This Wednesday: Galactrix Flocks things up on XBLA

by Richard Mitchell { Apr 6th 2009 at 3:30PM }

The good news: Flock and Puzzle Quest: Galactrix are both headed to Xbox Live Arcade this week. The bad news: They will cost you not only an arm, but also a leg to obtain. Flock clocks in at 1200

, while Galactrix will set you back two Hamiltons (aka 1600

). If you can live without a couple appendages -- what with computers doing everything these days, you probably can -- you can enjoy the space-faring successor to Puzzle Quest and ... erm ... a UFO-enabled herding sim. Herding is more fun than it sounds, trust us.

Gallery: Flock (XBLA, PSN, PC)

Gallery: Puzzle Quest: Galactrix (XBLA/DS/PC)

Tags: capcom, d3-publisher, flock, galactrix, puzzle-quest-galactrix, xbla, xbox-live-arcade

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

hunter2223 @ Apr 6th 2009 3:35PM

Big PuzzleQuest fan but I'm going to pass on Galactix for a while... it'll go half price then I'll get it... too many other games to play for arcade Titles to be this expensive.

Marty @ Apr 6th 2009 3:36PM

I'm looking forward to Galactrix, and perhaps some hardcore flocking after that.

Dirty @ Apr 6th 2009 3:58PM

I would recommend using some lamb skin if your going to be flocking with a stranger.

jumpshot @ Apr 6th 2009 4:34PM

Sheep's stomach might work better. Case in point: Haggis.

Farseer (GDI) @ Apr 6th 2009 5:43PM

This new learning amazes me. Explain again how sheep's bladders may be employed to prevent earthquakes.

ottoman673 @ Apr 6th 2009 3:36PM

I've heard plenty of people talk about the lack of quality of galactrix...

so i'll just keep playing the original.

iFester @ Apr 6th 2009 3:45PM

What the flock is with the downloadable market pricing? Every week it seems to go up.

ittybittygirl @ Apr 6th 2009 4:00PM

When you force developers to release original content, that's what happens. The $5 DL is dead because they aren't allowing old-school arcade/console conversions anymore, which also explains SEGA/Namco releasing compilations for much less then they could have gotten away with on XBLA.

It's not like you are getting ripped off anyways. You are getting mostly quality games for your $10-$15 (Maybe not Death Tank). Galactrix is only the third XBLA game to release at $20 anyways (fourth if you count NCAA), so it's hardly a trend. Plus, it's a port of a retail game that currently sells for $25 on other game consoles.

Marty @ Apr 6th 2009 5:10PM

I've also read of smaller devs releasing games at the $20 price point because it supposedly is the sweet spot. For less, people think they aren't buying a full game, and for more, they feel like they are getting ripped off.

Us gamers know better, of course, but still – 'tis what I've read.

bearcall @ Apr 7th 2009 10:30AM

I think you mean: for less people buy it, for more people don't even consider it, and for $20... oh wait, people still don't buy it.

AoE @ Apr 7th 2009 9:07PM

@bearcall,

Your attempt at witticism is betrayed by sales numbers and the fact that people continue to release things at that price-point. If things didn't sell for $20, people wouldn't try to sell them for $20.

shane86 @ Apr 6th 2009 3:45PM

MS can go Flock themselves.

Jcarpio @ Apr 6th 2009 4:02PM

Being which MS didn't set the price for either one of these.

Question though.. did anyone grumble about the pricing of galactrix when it came out on PC or DS?

UnderHero5 @ Apr 6th 2009 3:50PM

Nope. Not for those prices. Pass.

Courtney @ Apr 6th 2009 3:51PM

Odd week that there are actually two games released that I'm interested, though I'm likely to wait on Galactrix unless the 360 release for some reason fixes a few of the complaints about the DS release.

Paul @ Apr 6th 2009 4:24PM

Was a huge fan of the original Puzzle Quest. It's the only game I've ever got every achievement. Galactrix is just terrible. I don't recommend it at half the price.

Vic @ Apr 6th 2009 4:02PM

Save your money on Galactrix. It's not worth it. They took the PQ formula and ruined it by adding tedious jumpgates and made the game even more about luck and less skill with pieces coming in from all sides to affect gameplay. The first one was much better.

Omega2k3 @ Apr 6th 2009 7:12PM

Just because you can't figure out a simple mechanic doesn't mean people should pass. The tiles don't fall randomly, they fall into the direction you pushed the tile.

Damian @ Apr 6th 2009 4:10PM

Flock looks interesting, ill have to try the demo first though.

wdelaney @ Apr 6th 2009 4:35PM

Man. I was really looking forward to flock.

But 1200 points is a little much. I'll wait for it to go on sale some day.

Blue_Falcon @ Apr 6th 2009 4:38PM

I'm not going to immediately say no to either until I've tried the demos, but at this point they have to be able to really impress me in order to consider them.

Obie @ Apr 6th 2009 4:56PM

What is up with these rediculous prices? This is a recession, give people a freakin' break!

800 or less ya greedy bastards!

Wild Bill @ Apr 6th 2009 5:06PM

mmm. If Flock were 800 points there'd be a good chance I'd hit buy without a second thought if the demo is reasonably fun. At 1200 points I'll have to really LOVE the demo, and even then I'd wait a good amount of time before buying while I justify the purchase to myself.

Surely the whole point of these types of games is maximising impulse purchases? Lots of people buying a cheaper product is better than only a few people buying it at a slightly higher price. Especially when there's no actual physical product involved.

