Uno Announcement Overshadows New XBLA Games
So sure, we all spotted the announcement of Xbox Live Casual Wednesdays, and that's great news for rabid XBLA fans such as ourselves at the good ship GSW.
For those not in the know, and I'm adding info on price here, since that wasn't in the initial announcement: "The complete schedule [for XBLA releases] is announced as follows: July 12 – Frogger ($5/400 points); July 19 – Cloning Clyde ($10/800 points); - July 26 – Galaga ($5/400 points); August 2 – Street Fighter II Hyper Fighting ($10/800 points); August 9 – Pac-Man ($5/400 points)." Hopefully it'll go beyond August 9, too.
But XBLArcade.com has spotted the real story here, something Microsoft were clearly trying to hide from an adoring public (joke!): "It seems that along with Frogger being set loose, MS quietly released the long awaited patch to fix the match-making issues they’ve been having with Uno." Yay, this is great news - we had a lot of trouble finding XBL partners for the game and thought it was just us - evidently not.
"When asked about the update on various forums this morning, Richard Thames Rowan, UNO Program Manager at Carbonated Games, had the following to say: 'Yes, this update fixed the multiplayer matchmaking (both Quick Match and Ranked Match), along with another of other bugs, including better theme deck support (which is invisible until new theme decks are released).'"
Comments
I think it's really sad that UNO, everyone's favorite braindead, luck-dependent family card game has become such an X-box Live Arcade success story.
Is there a button you have to press to say "UNO," or does the voice communication channel enable that little piece of obnoxious branding to survive intact?
Posted by: John H. | July 13, 2006 2:03 PM
It depends on the rules you're using, but you can have 'Call UNO' turned on by pressing a button on the controller when you achieve UNO or you can have automatic UNO. The former is the default option. Also, if someone fails to call UNO within a certain time, other players have an opportunity to challenge the UNO by also pressing a button.
The game is quite simple, but addictive. You can change all the rules for custom games (which is a lot of fun-- my favorite progressive draw), you can play different games, or use different decks.
Posted by: JustMe | July 13, 2006 4:50 PM
The rule feature *could* be interesting, but in my mind mostly it'd depend mostly on the degree luck could be removed from the game, which would make it into a game essentially unlike Uno.
Posted by: John H. | July 13, 2006 7:28 PM