[360] CHROMEHOUNDS - GOOD NIGHT SWEET PRINCE

Originally Posted by Celisasu

Right now I haven't bothered with X-Box Live. I can't stand the control scheme on Blazing Angels, I hate Perfect Dark Zero with a passion, and Elder Scrolls: Oblivion is a single player game. Thus I only have Dead or Alive 4 to play online which isn't worth it to me. I've been watching Chrome Hounds with interest. If I do get this one it might be what tempts me to finally bother with getting my 360 online. I've always been fond of mech games although I have to admit that I consistently suck at them(well the ones where you pilot them anyways....I'm pretty good at the strategy games). You'd laugh at how poor I am at Mech Warrior or Zone of the Enders. On the other hand as long as my team doesn't mind watching lots of terrible deaths or mind the fact that I tend to be online at odd hours I'm a fan of multiplayer gaming. This and Gears of War are probably the two games I'm most looking forward to at this point.

I'm actually in a really similar boat concerning the state of Xbox Live. Dead or Alive 4 is probably the only game that I actually spent a good deal of time online. I'm not too hyped about Chromehounds, but I'm definitely looking forward to Gears of War.

Originally Posted by Colonel Skills

But Live is extremely cheap. It works out to something like 5 bucks a month. That's basically the price of one game a year. Just the ability to download arcade games is worth that much, let alone the multiplayer for games like Burnout and PGR3, and the downloadbale content for ES4. This'll sound like an ad, but Live is fucking awesome and I heartily recommend it.

If you didn't have to pay extra for arcade games then I'd agree. The current ones just don't interest me enough to warrant the extra cost. Hopefully Street Fighter 2 will change things, but if it costs over $10 US, there's no way I'm paying that much for it. Especially with the shitty Xbox 360 d-pad.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by Colonel Skills

Blazing Angels is a terrible game, and I agree with you on PDZ.

But Live is extremely cheap. It works out to something like 5 bucks a month. That's basically the price of one game a year. Just the ability to download arcade games is worth that much, let alone the multiplayer for games like Burnout and PGR3, and the downloadbale content for ES4. This'll sound like an ad, but Live is fucking awesome and I heartily recommend it.

Also, if you decide to get CHROMEHOUNDS be sure to let us know. So far I haven't been able to raise much....uhhh...enthusiasm for it. So I dunno if I'll be able to get a GFF clan or group together. The more the merrier.

The problem being I don't like the arcade games they've got available(plus you have to pay for them seperately from Live anyways) and the games you mentioned being great are from a genre I don't enjoy(racing). The limit of my racing enjoyment are F-Zero and Mariokart.

But like I said, as more games come out that make Live worth it, I'll probably get it. Chrome Hounds is a solid step in that direction and I'll bet Gears of War will be as well.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

I would be interested in teaming up with people to blow shit up.

The graphics and the gameplay details so far seems amazing. Hopefully the finished product deliver. I'll put it on top of my Gamefly list and hope for positive reviews.

I also hope it's more sim than arcade. Hopefully there is a strategy in the mech design, where you target your weapon damage and what. The game play should be thoughtful and deliberate not finding the nearest mech, turboing to him and spamming right trigger.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Hey, if you guys put together a clan let us know if you go with Tarakia, we're always looking for some new allies so I've always got my eyes peeled when I'm surfing for more Chromehounds enthusiasts.

If you don't end up doing a clan on here give us a look see.

Also, for the guys who are interested, the official site is up on sega.com and there's a pretty awesome fan site at www.chromehound.com

I'd never heard of the site here before so I guess your little discussion paid off. Neat place you have here, think I'll stick around :lol:

Most amazing jew boots

Originally Posted by Shin

Back on topic, does anyone know if this will be 360 only or if there'll be an Oldbox version too?

CHROMEHOUNDS is a 360 exclusive.

Originally Posted by Newbienumbers

you didn't have to pay extra for arcade games then I'd agree. The current ones just don't interest me enough to warrant the extra cost. Hopefully Street Fighter 2 will change things, but if it costs over $10 US, there's no way I'm paying that much for it. Especially with the shitty Xbox 360 d-pad.