Bummer

SidearmS @ Apr 6th 2009 5:23PM

The real "sissified" thing that tees me off with this pricing is that the blogs run by Major Nelson and Gamerscore no longer accept posting on the fly, aka anon posting. So while we all know this pricing IS A JOKE, you have to actually create an account now to tell them this. Major Nelson used to be a fun place to debate issues, but now Major seems to have had celebrity go to his head, and now he is too busy to listen to the community that helped put him where he is today. Gamerscore is worse, every post has "comments disabled" right underneath it.

THIS is why I have not bought an arcade game in months at launch - I do pick up the occassional points card ON SALE, but I do not buy any titles outright any longer. I thought this tactic would go away after the DRM tool, but no, Marketplace game prices STINK these days.

And $20 USD IS NOT A SWEET SPOT. John Davidson on 1Up Yours (now ListenUp - but the quote was from an older 1Up) pretty much stated that the "sweet spot" for DLC appears to be 2.99, as that is what is being eaten up in tons by the iPhone community. It would be nice to see DLC on the 360/PS3 in the 320/$4 USD range, but we never see it unless it is crap DLC on sale, or some stupid costume packs (which are usually nothing more than pallete swaps).

$20 USD for DLC, even full games, is stupid, purely stupid. Flock for $10/800 was a day one purchase for me, but $15/1200? PASS. Unless you are busting out Lost and the Damned or Shivering Isles content, you can not expect $20 for an arcade game to be taken seriously. I do not care who you are, you will fail in some way.

I for one am SICK of MS' pricing for arcade stuff. You notice that ever since the US "went into recession", MS has been RAISING PRICES on their stuff. Not only is that insulting to the consumer, but it does cost developers purchases of their titles.

GFWL - Join the meeting through Twitter? Unless I can PUKE MY DISGUST through Twitter, you can shove your "Twitter" up your backside.

Obie @ Apr 6th 2009 5:39PM

Agreed, DLC should be a lot cheaper. It's just data, it's not a physical product. No need to ship it to the store, no need for it to take place on a store shelf.

So it should not cost as such. It has less value to the consumer, because you can't rent it, you can't sell it on Ebay when you are done. Heck you can't even let a buddy borrow it for a weekend.

Just my 2 cts.

Jcarpio @ Apr 6th 2009 7:04PM

And that's why it is 15-20 dollars and not 50-60.

It still something that people invested in whether it's time spent on developing or a money.

You don't really think people make games to just entertain people right?

ifalldownstairs @ Apr 6th 2009 7:42PM

Microsoft =/= Capcom

If you care so much, just create an account. An anonymous post saying "MS sucks." doesn't really contribute, does it?

BFBeast666 @ Apr 6th 2009 5:25PM

I got Galactirx off Impulse a couple weeks ago and I'm hugely disappointed. They tried to add more depth to the whole match-three thingy and ended up taking away what made the original PQ so great: the fun. Battles feel more like roulette matches and the gate hacking minigame gets annyoing extremely fast. Save the 1600 and get the original plus expansion instead - much better play value.

AmishPhysicist @ Apr 6th 2009 6:04PM

I love how you can't go to the live marketplace and find anything on these games. Don't know why they don't support previewing games that aren't already released, or at least queuing them up once they're out. As far as live is concerned these games don't exist.

AoE @ Apr 7th 2009 9:15PM

Live marketplace is really just an interface for buying and downloading; as far as I know MS doesn't control what does or doesn't get posted for a game outside of very basic gatekeeper quality control type stuff, that's left entirely up to the companies. So in this case D3 and Capcom are to blame for poor promotion; they should have at least had trailers available.

On the other hand, MS does control directly all of the game information pages on xbox.com (which is, after a fashion, an extension of Live anyway) True there might not be info on your console, but there certainly is on xbox.com:

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/f/flockxboxlivearcade/
http://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/p/pqgalactrixxboxlivearcade/

Darkharmony @ Apr 6th 2009 6:41PM

They killed Puzzle Quest with Galactrix. I played it on the pc and the only way I could enjoy it was by modding the tedious jump gates and mining. Not to mention everyone starts the same and you have to go flying through those jump gates to find the upgrades you want only to find out they cost too much. I never found anything that made me be able to have fun. Like someone else said the battle are 10x more luck based then warlords was. Sure you can control what direction the gems flow in from but I've already matched some bombs and next thing I know the new gems allow the computer to match bombs for 30+ damage. Not to mention I spent more time unlocking the stupid jump gates then actually in battles. As someone else said, if you haven't got the original yet then use your points on that instead.

Now as for Flock, I played the pc demo and I gotta say it was pretty fun. I'm not sure how much I could play a space ship just scaring some animals around because it's not very controlled. Sometimes the animals go behind you and then when you go back for them they keep running away. But I think it could be easier on the 360, we'll see.

giantenemycrab @ Apr 6th 2009 6:59PM

Looks like I'm not going to get PQG.. I was going to get Flock, now I'm going to have to think about it... that's a shame.

so wrong @ Apr 6th 2009 7:39PM

yup, it was on my list, now at $15 instead of $10, I dont think ill go for it.

kyle @ Apr 6th 2009 7:36PM

MS only controls the price on games they publish or own, Capcom and D3 made the price of the games, MS can only give them recommendation. SO stop saying MS is ripping you off people

Amandrel @ Apr 6th 2009 8:13PM

I've been looking forward to Flock!, but now that I realise there is no online multiplayer, only local, I'm looking forward to it a little bit less.

Why why why does a game that you purchase and download online NOT have online multiplayer? The friends that I play Xbox with live 2-3 hours away and local multiplayer doesn't do me any good at all.