Game Room (Xbox Live service)

[MachineAres 1CC]

I don't think there's a general thread for this yet, so I figured I would make one just for general discussion, since, even though the company who created Game Room for Microsoft has gone out of business, they are still supporting Game Room, and seems to be getting better every week. Game Room is basically a service for any classic gamer who enjoys the games of the 80s and early 90s, ranging from arcade cabinets, Atari 2600 and later, Intellivision, etc. The service currently has over 100 games available, and the games are standardly priced at 240 Microsoft points, or about $3. For someone who enjoys these kinds of games, $3 is nothing to have a current release of a game you love. These games not only are arcade-perfect ports, but also feature active leaderboards as well as the medal system, where you try to complete certain sets of challenges, including getting a high score (of a pre-set goal amount,) surviving without dying for a certain amount of time, and just playing the game for a long time. You can also send specific challenges to your friends over Xbox Live to see if they can accomplish the feat you asked of them.

And since we're all here for shmups, the service has brought back for release a number of games that I never thought would get any kind of current-gen release in any way, and this is great for those of us who love these games. More specifically, the service already has:

Astrosmash (Intellivision, 1981, Galaga style)
Barnstormer (Atari, Hori)
Battlantis (Konami, 1987, Vert)
Beamrider (Atari, 1983, Vert)
Buzz Bombers (Intellivision, 1983, Galaga style)
Chopper Command (Atari, 1982, Hori)
Flak Attack (Konami, 1987, Vert shmup)
Finalizer (Konami, Vert)
Gyruss (Konami, 1983, Tunnel shooter)
Juno First (Atari, 1983, Vector, grid based)
Major Havoc (Atari, multi-action)
Megamania (Intellivision, 1982, Galaga style)
Mega Zone (Konami, Vert)
River Raid (Atari, 1982, Vert)
River Raid 2 (Atari, 1988, Vert)
Scooter Shooter (Konami, 1985, Hori)
Scramble (Konami, 1981, Hori)
Super Cobra (Konami, Hori)
Time Pilot (Konami, multi-directional)
Twinbee (Konami, 1985, Vert)
Detenai! Twinbee (Konami, 1991 Vert)

Among a few others that some may or may not group into what you'd call a shmup. To download the service is free, and as I stated before, the games are all $3,
and you can try them all out before you purchase as well.

By the way, http://www.microsoft.com/games/en-us/ga ... eroom.aspx this is also available for PC, you don't have to have an Xbox 360.

If anyone has any more discussion about this, feel free, or if you want to post your Gamertags for challenging each other, you can do that, too.

[BulletMagnet]

I don't think there's a general thread for this yet

There are actually not one, but two "general" threads for this floating around in OT, along with a handful of other game-specific ones in this sub-forum.

[MachineAres 1CC]

Weird, I searched for Game Room on this whole forum and after scrolling through about 5 pages of posts, all I saw was the Twinbee thread, so I figured this would make sense. And neither of those threads have been posted in since Spring of this year, when, at the time, there were barely any games out for the service.

[Austin]

Game Room had potential for something great, but they blew it by hardly offering multiplayer interactivity and by having a ton of games that are overpriced.

[Drum]

I'd really like to see a 'where are they now?' for the devs of a lot of these games. I know what Owen Rubin (Major Havoc, Space Duel) is up to as he has a website http://www.orubin.com/ and I am stalking him.
A dedicated general thread for people wanting to know who made what classic shmup and what they're up to, and maybe whether they hold the licenses to their games or not, would be awesome. Maybe I'll make it if nobody else does.

[Austin]

That is actually a really cool idea. You should make it.