Arcade games, for the most part, aren't bad deals. UNO and Marble Blast, for example, are well worth their price as they are riots to play with other people. Even if you only play one game online the cost seems fair, as I'd be willing to pay 5 bucks a month for the ability to play something like Burnout or CHROMEHOUNDS (considering how aweosme the online component looks).

Originally Posted by Cel

The problem being I don't like the arcade games they've got available(plus you have to pay for them seperately from Live anyways) and the games you mentioned being great are from a genre I don't enjoy(racing). The limit of my racing enjoyment are F-Zero and Mariokart.

Point taken. I suppose since the content (or at least, a majority of the awesome stuff) requires MSP, Live costs can rack up. Even then, I find the prices reasonable. But I can understand how others can find it to be a waste. I just feel that Live, for the most part, is the backbone of the 360. If it wasn't for it I wouldn't enjoy the thing NEARLY as much.

Also yeah, I'm a racing whore. ;_;

Originally Posted by Tony

I would be interested in teaming up with people to blow shit up.

So so far we have you and me, and a few potentials, depending on who else picks this sucker up. We have a number of rentals, at the very least.

Also I wholeheartedly agree with your sim comment. There needs to be a demo for this.

Originally Posted by Fever

Hey, if you guys put together a clan let us know if you go with Tarakia, we're always looking for some new allies so I've always got my eyes peeled when I'm surfing for more Chromehounds enthusiasts.

If you don't end up doing a clan on here give us a look see.

Sure, I'll let you know. However, I assume "us" is the website link you provided? I would much rather build a clan here (seeing as how attached to this community I am) but if there just isn't enough interest, I might give you a dingle.

How ya doing, buddy?

Art of War and Chromehound.com

Nah, the link is to a huge fansite full of people of varied mech gaming backgrounds. A lot of MA2 guys, who can be ridiculously annoying, but some old school MPBT frequent the boards along with some Steele Battalion guys. It's an interesting mix. I put it up not to draw away from the guys here because you all seem like a pretty dedicated group, but to give you a huge additional resource for game news. Also, if you make a clan for the site here it may behoove you to troll for members over there as well.

Our clan is Art of War. The link is in my signature actually. We're a group of hardcore fans who formed immediately after CH was announced last September. I can say unequivocably that we're the largest and most organized clan out there for the game. I'm always trying to find some new Tarakian allies to ensure that Tarakia does well at launch.

Fortunately it seems like a lot of people are going with Morskoj to start, I suspect because they have the heavier weapons. Tarakia will be balanced and Sal Kar will be focused on mobility. I guess the nice thing is that tactically-minded players seem to be choosing Tarakia because of its even-handed approach to Hound design.

Sim vs. Arcade

The game will be extremely sim-like in feel from all indications. Weapons will not lock on, ammunition will be limited, there will be no ability to repair in the field, location-specific damage will be in play, and variations in terrain will force players to design multiple Hound variants to stay competative.

There will be no crossaire in 3rd person perspective and every reviewer has remarked on the "sometimes plodding" pacing of movement within the game given the expansiveness of the maps (2 sq. miles in many instances). I think the third person view was instituted to let people appreciate their Hound designs and to attract some of the Mech Assault demographic because, although most of us would like to dismiss it as a blemish on serious mech games, it had a relatively large following, particularly among console junkies.

Perhaps the most exciting feature will be the online Neroimus war. I have a feeling that it will make or break this game. Built-in currency support, trading of parts, the need to purchase parts to access them, clan support for squads of up to 20 with full stat tracking, etc. will be amazing.

Finally, the customization in this game will be on an un-precedented scale. I don't have the link on me, but I think that xboxyde or someone just put up a 10 minute vid. of how the customization process will work.

I've watched it at least 30 times now...

That video ties in with my initial point by the way, it was uncovered by a member on chromehound.com and then disseminated.

