Tag Archives: Dan Boutros

iPhone app review site Appcraver is apparently asking developers for cash in return for “expedited” game reviews.

Trixel developer Dan Boutros contacted the site to get his now-released iPhone puzzler reviewed. He got this in response:

Thanks for sending over the information about your new app. Please note that due to the number of inquiries and review requests we receive daily, it may take a while to get to your app.

We have several other additional options for you to make sure your app gets seen by AppCraver readers.

We can provide an expedited review for a $50 fee. This will get your app reviewed by our staff within 6 business days. However, just because your app is reviewed doesn’t guarantee that the app will be published.

While paying the expedite fee cannot guarantee you a positive review, we will guarantee that if our reviewers don’t approve your app we will refund your fee and not proceed with the article. After all — our readers are not interested in negative reviews — they are looking for us to highlight the best and most interesting apps out there.

Read the full thing here.

Team17′s Martyn Brown’s told TechRadar today that developers should “probably boycott” AppCraver because its editorial policy on game reviews was “all shades of wrong.”

Adept iPhone puzzler Trixel’s released on the App Store – hit this to buy it.

The 100-level puzzler costs £1.79 if you’re in the UK. That isn’t very much money. Dan Boutros, him what did your Street Fighter IV review, was one of the developers on it, so help him out. He’s really poor and needs new shoes.

Developing games for the App Store means less outlay and less set-up risk than making titles for PSN, XBLM or WiiWare, indie developer – and “leet hardcore” Street Fighter IV player – Dan Boutros has told VG247.

“The cost of entry to a developer is way lower, you can control your own destiny by way of managing your own pricing and marketing, and you get paid monthly instead of quarterly, which does wonders for your ability to survive as a ‘free’ man,” said Boutros, who’s just finished working on Adept-Games iPhone puzzler Trixel.

“You can buy a top of the range Mac, download the SDK and pay for the dev license and any other dev-requiring software license for less than any of the big three’s dev kits. You may even be able to afford two or three of these setups depending on who we’re comparing things with.

“The other major distribution platforms (can’t speak for Steam) also only pay you quarterly, whereas you’re paid monthly by Apple.”

Boutros added that barriers to creating indie games on the console formats weren’t just financial. Developers are also unable to control when games are released on services such as Xbox Live.

“You’re also at the whims of the console format holders for when your game comes out, who sees it and when they see it,” he said.

“I worked on an XBL game for another team a few years back and even though our game was done in December 06, we didn’t release till summer of ’07, which really hurt the guys who had the bulk of their payment in the game’s back-end.

“This also really hurt our PR and marketing side as we didn’t know when the game was coming out and therefore couldn’t plan for it. Because the game was just a port, we were set loose at a time when the market climate looked at straight ports unfavourably, whereas six months prior, our selling odds would’ve been better. So yeah, definitely not a fan of handing over my fate in that way.”

Don’t expect an instant win, though, Boutros said. With a low entry point comes the hordes.

“Because of [iPhone's] attractiveness, the competition is large and fierce, so you have to work harder to make something worthwhile and you have to work harder to pimp it.”

Trixel went into submission on April 20 and will cost you $3. See some screens after the break.

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The last 11,059 words of Dan Boutros’s Street Fighter IV review lie can be found after the break, including his score.

Sorry. We planned doing this in three parts two weeks ago, but only did one. We failed because of GDC. We watched the finger. Not the moon.

Dan was the first ever US SFIV champion. He is also a general life-hero.

Hit the link to see why. There’s a score at the bottom.

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Dan Boutros, the man first crowned as American’s first Street Fighter IV champion at GDC last year, likes Street Fighter. A lot. So much so, in fact, that he wrote us a 30-page review of the latest in the legendary fight series in return for a copy of the game from Capcom and a Mad Catz Fight Stick.

Which Mad Catz wouldn’t give him.

But he did it anyway. What follows, as Dan puts it, is, “Possibly the most ridiculously in-depth review of Street Fighter IV you will read.”

We’re not arguing. It’s over 12,000 words long. Get the first part after the link. We’ll do it in three bits, ending Friday.

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Dan Boutros won the first ever North American Street Fighter IV championship at GDC last month. Here, Dan gives VG247 his exclusive thoughts on the game and its characters. Must read.

Here’s my thoughts on SF4 based on several hours play across two GDC days.

Presently, I love it. If you can’t be arsed reading all the details I’m about to lay before you, know that it’s very close in spirit to the ORIGINAL version of Street Fighter 2. Not Hyper, Turbo, Champion, Super or Super Turbo. The ORIGINAL. The pace is slower, the move-sets are simplified and in turn, the action seems more focused towards simpler play and classic rock-paper-scissors strategy. It’s still being balanced but right now it plays and looks like a dream.

First, I’ll detail the systems.

