A more descriptive video is available from EA's live demo (start at 8:25). Quoting Joystiq: "...Darkspore will let up to three players traverse 'several' planets cooperatively, and while there will be PvP in the finished product, Maxis isn't providing details just yet. The basics will be the same whether going in solo or as a team: You'll be able to choose from a number (again, no specifics yet) of pre-created melee, ranged and support creatures that can have their stats and abilities augmented by equipment. ... When choosing to beam down from your starship to a planet, you will see a lineup of enemy types that you'll encounter. This gives you and your friends enough information to decide which three characters from your collection you'll want to deploy. The trio can then be switched between on the fly, albeit with a brief cool-down period afterward. The idea is to use the characters' various abilities strategically against what the Left 4 Dead-inspired 'AI director' decides to toss your way."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

killdashnine writes "Last year we discussed the creation of the International Video Game Hall of Fame and Museum in Ottumwa, Iowa, and a first event in 2009 which brought 3,500 people to witness it. Since then, there's been much progress toward creation of the museum, including the upcoming 'Big Bang 2010' exhibition. Their first event kicks off with formal induction ceremonies, tournaments, record-setting attempts, and an array of concerts from 8-bit music to modern rock. This serves as the first official fundraiser for this new non-profit. Iowa is positioning itself as the Video Game Capital of the World. While some sneer and scoff at this, pointing to LA or Seattle as gaming giants and rightful heirs to the title, the real goal is not to glorify software developers but rather to memorialize the 'heroes of video games,' from the iconic Pac Man to pioneers such as Ralph Baer." Here's a list of this year's inductees. Who gets your vote for next year?

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Australia's indie games event Freeplay announced its program and ticketing details for its August 14-15 show, including two keynote speakers: recently installed Independent Games Festival chairman Brandon Boyer and Canabalt developer Adam Saltsman.

Taking place at the State Library of Victoria, Freeplay 2010 will offer paid workshops and panel sessions (tickets are $22), as well as a free gaming expo open to the public. The latter program will feature a showcase of innovative local independent games, an opportunity to ask a panel of developers about their process, a ook at 8-bit graphic and chip music, and more.

The theme of this year's Freeplay is "Play is Everywhere", as the show's organizers want to loo at te creative process for video games from a wide range of angles. The group says it wants to look at how game developers come up with ideas, take them to completion, and foster the ones that work while letting go of the ones that don't.

"Freeplay is Australia’s only independent games festival, and we’re excited about bringing it back to the State Library of Victoria," says the event's co-director Paul Callaghan .This year, we have over 50 speakers across our 29 sessions on play, innovative business development, and game design -- as well as the inaugural Freeplay awards to highlight the best in local and international independent game development."

He adds, "Our commitment to bringing innovative international speakers out to share their experiences continues with Adam Saltsman, creator of the iPhone hit Canabalt, and Brandon Boyer, the new chairman of the Independent Games Festival."

Freeplay's organizes have posted a full program schedule, speaker details, session descriptions, and ticketing information. You can read more about Saltsman's slated sessions after the break:

Session Title: The First and Last 10% – Design
Speakers: Simon Joslin, Adam Saltsman, Nathan Thomas

Description: At opposite ends of the development process are the prototyping phase and the polishing phase. But should they be so separate? And how do we know when to stop iterating over our ideas? And when should we stop polishing something and get it out the door? This session looks at those two stages of a project and asks – what really happens in that first and last 10%

Session Title: Play and Games and Video Games and Us – Design / Culture
Speaker: Adam Saltsman
Description: Most animals play as soon as they can move. But why do cats jump into boxes? Why do dogs play tug-of-war? What does that have to do with anything? Let’s follow a thread that starts before humanity and leads to a form of mixed media that could only be imagined by the greatest minds in science fiction.

