Xbox Live Indie Games the New Home For Japanese and Otaku Gamers?

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Normally when browsing through Xbox Live's Marketplace, I would steer clear of the Indie Games section but two games happened to catch my eye this time. Crescendo Symphony and XNA ShortNovel Series Vol. 01 are two of the newest games to hit the independent developer section and look like the first Japanese Xbox Live Indie games as well. Could this be a trend of more to come?

Both games can be found on the first page in the Indie sections, each with its own bubbly anime girl as their covers. Crescendo Symphony was the first game out of the two I decided to try out. Starting the game, we're treated with a cute looking anime girl at the start screen and then are thrust into a nicely draw, novel-esque introduction. The introduction was completely in Japanese though, so it's hard to tell why we're controlling some anime girl blasting weird, floating enemies in a scrolling corridor.

Screenshot of Crescendo Symphony

As for the gameplay, it plays out like any typical shoot em' up game where you float around the screen and blast enemies on the other side with your scattered projectiles. Enemy patterns can get repetitive and there are times where you have enemies spawns that corner you with no way to escape. After about four tries, I still wasn't able to beat the demo's first level but the gameplay was mildly enjoyable. If your a fan of shoot em' up games and anime influenced designs, you might find some enjoyment out of it. It's only 240 points, which seems about right.

Screenshot of XNA ShortNovel Series Vol. 01

The next game I downloaded was XNA ShortNovel Series Vol. 01. And it's exactly what it sounds like, an anime novel "game" where you read text coming from an anime girl and watch her mood change as she babbles on. There's not much to say about this one since the text was completely in Japanese, leaving the player with no clue why she's pissed off. Going by the demo, it doesn't look like there are any options to answer with different lines either.

Translating the summary for the game, "It is short the compilation novel series 1st feature. It is the work which draws the romantic love pattern which the chairman and the defectiveness weave", it looks like this might be the first of more angry, moody anime girl novel "games" to come. Maybe it'll all come together when translated into English.

All in all, neither were particularly impressive (and how many Indie games are really?) but may very well be the starting trend for more Xbox Live Indie games to come from Japanese XNA developers. Maybe we'll see a port of Sugeno's moe-tastic, fighting game Vanguard Princess?

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