What 360 game are you most looking forward to?

[Fivespot]

Kind of quiet lately on the 360 front with the exception of Live Arcade which recently added a few games; Marble Blast & Crystal Quest (today).

Beyond DOA4 which was released late, late December 2005, we've had no new games since....

Well, that's about to change! Lots of games to look forward to during February, March, April and beyond. Which are you most looking forward to and why?

I have a couple on my list:
Fight Night Rd 3 (for it's great multiplayer gameplay).

Ghost Recon Adwanced Warfighter (or whatever it's called). The title is looking sweet and is supposed to be a gameplay blend between GR1 & GR2. I'm also starting to hear that the multiplayer will be top notch with many customizable features (a large focus on allowing users to design and tweak multiplayer games).

A couple other games I'm thinking about picking up: Full Auto, Elder Scrolls: Oblivion, Splinter Cell 360 - forgot the title. I might take a wait and see approach with those.

[Cuddly Knife]

Fight Night R3 is a must.

Full Auto is a possibility, but I might hold out for Burnout Revenge. I'm not sure yet. I also might just wait to see how Test Drive turns out.

I just scored me a few Live Arcade games(Marble Blast, Zuma, and that 2-D shooter in the vein of Robotron), so I'm set for my quick-fix gameage. The next LA game I'll get will probably be Hoopworld. Maybe Street Fighter 2 if it does come out.

I though about FFXI, but I just can't seem to want to get into a MMORPG. Oblivion will be a buy, and will probably occupy quite a bit of my game time when it comes out. Also, that Play-Online deal from Squeenix is a pain in the anus to set up. Boo!!

[Rogue Bounty Hunter]

Oblivion is my system seller. I really expect to have a 360 by the time the game ships. I'm keeping my expectation on the average simply by hoping for something just as fun as Morrowind but with better lighting and better combat. Everything else, I'll gladly let those surprise me. If this game was in FP view only, I honestly wouldn't be interested in it. It would be a waste to create and customize your character and not be able to see him/her onscreen.

Saint's Row looks to be another title that wants to supplant GTA from the top of the free-roaming games, and from what I see, it has a decent chance to turn out to be a good title (but maybe no GTA-killer). I have no idea what the story will be or how many mini-games or optional quests available, but I do know you can create your character in this one and the game should have a good shooting mechanics. If anyone has played Punisher, it should be similar, and I thought the manual aiming for Pun was pretty solid.

Tomb Raider Legend is one that I would get for the 360 if all versions were released on the same day. Unfortunately, there's a "Later" date with this one, so if that ends up being too far from April 11, then I'm getting the PS2 version and possibly trade up for the 360 version later. A new dev should bring the game back to its old form, enough to at least keep the series alive for another TR.

Dreamfall: The Longest Journey is technically an Xbox 1 game, but I'm hoping that it will be b/c so I can play it on 360. If not, well, I'm out of luck.

The Godfather is another one of those "later" games, but unlike Tomb Raider, I can wait and see exactly when the release date will be, especially since the current-gen versions should be out the same time as Oblivion. From an interview at IGN, one of the producers (I think) claimed the game would be between 40-80hrs long. This I have to see...

Mass Effect is Bioware's next title, and I doubt it will hit in '06. Whenever it comes out, I'm getting it. Until they screw up, I'll be in line for all of their RPGs.

Everything else, I'm going to take a wait and see approach. I have to see how Gears of War turns out, and honestly, if there's no 3rd person option for Halo 3, don't be surprised to hear me pass on the game.

[Fivespot]

Oops, thanks RBH - almost forgot a major title:

Gears of War

Can't wait for that bad boy too.

[ThaMaskedGamer]

I think Oblivion will be a killer title for 360. After reading more about this game, the radiant AI for the NPC, the content(1.5 half times bigger than Morrowind), and all the crazy things you can do in the game, all coupled with an incredibly gorgeous looking presentation it is going to do really well. In fact I am becoming more optimistic of the chances of MS knockin' off Sony(its easy to do with not much news on the PS3) on the strength of their games.

Test Drive Unlimited is also looking hot. I don't understand what the feature set is though, if i'm reading it correctly thousands of people will be able to drive on the same 1000 mile reproduced island, yet the races only allow 16 people. So basically it sounds like the drivable map itself will represent a super lobby for the game. I personally don't think this is possible, but i hope i'm wrong. In addition I didn't know you could customize the cars as well as houses.

