Starting 2009 with a few popular Community Games

by Dustin Burg { Jan 6th 2009 at 3:45PM }

For those of you have yet to jump into the ever growing library of gaming fun found in the Community Games, we urge that you do. Really, there's a lot of goodness to be found and even though each game is paid content, there are trial versions for each and ever title.

To get you started on your 2009 Community Games test drive, we took the liberty of compiling a list of the top seven most popular games available. All of which are, for the most part, good times (except Fireplace, it's that controversial title that got a Major plug). Go ahead, jump in!

Fireplace - "Enjoy the awesome ambiance of a crackling fireplace in your living room."
Air Legends - "Take to the skies in frenetic WWII dogfighting."
Johnny Platform's Biscuit Romp - "Play as Johnny Platform himself in this retro-styled platformer!"
sin(Surfing) - "Ever wished you could surf inside an oscilloscope?"
Weapon of Choice - "Insane action and humongous aliens tied together by a twisted story."
RPaints - "Do you like to mess with colors, or just doodle? RPaints allows you to do just that!"
Dr. Popper - "Dr. Popper is a bubble breaker game."

Tags: community-games, xbla, xna

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Matthew Schenck @ Jan 6th 2009 4:00PM

I must mention Carneyvale:Showtime. I played the trial twice and had to buy it. It's fun and intuitive with controls that are spot on. The menus eek of polish, which is very hard to come by on Community games. Plus you can create and edit your very own levels. Very fun! I recommend everyone to at least try the demo first and give it a "whirl"!:)

itsburnsie @ Jan 7th 2009 12:05AM

YES! Carneyvale:Showtime is amazingly fun and addictive.

I had the same experience, I played the trial a couple of times, and then immediately hit "X" to buy the full version. At 400 MS points it really is a steal.

AoE @ Jan 6th 2009 4:04PM

Hey, does anyone know if Jelly Car is available or will be? That game was awesome when they did the community games preview...

Jcarpio @ Jan 6th 2009 4:11PM

I haven't seen it on the creators club site's games catalog. so it's not available to even review now.

Arashikou @ Jan 6th 2009 5:11PM

Sadly, the creator of Jelly Car cannot relase it on Community Games as things stand right now. Due to the agreement he has with his day job employer, he cannot charge for any of the games he makes on his own. And you cannot releas a game for free on Community Games right now, ergo none of his work can go up on there.

In the meantime, why not check out the PC or iPhone version? :) http://walaber.com/

Boff @ Jan 7th 2009 5:10AM

That sucks balls bigtime.

OS Perry @ Jan 6th 2009 4:08PM

Carneyvale:Showtime is a very well done community game, and rivals most regular XBLA titles. This is my first community game purchase, and I just got it last night and played it well over an hour straight.

Jcarpio @ Jan 6th 2009 4:09PM

I'd also recommend Cave In.. it's a match 3 but presented differently

Tony @ Jan 6th 2009 4:11PM

Carneyvale is good. So is Blow.

Bmurph @ Jan 7th 2009 7:23AM

Blow is great. Def check that out.

amart @ Jan 6th 2009 4:15PM

do any of the community games come with achievements?

SadisticHam @ Jan 6th 2009 4:18PM

Nope. TBH I've not even tried them, they've always felt like something that should just be free for Gold members to me.

AoE @ Jan 6th 2009 4:33PM

@SadisticHam,

So because you pay for access to MS' online service you think that indie developers and homebrew coders should just give you their work for free? Please explain that logic.

Ham @ Jan 6th 2009 4:43PM

Explain my logic?

I don't know why because I don't create games, I simply don't have the time..but I'll tell you what why don't you ask one of the game makers on a site like this:

www.newgrounds.com

Find out why they create games, put in lots of work and give it away for free. Or if that site doesn't suit you, why don't you go to one of the other thousands of websites out there with homebrew games?

You act as if giving it away free is unheard of, it's been going on for years, i don't see why the community games are any different i doubt much profit is made out of them.

amart @ Jan 6th 2009 4:46PM

thanks for the response ham.
btw wouldn't a site like newgrounds be a more logical choice than the xbla, since to be honest, ive never heard or seen any of these games advertised around the nxe. If exposure is what the developper is looking for, then a site like that would work relatively well, and even provide community feedback via comments unlike xbla(community games)

SadisticHam @ Jan 6th 2009 4:51PM

No worries.

To clarify though it wasn't so much a complaint, I'm not fussed that their charging..I'm happy to ignore it, i just thought it was something that would be better off free, if need be put in advertisements or something.

More people would play it, more games would be submitted if the initial charge was dropped and it'd get more attention if it truly was good, i think at least.