FELIPE NO

Some interesting articles on Chromehounds from Teamxbox
http://previews.teamxbox.com/xbox-36...romehounds/p1/
http://previews.teamxbox.com/xbox-36...romehounds/p1/

It looks and sounds pretty exciting. Just hoping it doesnt disappoint.
Clan's are also limited to 20 players from what I've seen.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

Oh, my bad. I thought "us" referenced the site because I didn't see the link in your sig. My bad. I will have to check out your website at a later time to see what's going on.

I'd also like to play a bit of the single player game with the different sides to see who I would prefer to stick with in the online war, myself.

And yeah, the sim like feel is what I get from the videos as well. It looks like everything you mentioned will be a facotr, but a demo is still the best way to tell for ourselves what it's like. Unfortunate that one does not exist.

I wonder how the online war will work as far as it ending goes. An achivement you can unlock talks about winning the war. So if it's over I wonder if it starts all over again or what.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Yes, the war goes until one of the faction completely wipes out the other two. Players for factions who have been wiped out have two choices - they can join another one of the factions, or they can attempt to re-instate their faction via guerilla warfare.

How tight is that?

Speaking of tight, here's the customization video:

http://xboxyde.com/leech_2700_en.html

It's in Japanese, but I think that you'll agree, it's well worth it!

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Well it looks like the game has gone gold and the release date is set for July 7th in Europe and the 11th in the US (Thanks to our games coming out on fridays we get global releases a few days early now it seems) which is sadly likely to be toon early for me to afford a 360.

Anyone want to lend me a couple of hundred quid?

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

It's a shame that's still more than two weeks away. It's been hard enough getting by with this release drought that we've been going through this summer, but the closer it gets the happier I am.

Maybe Over G will be good enough to tide me over. Eh'.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Did you guys ever play MA 1? If so what was your clan name back then?

I was speaking idiomatically.

It looks to be like Mechassault but with Armored Core's customization possibilities. I was hoping it'd be faster like Armored Core, but I enjoyed Mechassault when I was first getting into Live, so I may have to pick it up. Count me in on the GFF clan.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

God knows I'm in dire need of some SEGA lovin, so Chromehounds will hopefully fix me there.

And I'm sure a demo will be released for this game; it's just that with the superb timing we've seen thus far on demo releases, it'll likely be out around 5 months after the game has been released

I wonder with the game having such a high simulation level, if SEGA would possibly consider releasing a joystick similar to the one that was released for Steel Battalion. We can all dream, can't we?

FELIPE NO

Am I the only one who didn't like that unwieldy mass of a controller for Steel Battalion? Sure, the idea is cool, but I never even touched half of the buttons. And the startup sequence got old really fast. Give me the simplicity of the Virtual On joysticks any day.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

You bring up a great point WolfDemon. Those Virtual On Twin Sticks are pretty much godly.

And now you've made me sad, as the likeliness of seeing any Virtual On on the 360 is next to none. Though it would make my life complete if SEGA were to announce a new Virtual On for the 360. Hell, they can just port over Virtual On: Oratorio Tangram and I'll never complain again in life.

Ok, well that may not be entirely true...but I'll be a real happy camper!

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Cobra Commander

Did you guys ever play MA 1? If so what was your clan name back then?

Unfortunately there has never really been a GFF Live clan of any kind, really. The people here who own Xboxes and Have Live tend to have a rather diverse taste in things, so there was never enough players to really get anything going in the past.

At least with CHROMEHOUNDS there seems to be enough interest to have at least a few people in a small clan. If we've only got like...3 or 4 people though we might have to integrate into a larger clan so we can get some bigger games going.

As for the Virtual On sticks versus the SB..umm...behemoth, they served completely different purposes. VO was hardly a hyper realistic sim, although I'll admit the sticks were pretty much the greatest control scheme ever for a game of that kind. I must admit though that I love SB to death, even though I suck major MAJOR balls at it. It's not even funny.

And a VO for the 360 would be the coolest shit EVER. Never having to fight the computer again because of Live would be LOVE, especially if they released another twin stick home unit. <3

How ya doing, buddy?