Chromehounds looks intriguiging hopefully it will be a step up in terms of realism over MechAssualt and finally allow a mech game on a console with a console perspective, I doubt it, but I won't buy any more 3rd person mech games. What is it with the console crowd everything has to be 3rd person. This new flying game Blazing Angels is 3rd person, i'd much rather see the cockpit gauges and view from inside the plane, but I guess kids have to SEE their plane and SEE their car...oh well I won't be buying Blazing Angels either.

GR3 AWF is going to be awesome, viva la Mexico.

There are so many titles out there the Outfit might be a really cool game online with its RTS concept. Full Auto is just pitiful in my opinion there is nothing about the demo that even has me remotely interested in this game. I'd be very wary of it.

I'm looking forward to march, we already got a release date(firm) on GR3 March 7th. That will probably be the next game I buy, unfortunately, as i'm a few levels away from finally finishing COD2 that means I won't have jack to play for a month. I might might just break down and get PGR3, I hear its pretty short or I might just restart Forza on the 360.

[Cuddly Knife]

Here's the OXM description of how Live will work with Test Drive:

And while Unlimited is no MMo in the sense of FFXI,it comes loser than a racing game has before.If you're hooked up to XBOXLive, you're always online when you're playing the game, and the maps show you the population density of other drivers around you. The game reviews your stats, and picks the seven closest drivers that best match up with you, and they appear on the roads, constantly updating as players log on and off. "It's like Optimatch, but it's constantly refreshed,". SO while there might be thousands of players on virtual Oahu at once, the game filters out the noise and lets you challenge the most suitable seven opponents(by honking at them) at any one time. You can also pull up to drive-ins and chat it up, you can buy houses, form car clubs, and much more.

They also mention how the racing feels more like PGR than the traditional TD titles.
_______________________

Anyone know if any downloadable content is planned for any of the launch-window games on the 360?

[Cuddly Knife]

On the soundtrack to FNR3:

Fight Night Round 3 Soundtrack
Listen to some great music while you beat the snot out of your opponent.
posted by Stephen Coleman
February 8, 2006 - The most highly anticipated boxing videogame of the year is about to enter the ring with style. Electronic Arts today revealed the 12 songs that will score Fight Night Round 3. With cutting-edge artists Obie Trice, Atmosphere and Consequence (Kanye West's protégé) highlighting the soundtrack, you can be sure this realistic boxing experience will knock your socks off when the game ships on February 20 for the Xbox 360, Xbox, the PlayStation 2 and PSP.

"EA SPORTS Fight Night is a spectacularly brutal game with bone-crunching gameplay and photo-realistic visuals. We wanted to make sure that the soundtrack is as powerful as the boxer's punches," said Steve Schnur, Worldwide Executive of Music and Music Marketing at EA. "Each song gets your heart pounding and makes you want to move faster, dig deeper and punch harder."

The music in EA SPORTS Fight Night Round 3 features:
Title - Artist

Back Again - Dilated Peoples
Crook Dancin - Slic One
Don't Stop - Roc 'C'
Itz Nothin - Young Roscoe
Knock Em Down - L.T.D. A.
Never Gonna Get It - Sean Biggs feat. Akon & Topic
Night Night - Consequence
Round One - Kray Twinz feat. D&G
The Arrival - Atmosphere
The Best Out - Dipset
Uh-Oh - Brasco
Wanna Know - Obie Trice

All I gotta say is thank MS for including the option to hear your own custom soundtracks in any game.
_____________________________________
And now, Full Auto update:

Full Auto Hands-On
We see the final code and survive.
by Charles Onyett
February 7, 2006 - SEGA's shrapnel-snapping Full Auto has been getting a lot of buzz recently. Though it has plenty of particle filled explosions and high-powered weapons to set it apart from other games, it will also be the first full-retail game to release since Dead or Alive 4 back in December. Along with EA's Fight Night Round 3, Full Auto is also one of only two games to release this month. While we were able to play through a good portion of Full Auto with a preview build we were sent a while back, today we got the opportunity to play through the final version and have new details to report.

First and most importantly, Full Auto has been getting lots of attention in the gaming community since a playable, free demo was released on the Marketplace. This demo, contrary to what many may think, is an extremely outdated version of the game. It was originally put together in August 2005, and since then the game has undergone graphical updates, control tweaks and framerate optimizations according to Producer Cord Smith of Pseudo Interactive. We were able to play the very same demo at X05 event in Amsterdam and their Zero Hour launch event, and the game has certainly progressed since then.

When we got to sit down with the game today, we were shown some of the more intense head-on team races, some of the tweaks that had been made to gameplay, and some crazy races with the Warlord, a Batman Begins-style tank-car. After you're about 60 percent of the way through Full Auto's mission-based career mode most of the game's core content will be unlocked. The time spent completing the rest of the game will result in amassing car colors, skins and other extras, as well as refining your combat and racing skills for online play.

