This was an awesome interview, really. It started off a bit rocky with some technical issues but those were edited out (I hope). Jake Kazdal, awesome guy, founder of Haunted Temple Studios and lead designer and art director on Skulls of the Shogun, was my special guest on this podcast and he was super excited. I love indie XBLA devs because they love their games so much. The first five minutes or so, questions or not, Jake was goin' on about how everyone has loved the game so far and how it's surprised people and I couldn't help but smile and imagine how awesome that must be.
Skulls of the Shogun definitely speaks to me, Band of Bugs was a nice start at the whole XBLA turn based strategy but it really wasn't very enjoyable, even though the mechanics were solid. Then there was Vandall Hearts, I believe, and that game was awful. Dry and bland and full of crappy everything regarding narrative/character, which, if not at least tried at, should be completely removed from one's game. No point in making a crappy story. There's such a thing as a shallow story that still has its place, but for instance a game like Bomberman would have a very difficult time adding in relevant story that doesn't suck, so in that case it's foregone. Makes sense to me.
Anyways. The point is that it seems to have some pretty solid mechanics. At first I was worried it was just a sort of throw your units at the enemy affair, but the "spirit wall" mechanic, which allows linked units to block incoming aerial attacks and generally be a moving wall, adds a lot of depth. Beyond that, the whole collision system is awesome, especially the caster he mentioned, the Crow, which can push and pull enemies and allies. That has me very excited.
I'm looking forward to this one early 2012, shouldn't be too tough to convince my XBL buddies to pick it up either.
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