1 – The Revenge Meter

It’s a circular bar next to the main energy bar. It fills as you get twatted. It has two parts to it. When one or both are filled, you can unleash a super move exclusive to that bar. For example, Dhalsim has a very slow moving Super Fireball (like Oro’s super in Street Fighter 3) and Ken has a ‘kick the shit out of you’ super combo on the end of a Super Dragon Punch. But they can only activate those supers with THIS bar. I’m guessing it’s because these supers are very powerful, easy to combo and easy to perform and are thus perfect comeback maneuvers. To perform them, you simply do your character’s super move motion and press two buttons instead of one.

2 – Throws

As in Street Fighter 3, you press two (light attack) buttons together to perform a throw. Not like the cheap throwing in other Street Fighters.

3 – Focus Attacks

The full potential of these attacks are not entirely revealed yet. Every character has one. You press both medium attacks to perform the move. However, hold them down for a short while and you can absorb an attack before you unleash your move. For some characters, this works as a great anti-air. Otherwise, you can hold the buttons down to their chargeable limit and the character will unleash an unblockable attack that knocks off a tasty amount of energy. I can’t remember how much exactly (it was a few weeks back) but it was substantial. Again, the unblockable attack can also absorb one hit. Supposedly you can cancel out of this move by inputting the command to dash. You can also be thrown out of the move.

4 – Ultra Combo

A shitty name for what is a combination of having your super move bar and your revenge meter completely filled up and unleashing a super with two buttons instead of one. A very powerful move that’s also impressive to behold.

5 – Camera angles

A lot of the more dramatic moves have custom camera cuts that make the process a lot more watchable and exciting for onlookers as well as players. When I first read up about this, I thought it would be annoying, but it doesn’t obstruct play in the slightest. It’s been handled beautifully.

And now, the other shit that’s not so new.

1 – Super Moves

You have one super bar. It can hold one super. For now, characters only have one super move attack each.

2 – EX Moves

These are special moves that have a ‘super’ quality about them. For example, Ryu’s EX fireball hits you three times, Blanka’s EX cannonball goes through fireballs and Zangief’s EX banishing flat (that glowing hand thing) stops dragon punches launching. You simply perform a special move with two buttons, though it does drain resource from your super move bar.

3 – Taunts

Don’t seem to do shit for now. Taunts have always had very random and bizarre effects in Street Fighter games – Chun Li would hit you with hers in Street Fighter Alpha, Q would power himself up in Street Fighter 3, Dan would just roll and pose in Street Fighter Alpha, etc. Press two hard attacks together.

And now, the characters.

1 – Ryu

Plays like Ryu from Street Fighter 3.

2 – Ken

Plays like Ken from Street Fighter 3.

3 – Chun Li

Plays like the festering shit of her SF3, Alpha and SF2 Turbo mothers. She has a worthless fireball that fades out after a few seconds traveling, her spinning bird kick (still a crap move after all these years) and her lightning kick (the one where you press the button very quick). Her non-special moves are rubbish too. Her super move however is retardedly unstoppable. I felt violated every time it got me.

4 – Zangief

Plays like Street Fighter Alpha series Zangief. A tough bastard. Has better combo potential now too.

5 – Blanka

Super Turbo meets Alpha series Blanka. VERY powerful. They need to tone him way down. His electric storm is obscene and catches almost every move. A Dhalsim player burned me while I was in the move, he got shocked, I got burned, and I was still in the move!

6 – Dhalsim

Alpha series Dhalsim. Awesome. Probably my new favourite character. His teleport is almost instant now. A lot of fun to play with. His Revenge move is a lot of fun too. Great for combo potential.

7 – Guile

Rubbish. The delay on his flash kick and the delay after his sonic boom makes him worthless. I guess they tried to tune him down as he’s always been really powerful and probably a nightmare for them to balance.

8 – E Honda

Pretty boring to play I thought. Seems like Alpha series Honda. His special throw is now done with a full circle. His new super’s pretty cool though.

9 – Crimson Viper

Very weird. She’s clearly influenced by the super-bizarre SNK characters. If you play their games, she’s a mix of K’ and Benimaru from King of Fighters. If you don’t, she has a flaming kick she can do in mid-air, she has a range of charging punches and a ground pound that shoots damage underneath the opponent from far, though it isn’t very effective. Supposedly, Capcom’s having the most balancing issues with her at present.

10 – Abel

Again, very SNK-influenced. And he’ll probably end up a favourite. If you like the SNK stuff, I’d say he’s a mix of Maxima and Goro from the KOF series. If you don’t know what that means, he has a one of those combo-sequence special move strings (where you do motion after motion for multiple successive attacks), a special throw, an anti-air grab, an over-arching fly-kick and a roll. Powerful, great combo potential and strong all-round ability against all types of player. May struggle with super fast Chun Li players, assuming Capcom fixes Chun Li.

Final thoughts?

Loved it. Can’t wait to play the full balanced character roster (Balrog and Sagat were recently revealed in the Japanese beta tests).

Capcom does admittedly have a lot of move-set choices (Chun Li) and balancing issues to tune out. For one, projectiles tend to have longer recovery times, meaning if you hit someone, you’re vulnerable to attack if they’re close enough to you. Guile and Dhalsim suffer from this the most, but hopefully that’ll get fixed when it hits Japanese arcades in the Summer.