Along with its amazing Three Wolf God Sun shirts, Capcom will debut another tee design at this weekend's San Diego Comic-Con as part of a collaboration with Simon Legno's Japanese-style apparel brand Tokidoki. Like the company's many crossover games, the shirt will see Street Fighter's world warriors facing off against Tokidoki rivals like Bastardinos, Adios, and others.

According to Capcom, Legno is "a big Street Fighter fan", so the publisher jumped at an opportunity to work with his colorful, playful brands. Capcom and Tokidoki have produced 400 of these limited edition shirts and plan to sell them exclusively at their separate booths at Comic-Con.

[Via Capcom Unity]

[Sister site GamerBytes' editor Ryan Langley examines June 2010's Xbox Live Arcade debuts and continuing successes, with charts and leaderboard data, for a look at how XBLA titles -- from Earthworm Jim to Snoopy Flying Ace -- are performing.]

June has predominantly been the calm before the storm for the Xbox Live Arcade -- a slow month of small releases, overshadowed by the announcement of Summer of Arcade titles. Overall, last year there were multiple releases a week and a lack of sales.

But this year has been a little different for June -- big titles like Earthworm Jim HD, Puzzle Quest 2 and Snoopy: Flying Ace and has far exceeded expectations for the month, and gamers worldwide have engorged themselves on a enormous sale season for the platform.

We'll check out the Leaderboards for new titles, as well as look at the Top 20 lists released by the Major Nelson blog to determine how well the Xbox Live Arcade has done for the month:

Such A Groovy Guy

There were eight new releases for the five weeks of June – down from the fifteen that June 2009 had, but that's perhaps for the best. Too many game releases cause titles to be removed from the new release list, and doing so gives them less chance to see more purchases. What these new XBLA releases had to face was an onslaught of discounts for previous released titles, which we’ll get to later.

The first release was Smart Bomb's Snoopy: Flying Ace, a multiplayer flying game based on the popular Peanuts characters. It did very well, with over 25,000 Leaderboard players buying it in the first week -- getting a total of 66,134 for the month. That's fantastic for a game that’s focused on online multiplayer – the demo was also very good, with 30 minutes of online play coming with it. It will help the online community continue throughout the next few months.

The next two releases were Earthworm Jim HD and Neo-Geo Battle Coliseum, a two-fer of classic HD remakes. Earthworm Jim added over 26,000 Leaderboard players in its first week, totaling 47,406 for the month, also a great start -- certainly helped by the popularity of Jim himself.

SNK's Neo Geo Battle Coliseum, on the other hand, didn’t have the same luck. Only 9,225 people seem to be on the list at the moment; however this may be due to only being based on the story mode, and may require you to complete it. Either way, it has not appeared in the Top 20 lists since its first week, so it likely hasn’t done as well as expected.

The Week Of E3

In prior years, the week of E3 has been a horrible time for releases – the press is not around to talk the game, and the Major Nelson blog didn’t update with an announcement of its release. This is basically what happened for Space Ark.

Only 1,066 people bought the game for Xbox Live Arcade in its first week, with only 1,732 people in the month -- quite unfortunate for the team at Strawdog Studios.

Risky Business

The third sets of releases were 3D Realms' Duke Nukem: Manhattan Project and EA's RISK: Factions. Duke Nukem 3D was a huge success on Xbox Live Arcade, with over 230,000 players on its Leaderboards, but a quick port of Manhattan Project, the 2002 2D side-scroller, was not as lucky. It has only added 8,341 new players since its release.

RISK Factions on the other hand, has done very well – 38,834 players popped up in the first week with 63,532 players for the two weeks of June, making it one of the best sellers we’ve seen in months.

Ancient Quest

The final releases for June were Infinite Interactive's Puzzle Quest 2 and NinjaBee's Ancients Of Ooga. Puzzle Quest 2 added 20,781 new players in its first week, a good amount for a sequel and far better than Puzzle Chronicles or Galactrix fared. Ancients Of Ooga was not so lucky – 2,134 players were added in the first week, and it didn’t hit the Top 20.

