Lunar Lander is this week's Xbox Live game
Last week’s Xbox Live game, Enigmo, broke three straight weeks of Game Room releases. To be fair though, Harbor Master also came out alongside Centipede. Anyway, I hope you like retro games, Windows Phone gamers, because this week’s Xbox Live title is another Game Room entry: Lunar Lander.
Atari’s original Lunar Lander arcade game came out in 1979. Yes, this week’s release debuted the same year I was born. It’s 32 years young! Lunar Lander was the first Atari title to use vector graphics (just as Asteroids Deluxe did a few years later). Its graphics are composed entirely of white lines on a black background. The object is to safely land a spacecraft on the surface of the moon. The original arcade game used an actual lever to control the craft’s thrust and buttons for steering. It will be interesting to see how the game’s controls have been adapted for mobile touch screens.
See that? I didn’t say anything negative about Lunar Lander or how inexplicable it is that someone chose to release it on Windows Phone over so many other Game Room titles. That’s me, Captain Optimism!
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Tahiti Bob says:
Yeah! Take that iPhone, Xbox Live in your face!Note: This comment might be sarcastic.
federaly says:
Scraping the gunk stuck to the rust on the bottom under side of the barrel with these recent "retro" games.Such amazing games on XBLA and we're playing with for the most part the ****
Paul Acevedo says:
There are hundreds of Game Room titles they could choose from, so I'm not sure why they're picking titles that have little or no appeal to modern gamers.
HD7guy says:
It is a little hard to believe Lunar Lander comes out as a sooner than later Game Room title.But, and I mean this constructively, there are over 16,000 other apps in Marketplace that could have been reviewed instead.
GP101 says:
Doesnt anyone else wonder why the **** there arent any propper turn based games or dun dun dun...MULTIPLAYER games, isnt that what Xbox Live is meant to be about at its core... Ohhh look, your avatar, oooh look chivos, oooh loook your friends! BUT YOU CANT PLAY WITH THEM !NO NO! NO!
Paul Acevedo says:
We expect multiplayer games will come with the Mango update. It's a long wait, but once it comes about, we'll forget about these dark single-player-only times.
GP101 says:
Let's hope so, these dark days of SP games are bleak. Im also quite distrubed of late at the quality of the Xbox live titles for WP7. Any ideas what has happened to the game MUSH that was meant to come out? Angrymango keep saying soon, but thats been a long time now..
Paul Acevedo says:
We'll have an article about Mush pretty soon. Hopefully some info on the release date too, but I think it's still up in the air.
surge48 says:
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!?!?!?!? I am absolutely distraught by this announcement! First of all the Xbox games are ridiculously expensive. Second, I am not forking three dollars for a game that has a black background and white lines! Where is Sonic?!?!?! That's what I am waiting for! As for Angry Birds, I won't pay three dollars for that, just to get an achievement saying you killed a pig! Achievements are not worth two dollars!!! They need an option for no achievements!!! Ugh, frustration... venting... now hyperventilating lol
Arturo Bandini says:
All XBox Live games for WP7 are boring, so boring. Whatever the level it's always the same challenge. After 5 minutes I am bored and I give up.My old Gameboy games in 1993 were better and funnier... Super Mario, Batman, etc...Were are all the innovative games ? Were are the creative games ? Were are the funny games ?
Tahiti Bob says:
I don't get the "out of all the Game Room games" comment. Game Room shouldn't be on WP7 period! Nobody cares on Xbox 360, nobody cares on PC, why bother with WP7 now? I wouldn't play those games even of they were free!And I'm fed up of hearing things will be amazing with Mango, Mango is 6 months away, what about the existing users, don't they deserve proper apps and services? Should they put their phone in a box and open it as a treat in November? That's ridiculous really.
JerikTelorian says:
I guess I'll break up all the completely understandable complaints with a positive note.Lunar Lander is an awesome game and I can't wait for it. It was one of the first things I went looking for when I got the phone, and am glad to see we'll get it.I'm sure the interest will crash when I realize it costs $5 or something like that though.
theefman says:
Vote with your wallet folks. Sooner or later MS will realise no one wants these overpriced antiques and will give us quality games.
gearhead05 says:
Lets hope so. The whole game room thing seemed to flop on the 360 but for some reason they are still punishing us by putting this **** on WP7. Hopefully they will realize sooner rather than later...
Dark Mirage says:
If I had to guess, they still have a license to these particular games or something, so they're just using these as a cheap way of filling release holes.But really... Lunar Lander? Of ALL the Games Room titles, they went with Lunar Lander? Come on.
SeanR1221 says:
I was thinking the same. Probably some contract to push these before the Must Haves roll out.Prediction: Time Pilot next week.
Paul Acevedo says:
Keep your bile in check, Tahiti Bob. First off, a lot of people *do* like retro games. Your single opinion doesn't cancel them all out. It's just that Lunar Lander and Asteroids Deluxe are a little *too* retro and the graphics are frankly much too tiny for small screens.As for Mango, that's when multiplayer's coming. The fact that you don't want to hear about it doesn't change the reality of the situation.
GP101 says:
I agree with allot of whats been said above, the games are too expensive just because they have chivos, in order to be worth more money than other games on the marketplace they should offer MUCH better quality and at least have some interactivity built in like Fable Coin Golf which is the VERY least it should do, but how about just some turn based games, where are those, why havent these been implemented, EA's Monopoly was a prime candidate for that. Also the notion of having to wait for six months for Mango is rubbish, all the other games would have to be updated if there were some new backend requirement for multiplayer. Doubtful the buggy 1st gen games would be updated, they havent seen much love after their initial launch..
Piratelooksat40 says:
Can't find the orginal one that is listed above. I see 3 similare ones, but not the one that is listed.