Ah so I guess I would not have played with ya then in MA 1 cause I was in a lot of clans (4 I think) and got to know a lot of good players. Thought maybe one of them are here.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

There might be, it's just that we didn't have our own clan and it definitely wasn't me, as I didn't get an original Xbox any time near it's launch.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Well, the Chromehounds demo is out:

Quote:

You can now download a demo of 'Chromehounds' from the Xbox Live Marketplace. This free demo is available in all Xbox Live regions EXCEPT the U.S. and Canada. Yes, you read that right...this demo is not available in the U.S. or Canada.

Though it may not be out on American or Canadian soil just yet, I'm sure you all know the work-around for this. I just got back from work, so I haven't had a chance to d/l the demo yet.

From what I've read though, the demo is fairly short and simple, but gives you a good feeling for the overall gameplay. I'm guessing it'll be raw Japanese though -sigh-

I was speaking idiomatically.

That is a crock of motherfucking shit.

I also can't get a signup for the other regions right now because LIVE SIGNUPS ARE CLOSED. Fucking load of shit right there.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Yeah, I'm having the same problem trying to download Halo 3 (Mongolia region only).

Most amazing jew boots

Hmm, that sounds nice. I'm gonna download it now. Perhaps it's less shiny in motion. And I really need a mech kick right now.

Edit: So, I've played both missions in the demo, and it's good fun. Both missions are extremely short, which is a pity. The Sniper mech is fun, though I'd have loved faster reloading.
The graphics aren't as shiny as I feared. The fit in with the rest of the world, which has a WWII feel to it.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

Yaaaaaaaaaaargg.

Mr Kilroy, can you describe the experience and compare it to other mech games, console or PC, so those of us unfortunate enough to not be able to download it at the moment? And is it at least partially translated into English or other non-Japanese langauges?

Jam it back in, in the dark.

My Chromehounds Demo Mini Review:

The demo is all english text and dialogue.

Out of all the mech games I've played, Chromehounds is the most similiar to MechWarrior. The movements of the Sniper and Front line hounds are pretty slow. It takes time to get where you are going but there is a real distinction between how each hound handles. The Sniper hound does a massive amount of long range damage but has a really long reload time on weapons. The weapons loadout is a large long range rifle, a medium range rifle and a low caliber machine gun. I imagime some scout mech with fast firing weapons at close range would completely own the sniper hound. The Front line hound is equipped with a short range rockets, short range shotgun and a medium ranged rifle. The front line hound walks up to foot soldiers, tanks, buildings and just razes them with sheer firepower. Artillery and sniping hounds seem to be the key in taking these bad boys down. So far, none of the weapons have lockon. It's all aiming/deflection shooting and takes a fair amount of skill to hit things that are not point blank. The game is not about turboing to the nearest hound and spamming right trigger. Positioning is pretty key and you have to pay attention to your weapon cooldown times. I've found myself constantly switching among the three weapons to maximize my firing time.

The quality of the single player missions are soso. Just enough voice acting and story to give you a reason to blow shit up. The mission design also does not seem very inspired - just a means of teaching you how to play each hound. Online play is what the singleplayer is trying to teach.

Where this game will be at is the hound design. You couldn't do any custom designs but scrolling through the 'borrowed' hound there are TONS of hardpoints. Each part has roughly 20 attributes which can let you build some interesting designs. It's not just picking a type of weapon but also factoring in the cooldown time and ammo capacities. It favors a pretty balanced design as I can imagine people will want to build an all shotgun mech or an all rifle mech that would just get their shit ruined.

Graphics: So-So. Not prominently next gen from what I've seen. Still easy on the eyes and the low poly count per model will probably allow for more objects overall on screen at once.

Sound: No comment yet. Doesn't pop out at you nor does it distract you. Seems to do the job, voice acting again doesn't annoy you but doesnt inspire you.

Gameplay: Pretty fun. It's nice to tear stuff up in a mech and requires some skill in the process. Most of my gameplay impressions are up on top.

Intangibles: Nice feel overall. This is a game I would like to definently play with an organized group of people. Would be fun to work out tactics, who builds what kind of hound, etc.

Going to remove Chomehounds from my gamefly queue and adding it to my pre-order list.

There's nowhere I can't reach.