ScottishGames.biz

Slam Announces New Title - Planet Busters

Casual games developer Slam has put out the first information about it's forthcoming game Planet Busters.  Unlike many recent casual titles which feature happy cartoon animals, magical kingdoms and - more often than not - jewels, bricks cake or other easily arranged item; Planet Busters is focused very firmly on violence of cosmic proportions.

Like many of the true arcade classics, Planet Busters puts the player at the helm of a heavily armed spaceship and then lets them loose.  Thankfully it is in a good cause.  The ominously named 'Scourge' has just dissolved the Earth (using some sort of beam we'd imagine) and turned everyone and everything you loved into random strings of carbon molecules.

So you set out for revenge.  Obviously.

As the press release says:

Planet Busters’ gameplay couldn’t be simpler.  Sets of extremely dangerous missiles flash up the screen, messing up the space-time continuum.  Players have to move the missiles to create matching groups.  This creates chain reactions and triggers some ridiculously powerful explosions.  Once a sufficiently large group is made, they flash away into the inky blackness and explode, shattering enemy ships, battle stations and even planets – leaving destruction on a massive scale – and teaching the Scourge that mankind is not to be trifled with.

Which sounds like fun.

The game is coming out for PC's running XP and Vista.  Availability and cost will be announced 'shortly.

“Planet Busters is a whole new universe for us,” says Slam's Linda 'Star Commander' MacKellar. “Over the last few months, we've released games based on spelling and language and games for the female market, but we've not had anything which has featured lots of really, really big explosions.  We're delighted with the results.  I've always wanted to be an all-powerful force in the galaxy and now I can be – all without leaving the comfort of my PC.”

“Mwaah hah ha ha haaaah!” added MacKellar, as she obliterated the ancient worlds of Omicron Reticuli IV, V and VII.

Which sums it up quite well really. 

Read - Learn - Play - Touch

Another thing we love about casual games - outside the fact that they upset SO many 'proper' games companies - is that the companies behind them tend to be uncommonly generous.  Most games can be downloaded for nowt and played for quite some time for no financial outlay whatsoever. 

Slam Games, the company behind Joyboost.com, the home of puzzle games including Spinword, Orchidia (and the forthcoming Planet Busters) is continuing this tradition of open handed altruism.

Not only can you find a variety of free games on their site, the company is now offering one lucky person the chance to win an iPod Touch, for doing nothing more than signing up to their weekly newsletter.  Yes, that's right, you sign up for an e-mail and your name goes into a draw to win Apple's latest, sleekest, sexiest bit of kit (we're not including the iPhone because it's inherently evil and ties you to more hidden charges than a beer in a Soho 'revue bar')

The promotion is open to anyone over the age of 18 across the whole of the European Union, USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

It's a good deal and Slam are inherently NOT evil at all, as they won't sign you up for anything nasty, pass your e-mail onto anyone nasty or try to sell you anything nasty. 

You can sign up here.

Flower Power - New Casual Games Title From Joyboost

A new press release from Joyboost arrived in our inbox this morning.  The company has released another new title on it's casual games portal.

Orchidia offers a horticultural twist on the popular pattern matching genre (where you make chains of three or more colours, blocks, bricks, gems, jewels or 'other').

You must help free the kingdom of Orchidia from a rather nasty enchantment by breaking the 60 dams, which are blocking the river flowing through the heart of the kingdom.

Slam has gone all out to create a game which will have huge appeal for younger gamers and the female half of the population.  Orchidia is simple, colourful and fun (yes, they sent us a copy of the game so we could have a look.  Other companies - take note...)  There is a storyline wrapped around the 60 levels included in the game and you are, of course, helped in your quest by a rubber duck.  Plus you rescue penguins.  This seems to be a theme Slam are building into a lot of their games - and we salute it.  Cartoon animals should be mandatory in games.

Orchidia also offers an 'eternal' level, which ignores the storyline in favour of continual gameplay, which should keep players coming back, even once they've finished the original levels.

Visitors signing up to the Joyboost mailing list are currently being offered a WHOPPING 60% of the normal retail price of £11.95/$19.95, which seems entirely generous to us.

