For a limited time, Microsoft is slashing prices on many of their games over on the Xbox LIVE Marketplace. So if you have been holding off on downloading some of the extra content or accessories for your games, now is your chance to get them cheaper than dirt. Well, almost cheaper than dirt.

• Mass Effect: Bring Down the Sky
• Lost Odyssey – Triple Bonus Pack
• Forza Motorsport 2 – Both Track Packs and Car Packs
• Oblivion: Shivering Isles
• Guitar Hero 3 – Def Leppard, Foo Fighters, and Classic Rock Track Packs
• Beautiful Katamari – Accessory Sets and stages

The Major has the list and details how much the original cost was, what the new cost is, and how much of a saving you can expect. You need to get to downloading though because this tender offer from Microsoft will only last until the end of October – so don’t procrastinate.

via: Major Nelson

According to CVG, fans of Mistwalker’s Lost Odyssey will be able to download some more content this weekend. The ‘Seeker of the Deep’ Dungeon Pack, which is already available in Japan will be out on Xbox Live May 23rd for 400 Microsoft points. The most recent DLC for the game came out on April 25th.No word on whether this is the same pack that launched in Japan, but we assume that its, and according to CVG:

“You can expect a single rare item and a new boss encounter at the end. To get to the dungeon, says Microsoft: ‘download the DLC pack. Then, once the Nautilus can fly, fly to the centre of the gulf on the right of the inland sea on the north of the Tower of Mirrors (near Saman, the City of Merchants), and dive into the water. When the game displays either “Examine” or “Enter” at the bottom right corner of the screen, press the A button, and delve into the ‘Seeker of the Deep!’”

I looked at the official Xbox 360 site, and on Major Nelson and did not see this listed, so until we get the official word… assume that this is just for Europe. Lucky gougers.

Via: CVG

Square Enix is held up with high regard in the gaming community, most notably for its continuing work in RPGs such as the Final Fantasy series and Lost Odyssey — though recent opinions of these franchises have been mixed. But the company has still been facing stiff competition from other game makers; so much so, that they’re now looking at joining efforts with other publishers by either buying stakes in other businesses or creating new alliances. According to president, Yoichi Wada, it sounds like this could mean the company will be making some big changes to their usual methods:

“Economies of scale and breadth of scope are getting important. It may be a business alliance or it may be us taking a stake in others, but we need to go beyond traditional Square Enix…We face competition not only from Japanese videogame companies but from game companies worldwide. We also see some new players from outside the videogame industry coming in.”

No official agreements have been announced yet, but one of Squeenix’s main goals is to increase overseas sales from 50% of its total game sales to 80% over the next three years. No word on how they intend to do that, but hopefully we’ll begin to see some significant changes soon. Or at the very least a Kingdom Hearts 3 (please?).

Via Reuters

We’re over four months into the year, but Shane Kim still believes that 2008 will be another landmark year for Xbox 360. Speaking with GI.biz at yesterday’s Microsoft event, the head of Microsoft Game Studios pointed to the exclusives we’ll be seeing this year as proof of his claim.

“What we’re really trying to communicate is that this is going to be another landmark year for Xbox 360,” Kim said.

“Mainly because we are really focused on the strategy of tremendous exclusive content. Titles like Gears of War 2, Fable 2, Banjo, et cetera. as well as the continuing leadership we have in the online space with Xbox Live.”

He claimed the battle between Xbox 360 and PS3 in Europe was a “horse race no matter what,” but also said, “I understand that Sony has declared leadership already. We’ll let the data speak for itself.”

Kim admits that Europe has always been a dominant market for Sony, and claims that with that in mind, any progress Microsoft has made is great progress. Japan, however, has few bright spots for the 360.

“Look, we’ve acknowledged for a long time that we probably wouldn’t win in Japan and that it was going to continue to be a tough market for us.

“We took some different steps in this generation – our partnership with Sakaguchi-san produced two very well-received and critically reviewed titles in Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey. Unfortunately, it remains a difficult market for us.”

With that in mind, Microsoft isn’t about to give up on that market. Kim knows it’s critical and that there’s nowhere to go but up.

“I’m not going to go out and say our hope is to win in Japan because that’s not realistic. Do I think we have room for progress and improvement? I absolutely do.

“So, no, the battle is not over.”

The Lost Odyssey Triple Bonus Pack is now available on XBL according to the Major. This package includes three exclusive items: “Memory Lamp,” which allows you to watch the past event scenes all over again, “Shattered Bond,” an antique that will bring back the memory of a forgotten dream, and a special ring called Killer Machine.”

Content: Triple Bonus Pack
Price: 200 Microsoft Points
Availability: All regions

For more information,click here, and visit our previous posts more Lost Odyssey goodness

New Downloadable Content for Lost Odyssey is coming to Xbox Live Marketplace April 25. There are three new items included in the DLC. “The Shattered Bond ” unlocks a new dream, the “Killer Machine” ring is forged to specialize in fighting against magic-powered weapons and a “Memory Lamp” for the upgraded Nautilus will allow you to view dreams.

Personally the dream sequences were something I really liked about this game. I found myself scouring levels to unlock them all.