Weekly Top 20

There were 5 weeks in June. However, only 4 of those were privy to a Top 20 list by Major Nelson – the week of June 7th is unfortunately missing from the list, thanks to E3 the following week.

DOOM II was the only release from May that continued into the Top 20 – but only for one week. It added 20,283 players in June for a total of 37,649 since its release.

Toy Soldiers continues to be a big seller, with 30,000 new players in June – same with Trials HD, which received 91,000 new players thanks to the week of sales.

Several games that we can’t follow via leaderboards, such as Magic: The Gathering, Marvel Vs. Capcom 2 and Hasbro Family Game Night, are still in the Top 20 since their release last year. Microsoft’s Game Room appears to be getting around 10,000 sales of its internal Atari and Arcade titles according to this data, but this may not include games bought with Windows Live or those who buy a single play.

Deals Of The Week

June was subject to a cacophony of deals for the Xbox Live Marketplace. We’ve only got 26 of the deals here, but there were 45 throughout the month. The ones here are those that we could follow with Leaderboards.

Peggle got a nice boost from its sale alongside Duke Nukem 3D and Serious Sam HD, but the largest boost was for last year’s Summer of Arcade titles. Trials HD added another 54,000 players to their addicted fan base, alongside big boosts for Shadow Complex and Splosion Man.

Sonic titles got a single day of price cuts during the week of the 21st, which causes a huge burst of sales for the games. Each one nearing 10,000 additions during that week.

Smaller titles that did go on sale didn’t have as much luck. Poker Smash, Darwinia+ and Rocket Riot received more sales than they’ve seen in a while, but just enough to creep into the Top 20 for the week.

New DLC Arrives

July was a DLC bonanza for the Xbox Live Arcade – Defense Grid received four long-awaited packs of levels, and Toy Soldiers got its new Kaiser's Battle map pack.

The Defense Grid DLC did okay – but for 80MSP each and a player base of over 138,000, I would have expected more. The first DLC added 7,238 players with a good amount of that player base also picking up the rest -- could have been better, but still a good start.

The Toy Soldiers DLC wasn’t all that spectacular either. With a player base of over 340,000, it seems odd that only 8,703 players may have played it. This data includes those who played through the first level on both easy and medium.

Trials HD and Peggle Nights DLC continue to do well alongside their regular counterparts. Alongside the 91,100 players who bought Trials HD, 19,904 players also bought the DLC. With 25,830 new Peggle players, we had 8,216 others who bought Peggle Nights.

A Look Ahead

July is the biggest month for the Xbox Live Arcade – titles like Blacklight: Tango Down, Monkey Island 2, DeathSpank and the whole catalog of Summer of Arcade titles will begin to bloom this month – it’s the biggest money maker out there, and may end up doing better than some retail titles as well.

We'll have to wait and see -- meanwhile, check our analysis of the past 6 months of Xbox Live Arcade coming up in the near future.

[Every week, we sum up sister iPhone and iPad site FingerGaming's top news and reviews for Apple's nascent -- and increasingly exciting -- portable games platform, as written by editor in chief Danny Cowan and authors Tucker Dean, Jason Johnson, Ryan Hibbeler, and Mike Rose.]

This week, FingerGaming covers Ratloop's puzzler Helsing's Fire and an upgraded port of Kenta Cho's shooter rRootage.

Also within are the lists for top-grossing, most-downloaded free and paid Apps from Apple's store, as well as reviews for Nimble Strong, Ultrablast, and Graffiti Ball.

Here are the top stories from the last seven days:

- Top-Grossing Game Apps: Osmos Leads iPad Charts in Debut Week
"Doodle God's popularity has cooled after an impressive second-place debut last week. The title lands behind newcomer cake decorating sim Cake Doodle at eighth place, leaving the competing word games Words With Friends and Scrabble to close out today's rankings."

