Ikaruga on Live Arcade!

[Darksaviour69]

It looks like Treasure's rather marvellous Dreamcast and GameCube shooter Ikaruga might be on its way to Xbox Live Arcade.

That's because the game is currently showing up on Partnernet, the Xbox 360's closed debug network, access to which is limited to journalists and developers.

There are two downloads listed in the Xbox Live Arcade section of Partnernet, which mirrors Xbox Live's functionality in a different setting. The titles are nondescript, but if you download the two 5.7MB files Ikaruga appears under a Japanese name in the console's Live Arcade menu.

We couldn't get it to run, but it does reach a Treasure title screen, and lists 12 achievements including one marked "Secret" and one for each of Chapters 1-4 and the Final Chapter.

Treasure has previously said it was "really interested" in working on Xbox Live Arcade, but when company president Masato Maegawa spoke about that desire recently he wasn't specific about any projects in development.

Treasure is known to be working on an original shooter for Xbox 360, but last we heard it won't be out for a while.

Eurogamer.net (http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=72965)

[SmashinGit]

Please let this be for real!

[BrooksyX]

This is great news, one of my favorite DC games!

[jerrt]

i bought the gc version for less than what microsoft will charge for the live version, a great game, but the only thing that interests me is it in hd. [i do wish i could turn my rear projection tv on its side though. [: {now i'm really wishing i had gotten the projector}

[Anonymous D]

omg this is awesome if its true.

[dejkirkby]

Best news of the day!

[beetroot bertie]

This is fantastic news and I hope it comes to being as Ikaruga is a top game and one of my fave DC games.

Not sure how well the 360 controller D-Pad will fare though - an arcade stick like the dreamcast's would be spot on though rather than that funny looking arcade stick they're selling..

[BrooksyX]

I hope they let you use the Analog stick for control along with the DPad. I wanted to use it on the DC but of course you couldnt use the analog stick.

[beetroot bertie]

Yeah that was a shame. I liked using the analogue stick in GigaWing 2, although the DC pad felt fine for Ikaruga. The arcade stick made it feel very authentic. I felt it was games like street fighter that the DC pad suffered, making the rolling movements quite tricky and a wee bit painful on the thumbs..

[ACID]

This is by far one of the best shooters i have ever played so i hope is true.