Kotaku: Battlestar Galactica for XBLA Blows...
Posted: 2007-07-15 03:38pm
There was a thread about this sometime back in February, along with some speculation of what the game would be like. I'm not aware of any discussion about it here since then, so I figured those out of the know might be interested in how the game ended up playing out:
http://kotaku.com/gaming/fracked/hands+ ... 278599.phpHands-On Battlestar Galactica XBLA
Admiral Adama would be very disappointed in you, Sierra. Because a Battlestar XBLA title could be an amazing bite-sized piece of the show for fans to pick up and play on a whim. Instead it's a lame arena shooter without the weapon combat, controls, or maybe most importantly, almost any exploitation of the rich IP to make it a fun title.
In multiplayer, combatants fight in arena team deathmatch, Cylons vs. humans. Each ship is tiny on the screen, whipping around quickly and firing short-range guns or heat-seeking missiles. And that's the game.
Oh, there is a single-player element that is supposed to have somewhere are 8 hours of gameplay ranging several missions. Considering the limited spectrum of the basic combat (even with occasional powerups on the map) the real achievement here is how Battlestar Galactica the show—creating immersive, creative sci-fi operating on a shoestring budget—will have fans buying the title in droves.
My personal favorite part of the hands-on: the handler explains pitches me on the crazy good AI. Then he showed me what he meant. I shot at a Cylon ship. It followed me behind an asteroid.
Maybe I'm being unfair you say? Maybe I'm just a deranged fan who has hijacked a popular video game site, crying about anything less than a fullblown Mass Effect Battlestar Ultra Platinum Sprinkled In Gold And Fairy Dust Edition with photorealistic Cylon cleavage?
Well, that would be true. But Battlestar Galactica XBLA failed to meet even my most meager of expectations.