- Helsing's Fire: An Inventive Puzzler from Ratloop and Clickgamer
"Every monster caught in the torch's light will be destroyed when a like-colored tonic is used. The torch's light does not pass through solid objects in the surrounding environment, however, so careful strategy and planning is required to make the most of each tonic."

- Review: Graffiti Ball
"There's nothing ingenious, flashy, or even comely about it, but building a slope out of junk and shifting it around until the ball rolls down it exactly how you planned just never seems to get old."

- Spider: The Secret of Bryce Manor Now Available for iPad
"Voted as the 'Best iPhone Game' at last year's Independent Games Festival Mobile competition, Spider won many fans for its fluid gameplay, which challenged players to spin webs in order to trap and devour nearby insects."

- Review: Ultrablast
"While I would much rather be playing it on a system with tactile controls, it's still easy to recommend Ultrablast to anyone who fondly remembers what the term 'shooter' used to mean in the '90s."

- Top iPad Game Apps: Osmos, Modern Conflict Head Paid Charts
"Osmos currently ranks as the iPad's biggest seller across all categories, with Chillingo's low-priced strategy title Modern Conflict HD trailing close behind."

- Archetype Sells 160,000 Units in Debut Week
"Independent mobile publisher Villain LLC announced today that its online multiplayer first-person shooter Archetype sold 160,000 units in its first week of release, and is currently featured as Apple's iPhone App of the Week."

- Fishlabs CEO Schade: Mobile Gaming Will Match Console Quality Within a Year
"Schade, speculating on the release of an 'iPad HD' in the coming months, expects mobile game titles to match or exceed the standards for quality currently seen in games for the Xbox 360."

- Review: Nimble Strong: Bartender in Training
"Nimble Strong combines the reflex-driven action of Cooking Mama with the real-life practicality of America's Test Kitchen, only with liquor. You actually learn how to mix drinks in the game, and it's fun."

- Top iPhone Game Apps: Archetype Rivals Doodle God
"Gameloft's The Oregon Trail and Potty Racers fall out of the top ten this week, making way for EA's returning FIFA World Cup, Tetris, and Battleship."

- rRootage Back in App Store as New, Improved, and Free rRootage Online
"Kenta Cho's rRootage offers much more variety than the typical App Store shoot-'em-up, and like the PC original, rRootage Online is available as a free download."

Though many critics panned Ubisoft's video game adaptations for James Cameron's Avatar film, Stern Pinball will have the chance to release another kind of game based on the property when the 3D movie re-releases next month in theaters with eight minutes of extra footage.

The pinball company announced that it's working on a new table with a 3D backglass, speech and sound effects from the movie, original voice over by Stephen Lang (who plays the film's antagonist Colonel Quaritch), and a mech toy on the playfield similar to Stern's Iron Man machine.

Stern shared this information about the pinball table:

"In Avatar pinball, you as player are the hero Jake Sully. Capture the pinball in the transporter link, a case that reveals a Jake figurine, and transform yourself into his Avatar. Then, after a series of challenges, get past the motorized up/down target bank protecting Colonel Quaritch and fight the Colonel in his AMP Suit, aiming your pinball at him.

As you overtake the Colonel, his AMP Suit crashes to the ground and you save the Na'vi people from total destruction. Avatar pinball also features a twisting ramp, the magnet for random ball play, and lots of multi-ball action."

Though the company hasn't shown off the design of the game's playfield yet, Arcade Heroes did dig up this image that looks like an mocked up photo of the machine (above). Stern expects to begin production on the Avatar pinball machine in the middle of August and will ship the game in the U.S. in early September.

Helsinki-based indie developer RedLynx announced Big Thrills, a new expansion pack for its widely praised physics-based motorcycle racing/trick game Trials HD, releasing in the fourth quarter of 2010.

Along with 40 new levels created by the studio's professional level designers, Big Thrills will include 10 stages created by fans. RedLynx is holding a contest inviting gamers to submit their Trials HD stages for inclusion, promising cash, prizes, and in-game credit if their level is chosen for the expansion pack.