AoE @ Jan 6th 2009 5:48PM

@Ham, I don't think I acted as though free was unheard of; I was simply asking for an explanation. To separate developer/ms/etc from it all... I just don't understand why Party B should be obliged to give away something they created for free because it happens to be distributed over Party A's service, that you pay for. There's no misunderstanding of free on my part, I assure you. Just a misunderstanding of "they've always felt like something that should just be free for Gold members to me." Which frankly I still don't understand the logic of. And "well there's free stuff over here!" isn't an explanation, I'm sorry.

MrMuggs @ Jan 6th 2009 4:22PM

Glad to see X3F giving the community games some visibility!!

I mentioned this in a previous post but Easy Golf is a REALLY good game. Not only are the controls very good and the graphics excellent but it has a course creator that you can share with friends as well. I wish this got more publicity so more people played it.

Here's a link to the XBLM page:
http://marketplace.xbox.com/en-US/games/media/66acd000-77fe-1000-9115-d8025855011c/

Jcarpio @ Jan 6th 2009 4:29PM

Is it better than that Hot Shots Clone that's on the XBLA service?

Arashikou @ Jan 6th 2009 5:17PM

Actually, yes - I think it is. The really nice course creation and sharing tools are what sold me on it (hence why I'm big to get other people into it - more people to download courses from!) but the golf game itself is one of the nicer simple implementations of golf I've seen on a console. And as a bonus, the game will never try to sell you add-on DLC packs like Tee It Up, since Community Games don't have that capability!

But don't take my word for it - try the free demo.

Jcarpio @ Jan 6th 2009 5:20PM

Excellent.. i'll hit up tonight. 400 or 800 pts?

CL34N3R @ Jan 6th 2009 4:49PM

With decent games like Johnny Platform's Biscuit Romp going for 200 points, I'm pretty shocked to see that fireplace costs 400 points. Fireplace. 400 points. K

guttertalk @ Jan 6th 2009 5:24PM

Biscuit Romp actually was a DS homebrew game, and my kids loved it (and they still play it).

IMO no one should be recommending crap like Fireplace. But then no one went broke underestimating the intelligence of consumers.

Jayenkai @ Jan 6th 2009 5:10PM

Ladybird Galaxy's a nice little game, too. 'twas my first Community purchase. Lovely game.

I also bought Word.. um.. .. .. Word Whatever, the Generic "Find-a-word" thing.
I've made a few myself, (Stringy Things) so I've fallen in love with the game. Sure, I could've just made it again, but it's quicker to buy it.. ;) I can be lazy for a change!

Jcarpio @ Jan 6th 2009 5:21PM

WordSoup is what you were grasping for there. that was my first purchase on the system.

Jayenkai @ Jan 6th 2009 5:37PM

Aaah, yeah.. That's the one ;)

TechNick @ Jan 6th 2009 5:24PM

Johnny Platform's Biscuit Romp is a great game! Glad to see it's doing well! I love puzzle platformers like that. It is actually a port of a DS homebrew game, DS games don't look to bad on the big screen!

LMB @ Jan 6th 2009 6:54PM

We still don't have any Community Games here in Finland. Thanks Microsoft.

AoE @ Jan 6th 2009 7:13PM

Wow, I didn't know you guys even have 360s in Finland... maybe MS doesn't realize that either?

I DeX I @ Jan 7th 2009 2:02AM

I love Johnny Platform's Biscuit Romp and I would love to see some Mario clones as well. 2D FTW! I'm serious. I enjoy the classic 2D games more than all the 3D crap out there. O.K., so I do like some of the 3D crap out there, but bring on the 2D platform awesomness!!!

Evan @ Jan 7th 2009 9:02AM

Fireplace? RPaints? Are you just picking random games?

Try recommending games that are actually good, like Carneyvale:Showtime

Barkers Crest @ Jan 7th 2009 10:56AM

This is Matt the creator of Easy Golf. I've got 12 courses you all can download from me to your hard drive.

Gamertag: Barkers Crest

Send me a friends request as I know quite a few people who are playing online and sharing courses.

You can go to my website to read the latest news such as when I put out updates to the game.

www.barkerscrest.com

Blue_Falcon @ Jan 7th 2009 11:40AM

Even though I haven't bought any of the games yet, the service thus far is kind of a bust. For every gem like sin(surfing) and Easy Golf there are dozens of Fireplaces and Garrett the Slugs. It's almost embarrassing how bad some of the games are.

Josh @ Jan 7th 2009 1:31PM

I've actually been writing some concepts in XNA. In so, I've started seeing more and more games. If anyone here has played Khet, there is a clone of it called Satellites (http://marketplace.xbox.com/en-US/games/media/66acd000-77fe-1000-9115-d80258550123/). Another REALLY good one is called Hexothermic (http://marketplace.xbox.com/en-US/games/media/66acd000-77fe-1000-9115-d80258550149/).

Not trying to divert attention from x3f, but this site has wonderful reviews of community games, http://www.xnplay.co.uk/.