The package is only 200 MS points so it’s not a bad deal. Check out the fine print at Xbox.com.

Ray Nakazato, president of the AQI-owned feelplus recently talked with Gamasutra on developing Lost Odyssey and the creation and dissolution of the game’s development team. He also speaks with an insider advantage about the Xbox 360 and Japan.

Nakazato goes into detail about the difficulties involved in using the Unreal 3 Engine for Lost Odyssey. Meshing the engine with developers with a mindset geared towards developing Japanese RPGs was difficult, as was trying to keep up with changes to the engine with few English-speaking engineers. He also spoke of the uncertainty over the use of the Sound Novel concept for the game’s flashbacks.

In Japan, there is a genre called the Sound Novel. It’s like a novel; it’s all text messages. And we were, how do I say — we weren’t sure if it would be accepted well, but it actually was accepted very well, because that writing was very beautiful, and it translated well to other languages.

Feelplus is currently working on Blue Dragon Plus with Final Fantasy and Lost Odyssey creator Hironobu Sakaguchi. According to Nakazato, the company has several smaller projects in the works and hopes to have a more robust offering to announce next year.

via Gamasutra

Looks like Japanese Lost Odyssey fans are going to have even more incentive to revisit the game  this Thursday. That’s when a new batch of DLC is slated to be released; the third such content for Japan’s Xbox Live Marketplace. The download will bring a brand new dungeon, called the Seeker of the Abyss, which will contain a rare item and a new boss encounter. Apparently the challenge is geared towards those who have already completed the game, since it requires you to be on the fourth disc and able to swim around the Experimental Staff to discover it. The new dungeon will be available for 400 MS points, though it’s not yet clear if the DLC will work with a North American build of the game like previous content packages. Hopefully though, they’ll start the extra content over to the other hemisphere’s XBL Marketplace soon.

Via Siliconera

There’s a great article up on Hooked Gamer on RPG Inflation. The author isn’t referring to the price of games but to the tendency of RPG to level characters up ever more quickly. It’s hard to swallow a character, even a prodigy with a destiny, rising from rudimentary skills to god like powers in a few day’s time.

The are RPGs that manage to pull this off, such as The Witcher and Lost Odyssey, where the main character has suffered a trauma and is basically relearning or remembering skills he once possessed. In other games, the character leveling doesn’t just break suspension of disbelief, it shatters it completely.

The author suggests that characters need to be more human so that players can relate more to them and imagine themselves as their fantasy avatar.

Be thankful that in Real Life, henchmen can be counted on to look out for their own self-interests when the chips are down, otherwise we would most definitely need that Champion of the Empire hero to sally forth on our behalf — and in Real Life, such heroes do NOT exist.

And that, I guess is my ultimate point: at least try to make even fantasy games to have a passing relationship to Reality. Yeah, we all groove on the sense of accomplishment as our characters rack up the experience points. But when we’re dealing with these massively inflated numbers, the chasm between Me and Fantastic Me goes from the Grand Canyon to that void between galaxies. That is, I identify much, much more with a character that could be _me_ if I shed a few pounds, improved my reaction time somewhat, developed a comprehensive database of general knowledge, etc. Make THAT character succeed, and I go “YEAH!” But when my character is just short of godhood and he succeeds, I go, “Ho hum. Wonder what game I’ll play next.”

This is one gamer’s opinion. I’m sure not all of us agree on this. I find more satisfaction from a game when I get more than just tallies of total kills. I like characters that are fallible and have something to fight for other than destiny. However, I also play to take a well deserved break from reality so don’t make them too much like a day at the office.

via Hooked Gamers

For the fourth month in a row, Call of Duty 4 on Xbox 360 has reigned supreme atop the sales charts once again. A mere thousand units sold separated it from the number two game, Devil May Cry 4 (also on 360). Wii Play has been a mainstay since it was released, it would seem, and it comes in at number three. The Wii and PS2 versions of Guitar Hero III also managed to stay in the top ten, leading Rock Band on 360 which came in at number ten.

Despite another month of strong sales for the PlayStation 3 (superior to the 360 for the second month in a row) only a single game, Devil May Cry 4, was in the top ten. Are people still not buying Ratchet and Uncharted, or are people simply buying the PS3 to use as a Blu-ray player?

Seeing lost Odyssey make the list was a pleasant surprise, and I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised by Turok making the list. I didn’t find it to be anything particularly special (and Yahtzee seemed to agree) but whether it was nostalgia or the promise of being able to shoot dinosaurs, it sold just under 200,000 copies.

So, will Call of Duty 4 finally be unseated in March? We’ll find out in under a month, but something tells me that Rainbow Six Vegas 2 will certainly play a role in the matter.

February 2008 Software Sales

1. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Xbox 360) — 296,200
2. Devil May Cry 4 (Xbox 360) — 295,200
3. Wii Play (Wii) — 289,700
4. Devil May Cry 4 (PlayStation 3) — 233,500
5. Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock (Wii) — 222,900
6. Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games (Nintendo DS) — 205,600
7. Lost Odyssey (Xbox 360) — 203,600
8. Turok (Xbox 360) — 197,700
9. Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock (PlayStation 2) — 183,800
10. Rock Band (Xbox 360) — 161,800