Space Giraffe

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Space Giraffe
Developer(s)	Llamasoft
Publisher(s)	Llamasoft
Designer(s)	Jeff Minter
Release date(s)	TBA 2007
Genre(s)
Mode(s)	Single player
Rating(s)	Rating Pending
Platform(s)	Microsoft Xbox 360 (XBLA), Microsoft Windows
Media	Direct Download
Input	Gamepad

Sample gameplay.

Space Giraffe is a fast-paced action arcade game by Jeff Minter of Llamasoft. It is being written for both Windows-based PCs, where it will be released via Minter's own online distribution method, and the Xbox 360 console on Xbox Live Arcade. The main graphics engine is based on the Neon Xbox 360 light synthesizer visualisation software built into the console.

The name "Space Giraffe" originated from Jeff's posts on the Jeff Minter fan forum YakYak and on his blog in which he semi-seriously referred to the player's character in the game as resembling a giraffe. [1] [2] This immediately attracted calls from readers and forum posters that the entire game should be named Space Giraffe, and this was used as the working title for the game, and then adopted for the final release because by that time it had already been the subject of widespread publicity. Minter in an interview related, "...all over the place along with stories talking about 'Jeff Minter's new game Space Giraffe,' and in fact I rather liked that name, and so it's stuck. I don't think I need to call it anything other than Space Giraffe now, and indeed it's been so widely reported as such that I actually think it would be harmful to rename it now."^[1]

Although aesthetically similar to the arcade game Tempest, Jeff has strongly denied that Space Giraffe is an update to Tempest, as it introduces significant gameplay changes.

1 Gameplay
2 Release date
3 Articles
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Gameplay

The player controls the Space Giraffe as it moves around the outer rim of a 3-dimensional extruded surface. Enemies appear on the surface at the opposite end of the third dimension and approach the player, moving forward and firing bullets. The Giraffe can destroy these enemies by firing at them. Unlike Tempest, the Giraffe can control the direction of its shots freely to shoot at enemies on other parts of the surface.

In addition, a line on the surface behaves as a VU meter, indicating the "power zone". Shooting enemies extends the Power Zone, and at all other times it slowly contracts. While the power zone is not at zero, the Giraffe can safely collide with enemies on the rim, knocking them off in the process (referred to as "bulling"). This attracts higher scores, especially if a large chain of enemies are bulled off the rim at one time. The player can collect power-up "pods" which allow the Giraffe to jump; jumping also fills the entire power zone.

(Note: Some of the early screenshots of the game include obscenity. This will not appear in the release version. Its inclusion is Jeff's known way of preventing mainstream gaming media from reproducing early screenshots, by rendering them unprintable!)

[edit] Release date

Space Giraffe is expected to be available to the public during 2007.

The alpha build of Space Giraffe was handed off to Microsoft on Wednesday February 7, 2007. ^[2] The final build is due to be sent to Microsoft at the end of March, where it will need to pass through an approval and setup process, hopefully leading to a release date mid-April.