"Ever since we released the first Trials HD expansion, gamers have demanded more," says RedLynx creative director and lead designer Antti Ilvessuo. "They email us every day, they post on our message boards, and lately they've started calling my house and chasing me down the street. With this announcement, I can now emerge from hiding and get back to making games."

We'll take any excuse to write about Sega Saturn's dearly departed mascot Segata Sanshiro here, our latest opportunity being this officially licensed shirt from Cospa. The tee proudly displays the 32-bit console and the judo master's catchphrase, "Sega Sat?n, shiro!", or "You must play the Sega Saturn!"

Import shop NCSX is selling the shirt in both mint and white, sizes ranging from small to extra large. You can pick up one -- and you should to honor Sanshiro's contributions to our unappreciative world -- for $39.90 before shipping/handling. Expect NCSX to begin shipping the Sega Saturn shirts in late August.

With just a day until the July 21st early reg deadline, GDC Europe organizers have announced major talks on Limbo, Guild Wars 2 and Kane & Lynch 2 at next month's Cologne, Germany-based game conference.

Coming shortly after the Guerrilla Games/Killzone 3 keynote, these new talks are confirmed for the 2010 Game Developers Conference Europe event, which will take place August 16th-18th, and is located in Cologne, Germany alongside GamesCom, the leading European trade and consumer show.

The newly announced GDC Europe lectures arriving just before the early registration deadline include the following notables:

- In 'Limbo: Balancing Fun and Frustration in Puzzle Design', Playdead's Jeppe Carlsen focuses on the acclaimed Xbox Live Arcade title Limbo, discussing "creating an immersive game experience that is challenging to players without being discouraging." Along the way, he'll explore "relevant design principles using concrete examples from the game, focusing on considerations in the areas of accessibility, difficulty, learning by dying, and fun."

- IO Interactive art director Rasmus Poulsen is speaking on 'Art Direction in the YouTube Era', discussing how he and his colleagues approached the distinctive look to the Square Enix-published console title Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days. The game takes an alternative, documentary film-inspired look to visuals, and the description notes that "as the gaming industry continues to follow the trend of hi-fidelity graphics to convey realism, an exploration to find what ‘real’ is sparked a fresh artistic vision" for the title.

- 'Designing Guild Wars 2 Dynamic Events' features the much-awaited ArenaNet MMO's lead designer Eric Flannum and lead content designer Colin Johanson outlining how the core content of games in the MMORPG genre has evolved over time. They "will discuss the inspiration for and the implementation challenges of their Dynamic Events system, with the goal of creating an exciting, living, breathing online world that encourages social interaction between players."

In addition, GDC Europe organizers are presenting 'Focus Russia', presenting up-and-coming regions or countries that are important for the worldwide game industry. During the show, organizers will hold two workshops to analyze the current changes in the Russian market, present important players and trends as well as new business concepts and opportunities for cooperation.

These latest announcements are part of a large GDC Europe line-up that includes a Rare-helmed lecture on Microsoft's Kinect, the BioWare co-founders on the Baldur's Gate franchise, a lecture from Another World creator Eric Chahi on his new title Project Dust, an ESA/G.A.M.E. panel on government intervention in games, and a Heavy Rain production talk.

Also added are lectures and panels from Remedy art director Saku Lehtinen on Alan Wake, Ensemble co-founder Bruce Shelley on creating a design proposal, a keynote from Chinese online game powerhouse Tencent, significant lectures from Quantic Dream's David Cage, InstantAction's Lou Castle, and the creators of Crysis 2, and other lectures and keynotes from Sony, Playdom, and German gaming powerhouse Bigpoint (Battlestar Galactica MMO).

The conference, taking place Monday through Wednesday August 16-18, 2010 at the Cologne Congress Center East in Cologne, Germany, aims to present the leading game industry event for developers, consumers, publishers and trade professionals. The event will run alongside the major GamesCom event, to which free access is available for non-student GDC Europe passholders.