Among this core content is the ability to adjust your weapon levels. Most of the time tweaking weapons so they're more powerful increases their destructive power, capacity to fire before overheating, and rate of fire. Others have unique effects, like the level three missiles and rockets. As it used to stand, the homing missiles on level three would fly out and be able to bend insane, impossible corners and follow cars to a highly unrealistic degree. Unsatisfied, the development team kept trying to come up with something different, and eventually ended up with the current high-level rocket trajectory. Now, instead of homing missiles flying low along the ground, they pop up into the air after they're fired. After hovering for a brief moment, the missiles locate their target and slam down into them. Rockets, which normally burst from the hood of the car in bunches to smack opponents with explosive force, get an added incendiary effect at level three, setting opponent ablaze.

As important as proper weapon management and utilization is in Full Auto, if you want to survive you'll also need to keep your eye on your wreck points. Each level in career mode not only requires you to finish first to get the highest award and unlock the most goodies, but also to accumulate certain wreck scores. Getting high scores is simple: just blow stuff up. The more stuff you blow up, the more multipliers you get which, if you understand how to manage, can give you the required wreck points easily.

Keeping your multiplier active requires to you accumulate wreck points on a consistent basis. In other words, constantly shoot stuff. However, if you keep your guns firing all the time they'll eventually overheat and be forced into a cooldown period. During this time, you'll lose your multiplier if you aren't blasting opponents or the environment. Managing your weaponry use and making sure you've always got at least one available to fire (you've always got two) can save you a lot of hassle. Even though your opponents are worth way more points than environmental objects, they're worth even more if you're able to destroy a few with a 5x multiplier.

One-touch replays are another cool feature of Full Auto, and something gamers will definitely want to check out when they perform a particularly impressive move or cause a catastrophic accident. At any point during gameplay you'll be able to hit down on the D-pad and be taken immediately a replay screen that shows the last little bit of gameplay. You'll have the option of watching the replay from an angle the computer decides or exit out of that to see things from the much more interesting "developer cam." In this mode you're able to rotate the camera whichever way you want, zoom in, zoom out and adjust the replay speed to whatever you like. What you won't be able to do is save a replay or screen to your hard drive, unfortunately.

Though the career mode starts out with basic challenges, you'll eventually progress to more complicated and interesting races. One of these is a head-on team race, in which you're racing alongside teammates and trying to destroy opponents that are racing beside you and also right into you. This mode starts two squads going opposite ways on whichever track you pick, and you'll need to battle those beside you as well as those heading straight at your headlights. We got to see one level where it was Hookzillas (tow trucks) versus SUVs, and for as many explosions and fragments of steel and concrete that went flying, there were just as many instances where Unwreck had to be used. Avoiding blasting your teammates is another thing you'll need to be aware of, especially since blowing them up gives you a point penalty.

Playing through the career mode will unlock tracks, cars and weapon sets for Arcade, but should you sign onto Xbox Live, you'll find everything already unlocked. Pseudo Interactive didn't want online competitions to be unfairly skewed against those who hadn't yet finished the game, so they allowed everyone access to all there was. We'll have an update for you later on about how this game plays online. In the meantime, check out our new gameplay videos of automotive destruction.

[Fivespot]

Full Auto looks like a purchase come this time next week.

[ThaMaskedGamer]

Here's the OXM description of how Live will work with Test Drive:

And while Unlimited is no MMo in the sense of FFXI,it comes loser than a racing game has before.If you're hooked up to XBOXLive, you're always online when you're playing the game, and the maps show you the population density of other drivers around you. The game reviews your stats, and picks the seven closest drivers that best match up with you, and they appear on the roads, constantly updating as players log on and off. "It's like Optimatch, but it's constantly refreshed,". SO while there might be thousands of players on virtual Oahu at once, the game filters out the noise and lets you challenge the most suitable seven opponents(by honking at them) at any one time. You can also pull up to drive-ins and chat it up, you can buy houses, form car clubs, and much more.

They also mention how the racing feels more like PGR than the traditional TD titles.
_______________________

Anyone know if any downloadable content is planned for any of the launch-window games on the 360?


Good stuff! I hope the game besides showing those close to your skill level automatically shows people on your friends list?

[Glockstar]

If all goes well, I should have a 360 SOON! :D

But regardless of how soon, I gotta have one before Oblivion comes out. That's the gotta-have-game of the year, as far as I'm concerned. Well, that and Gears of War. However, I gotta tell ya... I really do not think that this game will be coming out on March 20; II don't think we're going to see the game until, like, May.