You can read the full press release by following the link below.

We Like SE - Slam Respond To Scottishgames

Linda MacKellar from Slam Games has e-mailed us a response to the piece which ran in Holyrood Magazine and The Scotsman at the start of this week...

Hi Brian, I'm writing about the piece you posted recently about the relationship between the games industry in Scotland and the lack of recognition from the Scottish Executive and Scottish Enterprise.  Slam was quoted in the article and I want to state very clearly our views on this issue.

We actually have a very good relationship with the Scottish Executive and Scottish Enterprise. The people we deal with are very aware of the games industry and do what they can to help. Like many other games companies in Scotland we have received funding and support - support which we are very grateful for.  Grants for trips to E3, grants for job creation through RSA; prototyping repayable grants; soft loans – and just as importantly a sounding board for business ideas and strategies. These are all useful – and we all know we get support that companies from other sectors just don’t.

It’s important to realise that there is an intervention strategy for the games industry in Scotland. ITI Techmedia Online Games Development, and the Games Based Learning Programmes are a multi-million pound  investment directly into the games industry in Scotland.  These programmes are carrying out research to improve game development technologies and to give advantages to indigenous Scottish companies using this technology. If that’s not recognition of our industry, I don’t know what is, and we’re proud to be associated with it.

I’m also not convinced that any of the Scottish games industry is angry with the Scottish Executive or Scottish Enterprise.  We’re all too busy running our companies and getting on with things.  We take what help we can, but each company is ultimately responsible for the success or failure of their own business. The games industry has had it hard in Scotland, but I think the companies that are succeeding today have good business models and a solid future.

The Scottish Executive has good people working hard every day to help us make our businesses better, but at the end of the day the only people who can really make a games industry in Scotland – are us.

Slam Releases Spinword For Windows Vista

You may have noticed that Microsoft Windows VISTA was released this week.  Microsoft have made much of the fact that gaming is one of the core capabilities of the system.  Not just the high end, graphic intensive weapons-fests either.  Vista boasts a range of simple, casual and fun games, which promise to make Minesweeper and Solitaire look sooo 20th century.

One of the showcase games inside Vista comes from Slam in Glasgow.  Spinword is "a fast-paced and exciting word-based puzzle game".

Slam have created something quite different with this one.  Having had the chance to try the game before it was released, it's a totally different experience to the games in previous versions of windows which, fun as they were, always seemed to be an afterthought, coded in the space of an afternoon.

Spinword is gorgeous.  It makes full use of Vista's new graphical capabilities.  Plus it's insanely addictive.  You make words from letters which appear on cubes at the bottom of the screen.  Every Vista owner will be able to understand it and pick it up in minutes.

Chris Early, Microsoft's Product Unit Manager for casual gaming is quoted as saying “Spinword is an excellent example of a simple, fun and compelling game, with a very broad appeal,”

So who are we to argue?

Plus, having your first title included in Microsoft's shiny new OS (as a showcase game no less), is a pretty big deal.  So congratulations to Slam and we're already looking forward to the XP version (in development we're led to believe...)

Here's the official press release:

Glasgow, UK, February 2nd 2007.  Game developer and publisher Slam today announced that its debut game –  “Spinword for Windows Vista™” – has been selected as a Windows Vista Showcase Game.  As a result, players will be able to download Spinword to their Windows Vista PCs directly from MSN Games via games.msn.com/en/vistagames.

Spinword was premiered at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, where a fully playable version was available on the Microsoft Windows Vista stand.  The full game will be available on MSN Games timed with the Vista launch.

Spinword is a fast-paced and exciting word-based puzzle game.  Players play in two ways: by making words and solving puzzles against the clock; or by making as many words as they can in a relaxing survival mode   Immovable blocks, exploding blocks and obstacles on the board ensure players have to think fast, spell accurately and keep their eyes open to score as high as they can!

“Spinword is an excellent example of a simple, fun and compelling game, with a very broad appeal,” said Chris Early, product unit manager for Microsoft Casual Games.  “Windows Vista is optimized for game play and Slam has created a title with that easy-to-play, hard-to-master nature that will keep players coming back for more.”