With just one day to go until the early registration deadline, more information on GDC Europe, for which reduced price registration is in place until July 21st -- visit the official Game Developers Conference Europe website.

[“The Blue Key” is a new biweekly GameSetWatch-exclusive column by Connor Cleary that explores the wide arena of gamer culture -- where it's been, where it is now, and where it might be going. In this article, he discusses the importance of balancing logistical necessities with emotional engagement in gaming.]

I have heard several people complain that the combat system in Assassin’s Creed 2 was too boring. Anyone who has played either iteration will understand what I mean when I say that you can win any fight with one hand. But if you haven’t played them, here’s a quick explanation: you have the option of simply holding the block button and activating a parry against any incoming attacks, since parries are also automatic counter-attacks there is no need to fully engage in any battle.

But it should be noted that Assassin’s Creed 2 offers a very wide variety of weapons and gimmicks and tactics to choose from which, if utilized, can produce some really interesting and epic battles. The drawback is that making use of that variety is not the most efficient way to fight.

So you might take some damage if you decide to try breaking the enemy’s arm to steal their spear, or if you try to jump up on a ledge and rain throwing knives down upon your pursuers. These are more risky than the simple block, parry, block, parry, block, parry—but they are also infinitely more fun, and making your own fun is important.

So where exactly does the division of responsibility lie between the game studio and the gamer in creating an entertaining experience? Clearly the game studio has to produce a quality title, no amount of personal engagement can save a terrible game. But is it reasonable for us as gamers and consumers to expect every iota of entertainment to be served up on a platter with absolutely no involvement on our end?

The short answer is clearly “No.” That is not reasonable. Games are not movies, we are supposed to get involved.

The longer answer obviously depends on the type of game being discussed. A highly linear game generally requires just a suspension of disbelief and a desire to keep playing. Simple silly-fun games—while great—are another story entirely. But as for the open-world type games, there is a reason we have attached the adjective “sandbox” to them.

Remember being a kid in an actual sandbox? An active imagination and a few simple toys were all you needed for hours of fun. That is essentially what the open-world design gives us. But in this case, our sandbox is a finely crafted alternate reality, and our toys are swords and bows and magic, or guns and bombs and gadgets, etc.

We are given the ability to create our own events in these worlds, and to act out those events in ways that satisfy and entertain us on a deeper level. Did someone say something nice to you in Fable II? Go ahead, give them a jewel, or some chocolates. Did someone say something mean to you in Fallout 3? Go ahead, slip a live grenade in their pocket. But if there are no in-game benefits to doing such things, then why bother?

Because it makes you smile.

Sometimes these actions may come back to haunt you—like in Mass Effect or Heavy Rain—but this can also create a more engaging experience. If you’ve ever played Dungeons & Dragons or any similar pen-and-paper RPG system, you probably already know the satisfaction that comes with developing a complex character.

It involves exploring and detailing your invented character’s psychology and background, deciding his or her strengths and weaknesses. But it also means role playing both their virtues and their flaws, even to the potential detriment of yourself or your party—because it’s interactive fiction, and perfect heroes are boring.

Take Dragon Age: Origins for example: Maybe your Elf character has a seething hatred for Humans (because Humans enslaved the entire Elven race in the past) but is otherwise a good-natured hero. Your sharp tongue with Humans might cause you to miss out on certain opportunities, but it will also contribute to the feeling that this is your story, that you have created a unique experience for yourself.

But this kind of personal involvement actually isn’t limited to sandboxy or character-driven games. Our imaginations are powerful story crafters, and if we’re not afraid to use them we can add deeper immersion to all kinds of games.