I'll be picking up PGR3 and (probably) Kameo with my system. And I also plan on playing PDZ and Condemned - either thru rental or purchase (not sure yet) in the weeks soon after. So I don't know where I'm going to have time for Full Auto - the systems next new release.

The next new release after that isn't supposed to be for awhile tho', so hopefully I'll be pretty caught up by the time Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter hits the shelves. I didn't get into the Ghost Recon (or Rainbow Six) games on the Xbox, but this game looks like something I just gotta try!

And of the rest of the games supposedly releasing over the next couple of months... I'm looking at Moto GP 2006 (part of the reason why I skipped on MGP3 was that I knew they were working on this 360 version for a release early this year) and Tomb Raider Legend. From what I've seen of the 360 versions, both games look to be 360-worthy - if you know what I mean.

[Fivespot]

I agree w/Glock about Oblivion. It isn't coming out 3/20. As a matter of fact, I've read numerous (and recent) interviews with the developers who still stand on the fact that they have not officially announced a release date. And 3/20 is listed on several websites. Where the hell are they getting that info anyway???

Ghost Recon AW is 3/7 I believe and have read that the game is mostly finished and ready to meet the release date.

[Cuddly Knife]

The new OXM just came out, and they give the game a 5.5 out of 10. Their beef includes lack of any kind of storyline for single-player, a lack of variety in weapon selections, and game modes, both online and off. They say it's NFS with guns, instead of Burnout with guns. I want to wait to see what other reviews are before I get this one.

Hell, I might have to pick up the new Toca. They give the game a 9.0.

Later today, I'll make a thread about the new ish.

[Fivespot]

Ouch, a 5.5. Thanks for the heads up. I'll probably have to read a few reviews myself before throwing down 60 greenbacks.

[ThaMaskedGamer]

According to I think an IGN interview with the developer...all they are doing now is trying to find every single bug they can. They said no more content would be added this late in the game. The PC and 360 versions are both the same, exactly the same, except for the input device. The ship dates may end up being a little differently because the manufacturing and distribution for 360 and PC games go through different channels. Its a very good read, the guy was talking about the radiant AI and how unpredictable it is...and the size of the game. I just hope they've done something with the combat, its gotta be more than just click and hit(in terms of the melee). Hopefully you can somehow swing hi, mid, and low to the left and right and have a variety of blocks. Hopefully you can hack off limbs and that kinda stuff a la Blade of Darkness. Weapons break so that is cool.

Its gonna take me a year to finish this game though.

GR3 is set for 3/7 and I'm kinda looking forward to this cause it will be the first 360 game i will play on LIVE, and I just hope it can step up and be as fun as R6 was on LIVE.

[Rogue Bounty Hunter]

According to I think an IGN interview with the developer...all they are doing now is trying to find every single bug they can. They said no more content would be added this late in the game. The PC and 360 versions are both the same, exactly the same, except for the input device. The ship dates may end up being a little differently because the manufacturing and distribution for 360 and PC games go through different channels. Its a very good read, the guy was talking about the radiant AI and how unpredictable it is...and the size of the game. I just hope they've done something with the combat, its gotta be more than just click and hit(in terms of the melee). Hopefully you can somehow swing hi, mid, and low to the left and right and have a variety of blocks. Hopefully you can hack off limbs and that kinda stuff a la Blade of Darkness. Weapons break so that is cool.

Its gonna take me a year to finish this game though.

As big as this game is going to be, I don't expect the devs to find every bug in the game. As long as they get rid as many as they can, including all of the game-crashing ones, I'll be satisfied. So, overall, I don't expect this game to slip past early April at the latest.

I wonder if this game will physically show a broken weapon this time around instead of the stats that were shown in Morrowind. Is it too early to start an Oblivion thread?

I think a lot of websites these days get their release date info from either EB's or Gamestop's site.

[Cuddly Knife]

Is it too early to start an Oblivion thread?
No. Start it up.

[Fivespot]

I've only played it for about 4-5 hours so far but I've spent enough time with Full Auto to completely disagree with the negative reviews I've read. I need to spend more time with the game before I'm in a position to give it an overall grade however.

Some of the negatives I've read and disagree with:
1. Frame rate problems - have had very little none of which affected the gameplay
2. Gameplay not deep enough - BS
3. Graphics look like XBOX 1.5 - again I disagree

I'll keep you all posted but wanted to at least share my initial impressions.

Regarding games I'm most looking forward to (back on topic) - I have Fight Night Rd. 3 reserved in addition to Ghost Recon 360. That should cover me through the next couple months until some of the other blockbuster titles are released.....