Joystiq

Moon Diver springs into XBLA on May 4

Alexander Sliwinski — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 11:18:00 EST

Moon Diver will become available on Xbox Live Arcade on May 4 for 1200 MSP ($15). The four-player "Strider for the 21st century" hit the PSN last month, and was shortly followed by some DLC packs.

Be sure to give the trial a go before purchase. Just sayin'.

Gallery: Moon Diver (2/17/11)

Moon Diver springs into XBLA on May 4 originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 21 Apr 2011 11:18:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Moon Diver DLC live on PSN, two more packs coming

JC Fletcher — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 16:00:00 EST

The first DLC pack for Moon Diver arrived this Tuesday along with the PSN update. The 99-cent "Silence" pack added a new playable character and a score attack mode to the Strider-esque side-scroller. Two additional DLC items were announced today, one coming next week and the other currently without a date.

On April 26, two more infinitely scrolling Score Attack stages, "Orbit," and "Rage," will be available in a single 99-cent pack. Sometime in the future, the free DLC Pack #3 will include the "Chain Kill Mode," in which players attempt to kill as many enemies as possible while maintaining a combo. "A brand new world awaits if you are able to survive the attacking hordes!" If you're lucky, maybe it'll be a new horde-free world.

Like the "Chain Kill" DLC, the Xbox 360 version of Moon Diver remains undated, with Square Enix saying only that "Pricing and availability for the Xbox LIVE Arcade for Xbox 360 will be announced at a later date."

Gallery: Moon Diver (DLC)

Continue reading Moon Diver DLC live on PSN, two more packs coming

Moon Diver DLC live on PSN, two more packs coming originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 14 Apr 2011 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Moon Diver review: Lunar mayhem

Mike Schiller — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 16:00:00 EST

Do you remember Strider? I'm not asking if you have a vague awareness of it or even if you've played it -- do you remember the excitement of its arrival on the Sega Genesis? It was the first game to shove eight megabits of memory into a single console cartridge, a fact loudly proclaimed by an emblem on the box art that screams "8MEGA MEMORY." It featured enemies like a giant centipede made out of people, an evil guy in a robe who (as the story goes) took out five of the seven continents without breaking a sweat, and, of course, giant robot dinosaurs.

If you owned a Sega Genesis in 1990, Strider was a Big Damn Deal.

21 years later, it can be said with no great amount of equivocation that the quietly-released Moon Diver is about as far as one can get from a Big Damn Deal. What Moon Diver is, however, is as close to "Strider for the 21st century" as we may ever see. It looks like Strider, it plays like Strider, it even features a production credit from none other than Kouichi Yotsui, Strider's director. While it never explicitly references the 20-and-change-year-old classic, it is quite obviously cut from its cloth. Moon Diver's prime target audience, then, is those who do remember Strider as a Big Damn Deal.

Gallery: Moon Diver (2/17/11)

Continue reading Moon Diver review: Lunar mayhem

Moon Diver review: Lunar mayhem originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 06 Apr 2011 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Moon Diver strides to PSN March 29

JC Fletcher — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 22:00:00 EST

You might remember Moon Diver under its previous title Necromachina, or the title before that, Moon Diver. Or you might just remember it as "that game that looks like a four-player Strider." That's no coincidence, by the way -- it's actually designed by Koichi Yotsui, who was one of the leads on Strider.

According to a list of upcoming releases sneaked into Sony's Spring Fever promotion announcement, Moon Diver will plunge onto the PlayStation Network on March 29. No release date has been mentioned for XBLA yet -- not that we're surprised the PlayStation Blog would refrain from volunteering that.

Moon Diver strides to PSN March 29 originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 08 Mar 2011 22:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Square Enix's 'Necromachina' now 'Moon Diver,' pushed to spring

Griffin McElroy — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 17:00:00 EST

Good news, fans of lunar aquatic sports! The North American version of Square Enix's downloadable, Strider-esque action game, Necromachina, has reverted back to its original Japanese title, Moon Diver. A recent announcement on the Square Enix Facebook page not only revealed the game's titular revision, it also revealed the game's new release window: Spring 2011.

Unfortunately, the post couldn't be more specific than that, but it sounds like several months still stand between us and this Feelplus-developed multiplayer slasher. That should give Square Enix plenty of time to change the title back to Necromachina, then back to Moon Diver, then Necromachina, then Moon Diver again, then Secret of the Crystal SpaceSwords, then right on back to the lovely Moon Diver.

Square Enix's 'Necromachina' now 'Moon Diver,' pushed to spring originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 06 Jan 2011 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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'Moon Diver' now called Necromachina, added to Square Enix E3 lineup

Griffin McElroy — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 10:25:00 EST

Filed under: Weird But True, Opinions, New In Pop Culture

We don't think Square Enix appreciates the genuine toil that goes into producing a high-quality photoshop. That one we made yesterday, of the guy diving into the moon? It will never be relevant for anything ever again. The publisher recently announced that the Feelplus-developed, side-scrolling action title formerly known as Moon Diver will come to the U.S. PSN and XBLA under the moniker Necromachina. (How are we supposed to make a photoshop out of that? It is virtually impossible.)

Accompanying the announcement was a fast-paced gameplay trailer, which is posted after the jump. It looks awfully slick, with sharp 2.5D visuals and old-school action-platforming -- but even from this very first trailer, we can already tell it's going to be punishingly difficult. We'll get a chance to test that hypothesis when we get our hands on the game at E3.

Continue reading 'Moon Diver' now called Necromachina, added to Square Enix E3 lineup

'Moon Diver' now called Necromachina, added to Square Enix E3 lineup originally appeared on Joystiq on Thu, 10 Jun 2010 10:25:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Square Enix and feelplus team up on 'Moon Diver' for XBLA

Griffin McElroy — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 15:00:00 EST

Filed under: Weird But True, Opinions, New In Pop Culture

Andriasang reports that Square Enix has pulled back the curtain obscuring the identity of its next project: a 2D action game called Moon Diver, coming this year to the Japanese Xbox Live Arcade. The title, which will be developed by Lost Odyssey and Ninety-Nine Nights 2 creator feelplus, pits four-player teams of ninjas -- presumably moon ninjas, which we all know to be the coolest type of ninjas -- against waves of monsters in an attempt to protect a post-apocalyptic Earth.

We still have so many questions: Is it coming to America? Can we see some screenshots? Are we expected to dive into or off of the moon? We suppose our curiosity will have to be sated by these slim, slim details for now. We'll try pestering Square Enix for answers to these pressing questions at E3.

Square Enix and feelplus team up on 'Moon Diver' for XBLA originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 09 Jun 2010 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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