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Bixout XP Review
Lilwolf:
Well, I've been noticing more and more shareware type games coming out that are great for an arcade cabinet. I found one today, and thought I would write a review.
Brixout XP
What do you get with the Demo?
You get one world (of 5) and you can play 2 levels.
A great game of Arkanoid is always a good thing. The first time I played a game like that was the original little breakout for the AppleII (that you had to type in yourself). Then the arcade came out and did pretty well... Then clone after clone. Someone might let me know which was the first incornation, but I first played it on the Apple II.
Well, what about this version?
I was excited to see a great 3d version of arkanoid come out. So I quickly downloaded it.
The installation was painless. It also is completely controllable from a mouse and one button, so you can add it to an arcade machine with no troubles.
Next, I ran it. It was very very pretty. You can see the balls rolling, and it seems to roll in the proper direction. The rest of the screen looks great.
So I start off playing and quickly quit out and degraded the resolution and brought it down to 16bit. Why? It was running slow... then I found out it always seems to run slow. It didn't get faster as you are playing.... what? At least for the demo, when your playing the ball rolls at the same speed.... this sucked. I ended up hoping to get the ball speedup powerup (that I'm assuming was suppost to be a negative powerup). I'm hoping it's a demo only bug, but it was enought that I wouldn't consider buying the full version. I was eating and playing without any troubles.
Ok, lets assume that this is a bug that is fixed in the full version... how about the rest?
The powerups are different then Arkanoid. You can have multiples, but they only last for a little bit. This was fun. You could get an extended size, magnitized, with rocket paddle all at the same time. You can also change the balls to different types. The best ones are the weird ones. Aliens will come down and blow up a some blocks... Or lightning... Or if you get a 'Z' powerup, it will flip the screen (hard to control).
All in all... if they speed the gameplay up, I think it will be a great game, but until that happens... I would stick with mame and arkanoid.
http://www.sunnygames.com/
sunnygames:
Hi guys,
Thanks for the review I am very appreciate it.
Let me introduce myself. My name is Sergei Eliseev. I am president of Sunny Games LLC and creator of Brixout XP.
Well, I would like to make clear questions about gameplay and slow motion:
1) The game uses OpenGL for rendering and your video card should be powerful enough with the latest drivers as well. I suggest at least video-card with nVidia chip (GeForce256 and up) or ATI chip (Radeon and up). The rest video-cards very often have some *issues* with OpenGL drivers (like Matrox, Savage, etc) but as far as I know the game works fine even with them and with old cards like RivaTNT;
2) If you want to have special version of the game for arcade cabinet or something else, just let me know. It is very easy to adjust the game (change speed, add new features, etc.) Everything possible. Moreover it can be done for free :)
Brixout XP is our first game (actually it was developed only by myself, I wrote the code, made graphics, textures, sounds, etc. except the music) and I think it is not bad for first attempt ;)
Anyway thanks for review and I would be very grateful for comments or suggestions. Feel free to get in touch to me at feedback@sunnygames.com
P.S. Currently I am working on the remake of the *very* famous arcade. It will be totally in 3D with lot of special effects, cute graphics, cool music and so on. But sh-sh-sh! it is a secret ;)
Best regards,
Sergei Eliseev
President of Sunny Games LLC & Creator of Brixout XP
lightspeed:
I'd like to see more reviews like this - I posted a topic to the "Everything Else" forum (Other (non-MAME games) on your cabinet ) - I'm really interested in which native PC Games can be easily played on standard arcade controls.
Thanks for the info.
sunnygames:
Hello,
We just released a new version of Brixout XP and totally changed gameplay. We would be glad to hear your comments or ideas. BTW Person who contribute the most valuable comments, suggestions, ideas, etc. will get the full version of the game for free :)
Here is a clip from PR:
"Brixout XP ver. 1.5 - 101% of Pure 3D Action!
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Sunny Games has released Brixout XP ver. 1.5 - a fast-action fully
three-dimensional twist on classic ball, paddle and bricks games such
as Arkanoid and Breakout. In the new version gameplay was drastically
changed and improved. Now guns are bigger, rockets and balls are
faster, every level has more bonuses and finally added new difficulty
mode "Insane" for hardcore gamers!
In addition Brixout XP features outstanding 32-bit graphics, advanced
3D engine, original soundtrack (an individual theme for each level)
and professional sound effects. Add here over 80 unique levels, 4
different worlds, 30+ varieties of bricks, 20+ power-ups and 4 levels
of difficulty and you'll get the game that can keep you busy for
months. You can also download additional level packs from the Sunny
Games Web site for free or create your own ones.
A Demo version is available to the public at
http://www.sunnygames.com. Program registration is only US$19.95 and
may be handled on-line from the company's web site.
Game Site: http://www.sunnygames.com/brixout.html
Direct download link: http://mirror1.sunnygames.com/download/BrixoutXP_Demo_v15.exe
Screenshots:
http://www.sunnygames.com/images/brktxp/1-2.jpg
http://www.sunnygames.com/images/brktxp/2-2.jpg
http://www.sunnygames.com/images/brktxp/3-2.jpg
Requirements:
Windows
Lilwolf:
Well, I felt like I should do a update.
I downloaded the new demo and installed it. WHAT A DIFFERENCE!
I haven't found anyt new items or graphics, but the gameplay is MUCH MUCH better! The ball rolls at a decent speed now, and seems to get a little faster as the game goes on.
This has 2 effects.
1) Makes it playable and fun. I've played it to the end where before I could have, but couldn't be bothered.
2) (and the big one) the powerups aren't on the same speed as the ball now. Before I missed a ton of powerups because it was the ball or the powerups.
Now the extra powerups really push one feature that is different from other 'pong' games. You can have multiple powerups. Now you can actually see the fun in them. Get the 4x powerup, the cling paddle and the extended size! But they only last a specific amount of time. If you get the right combination, you will have easy sailing to the next level.
Some things I would like to see (and might be in the full version) is a screen builder and a way to copy/send those screens to your friends. And maybe a 2 player version (with a paddle on both sides and 2 balls) where if you drop one, you loose a point or something. This would add a ton of new powerups that would be fun (the ability to bounce bad powerups to the opponent, drop their specials, maybe even hit the ball harder at them, but increases the speed for 2 hits, (so expect it fast coming back).
With such great customer support (of finding this website and replying to the post after I mentioned putting it on a home cabinet, but I didn't give any urls or website names, so he searched it out himself). I would expect that any good ideas (within reason of course) and bug fixes should always be there.
So I officially change my opinion to a big download this demo! See it for yourself!
Great patch!
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