City Rain – Award winning XNA XBOX and PC Game

A newly formed interactive game publishing company that brings ‘games-with-purpose’ to market, today announced the availability of “City Rain”for the new Xbox Live Marketplace ‘Indie Games’ site. Created as an initial student concept project, City Rain is a puzzle and simulation game based on urban planning and sustainability. Players must rescue cities that are being ‘black listed’ from the World Environment Protection Agency (WEPA) by quickly making decisions to establish and re-organize urban developments that will make cities more sustainable and ‘green’. City Rain is available now as a free trial at Microsoft Indie Games, and the full version for 400 Microsoft points.

City Rain was originally a concept game, built on the Microsoft XNA Game Studio platform by Mother Gaia Studio, Brazil. The strategic urban-planning game quickly captured the attention of game developers and players, winning the Microsoft Imagine Cup 2008 (Paris), and becoming a finalist in the 2009 Independent Games Festival at the Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2009 in San Francisco, Calif. Since shipping, City Rain has accumulated much press coverage and notice. City Rain recently won the Indie Game of the Month Award for November 2009, from Australian game site, TheGo.

“As a fan of both SimCity™ and Tetris®, I immediately fell in love with City Rain based on its fun reference to those two classic games, but also because it introduces a meaningful and relevant purpose that educates players on how to think about creating ‘green’ and ‘sustainable’ cities and communities,” said Alexandre Renaud, founder of Ovolo Corporation and executive producer for City Rain. “Ovolo recently joined the 1% For The Planet, an alliance of businesses that understand the necessity of protecting the natural environment, like we present in City Rain. The 1% for The Planet contributes 1% of net annual sales to grassroots environment groups, helping affect real change. We encourage our customers and game development partners to consider joining,” added Renaud.

City Rain Synopsis
Best described as “SimCity-meets-Tetris”, City Rain produces buildings that fall from the sky, which must be quickly place on a grid. Players are challenged to master the art of urban planning on the fly, requiring quick reflexes and a logical building placement that ultimately helps the community thrive and the ecology survive.

Pricing and Availability
City Rain is available now at Xbox Live Marketplace for 400 Microsoft Points. A free demo version is also available for instant download. A PC version of City Rain is available for purchase (DRM and Region free) direct from Ovolo Corporation, Inc. as a direct download via PayPal for US $9.95. City Rain is also available from the online sites: Direct2Drive, Impulse, and GamersGate.

Tags: city rain, green, mother gaia, ovolo, pc, sim city, sustainability, tetris, urban planning, xbox, xna

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