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With yesterday’s announcement, Microsoft is set to revolutionize the online gaming world with their XNA Creators Club.  The service will allow Xbox Live members to create, upload, download, play and rate their own games over the existing Xbox Live system.  Unfortunately, it seems that we’ll need to pay a fee to play any more than trial versions of the game (funny how that wasn’t mentioned in the address.)  Anyway, the announcement was followed quickly by an opening salvo of seven user-created titles available for immediate download.  I got a chance to try each of them out, and, well, it’s a bit of a mixed bag.  None of the offerings seem quite finished, but there’s definitely some promising mechanics at work in a few of them.  Here’s a look at each of them:


Culture

One of the more visually pleasing titles available, Culture challenges gamers to encircle growing weeds with different colored flowers on a small, rotating planetoid.  It’s tougher than it sounds, with flower colors changing on the fly and weeds that spread in unexpected directions, and more fun, as well.  It can be frustrating, but the graphical goodness is well worth the effort.

Jellycars

Now this is what the Creators Club is all about.  Jellycars is one of the most interesting driving games ever conceived.  Your car and most of the environment is composed of a strange, gelatinous substance that bounces and squishes when pressure is applied to it.  This makes for some of the wildest, most entertaining driving mechanics on any console ever.  Add in a selection of quirky visual styles and what may be the strangest and most fitting sound effects of all time, and you’ve got the makings of a winner.

Little Gamers

Little Gamers is basically a Flash game you play with a 360 controller.  It’s not a bad Flash game, but it’s not a great one either.  Simple controls and a charmingly amateurish art style aren’t enough to make this one worth more than a few minutes of mindless gameplay.  The comic strip is great.  The game, not so much.

ProximityHD

Tile-based board game ProximityHD is an example of a solid concept ruined by shoddy design.  Now, I know this is just a pre-release trial edition, but seriously, light grey tiles over a white and light blue checkerboard background?  That’s just plain dumb.  Other than that, though, it’s a genuinely fun multiplayer strategy game with a lot of potential.

Rocketball

I’m a huge fan of games like Super Dodgeball for the NES, so Rocketball, a high-speed dodgeball derivative, should have me jumping out of my seat in excitement.  Sadly, this is not the case.  Character control is severely limited, and the character models are small, making the action very hard to follow.  This one needs a lot of work before it gets a full release.

The Dishwasher

With obvious influence from Ninja Gaiden, Afro Samurai and Devil May Cry, The Dishwasher is probably the most stylistic game on this list.  It also happens to be a fun and challenging hack and slash adventure with tons of blood and cyborg eviscerations.  Definitely on to watch, if only for the superb art design.

 

Trilinea

Now this one I just don't get.   Maybe it's me, but this domino-esque board game is confusing and seemingly overdone.  Magic spells in dominoes.  Maybe for some of you out there, this is appealing, but I gotta put this one at the bottom of this list.

 

 

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