A while back, I was playing StarCraft with a friend of mine—let’s call him Greg—and I found out something really interesting about how he plays. We were playing as Terrans (Humans) against computer opponents of unknown race. When we discovered they were Zerg (Bug-like monsters, think Starship Troopers’ arachnids meets the aliens from Aliens), he gasped and said “Zerg!” under his breath. He sounded genuinely scared, so naturally I laughed at him.

Greg later explained that when he plays StarCraft, he prefers to conjure up a little fiction for each round. He says, for example, it’s more fun to pretend that he is the leader of a group of human settlers trying to colonize a new world—rather than thinking like a detached, calculating, omniscient overmind. Because he had invested in that little fiction, the discovery of a Zerg base provoked a sincere emotional response. In taking it upon himself to add another level to the game, he created a more fulfilling experience.

Let’s take another medium as a final example: A psychologically charged movie is going to be a far more compelling experience for the audience members who allow themselves to be fully immersed and emotionally invested—while intentionally ignoring the fourth wall.

The same can be said of games and gamers. Meanwhile, if we spend every moment of our in-game time focusing on game mechanics and calculating how to maximize power and minimize loss, we will be seriously stunting our capacity to be moved and entertained in a genuine and more deeply satisfying way.

To be fair, leveling is important, damage output is important, and having enough money is important—no one wants to be a weak hero who is also broke. But having a fulfilling experience is important too. I think that creating a truly excellent gaming experience for yourself means finding a balance between logistical necessities and emotional fulfillment—and come to think of it, same goes for real life.

Whether they annoy you or fulfill your nerdy collection habit, achievements have spread across the gaming landscape and are here to stay. The Xbox Engineering blog recently posted a glimpse into the creation of the Xbox 360 achievement system, discussing how achievements work at a software level, and even showing a brief snippet of code. They also mention some of the decisions they struggled with while creating them: "We are proud of the consistency you find across all games. You have one friends list, every game supports voice chat, etc. But we also like to give game designers room to come up with new and interesting ways to entertain. That trade-off was at the heart of the original decision we made to not give any indication that a new achievement had been awarded. Some people argued that gamers wouldn't want toast popping up in the heat of battle and that game designers would want to use their own visual style to present achievements. Others argued for consistency and for reducing the work required of game developers. In the end we added the notification popup and its happy beep, which turned out to be the right decision, but for a long time it was anything but obvious."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

[We round up the week's top news and new digital releases from console digital download site GamerBytes, featuring new information about Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network, WiiWare, DSiWare and PSN Minis.]

Some top quality releases over the past seven days on various digital platforms -- includingDeathSpank across multiple platforms, 3D Space Tank and Pearl Harbour Trilogy

Also some pretty interesting news -- new cooperative modes for Plants Vs. Zombies? A new Oddworld game in the works? Sounds like we'll have plenty of quality games at the end of the year, for once!

Store Updates

XBLA Update - DeathSpank, Deadliest Warrior, Game Pack 007
NA PSN Store Update - Death Spank, Landit Bandit
EU PSN Store Update - DeathSpank, Car Jack Streets And More
NA Nintendo Update - Toribash, Primrose And More
EU Nintendo Update - 3D Space Tank, Pearl Harbour Trilogy, Soul Of Darkness And More

Top Stories

NEXUIZ To Use CryENGINE 3 (XBLA, PSN)
Quake 1 to CryEngine is a pretty big leap.

Blacklight "Sequel" Already In The Works? (XBLA, PSN)
Like Blacklight, but with giant robots?

Haunted House Gets A Remake (XBLA)
But is the game as spooky as it was 30 years ago?

New Oddworld Title In Development By Just Add Water (XBLA, PSN)
Follow me? Okay!

Hoopworld Out Next Week (WiiWare)
Is it the shoes?

Leaked Plants Vs. Zombies Achievements Reveal Co-Op And Vs. Mode (XBLA)
Some delicious new modes for the zombie strategy game on XBLA.

IGF Finalist Where Is My Heart? Found On PSP (PSP Minis)
Bizarre pixel-puzzler breaking your brain on Minis.