Three months later, with patience wearing thin, the X3F guys bugged the Castle Crashers dev team who told 'em that "the update's release is definitely reaching the end of the process" but that they still can't talk about a release date. It's still in Microsoft's hands apparently.

So, hurry up and wait, again. Hopefully this will be a "Surprise! It's out!" kind of thing and not the sort of item appearing on a New Year's resolution list.

The Behemoth: Release of Castle Crashers patching nearing 'end of the process' [X3F]

The Behemoth: Castle Crashers Hits 250k Players, Fixes Coming [Gamasutra]

Chainsaw massacre !!! [The Behemoth]

We just got off the phone with Microsoft and we had a great talk about updating Castle Crashers, YES!! Looks like we’re on our way to getting this title update out and the bigger issues like saving and online connectivity resolved, in addition to other bugs that have been reported.

Unfortunately that's as precise as they get, saying they "don’t have a specific time frame yet" for when we can expect the release, but it can't be too far off. Can it?

Title Update is Coming! [The Behemoth]

So, should you be reaching for the hammer again?

LOVED

Fun – This game is fun. It’s as fun as you remember old side-scrolling beat em ups being, and then some. It can often be funny (when it’s not relying on gross-out jokes), and is always charming, from the teary-eyed sand monsters who guilt you for killing them to the heart-wrenching tale of a villain wedding gone bad and a love unrequited.

Good Looks – It may be under 150MB, and may only be going for 1200 MS points, but Castle Crashers is one of the best looking games on the 360. The game’s dripping with bold, vibrant colours, Dan Paladin’s art style has matured ten-fold and there’s both ingenuity and genuine humour to found in nearly all the character designs.

Depth – There’s a little more depth to Castle Crashers than your average, old-school side-scroller. Your character levels up as you progress, leaving you to assign attribute points in the fields of strength, magic, defence and speed. Not only does this let you tailor your character to your own play style, it lets you specifically upgrade your stats if you’re failing a stage or a boss fight because you’re too slow, or too weak. A wide variety of collectible weapons and animal sidekicks (who each give you a specific boost) to be found throughout the game also flesh the experience out.

Hack, Slash – I said “fun” before. The biggest contributor to that deserves its own spot. There’s a simple, fluid joy to Castle Crasher's combat. Button-mashers are catered for, as the game’s not terribly difficult, but a series of quick, easy combo moves are there for the more experienced player, as well as a satisfying magic attack that can be levelled up to become almost too powerful.

HATED

Rough Around The Edges – Castle Crashers has been a long time coming. It’s as though they spent the extra time polishing the art, music and extra bits, and forgot to fix some of the more important stuff. Like cheap enemy attack routines that can see you killed by an unavoidable onslaught of ranged attacks. And paper-thin characters you need to line up perfectly to register a hit on. And stage art that's too busy, resulting in enemies you can't see, and deaths you can't avoid. Or times when you finish 4 levels, quit, then restart to find the game only remembered you finished 2 of them.

Online? Try Offline – The game supports 4-player online co-op. Or, least it says it does. I spent all weekend trying to play a game with no luck. Not a single connection. A patch is promised, and should hopefully improve things, but it stings when a game built around the premise of co-op good times doesn’t let you play any (online, at least) co-op.

This is one of those times when it’s important to remind you that our loved/hated sections aren’t points. A game shouldn’t be judged on how many pros there are vs the number of cons. Because I absolutely adore Castle Crashers. It's bright, it's happy, it's simple, it's fun. It is, much like Bionic Commando was last month, a text book example of how you take a tired, decades-old game style and make it great again.

They just need to get these online problems fixed. Soon, if at all possible.

Castle Crashers was developed by The Behemoth, and published by Microsoft. Released on August 27 on Xbox Live Arcade. Priced at 1200 Microsoft Points. Reviewed on Xbox 360. Played to completion of main storyline. Unable to connect to online multiplayer.

Confused by our reviews? Read our review FAQ.

Xbox Live Arcade Activity For Week Of August 25th [GamerBytes]

There have been widespread reports of networking problems with some gamers being unable to connect to games and others being completely unable to find online servers. Several instances of Xboxes freezing were also reported in the Xbox.com forums.

To compound the problems, the official Crashers website and forums went down shortly after the game's launch.

In an interview with Joystiq, Tom Fulp and Dan Paladin from The Behemoth acknowledged the problems and claimed that help was on the way.

"There are certain network settings," said Paladin, "where, if you're in a very specific network environment, it won't work with another person's connection and that's what's happening. But that's something we're already addressing by working with Microsoft to get a patch out as fast as possible."

PAX 2008: The Behemoth talks Castle Crashers pricing, patches and performance [Joystiq]

Second character just announced: Skelly, whose weapons seem to include a sword and a bow-and-bone arrow. Plus from gameplay screens, he's either blocking or projecting some kind of energy attack.

Full screens after the jump.

Castle Crashers: Ninja and Skelly [Castle Crashers Development Blog of Love, via Xbox 360 Fanboy]

Castle Crashers Isn't Only Done, Now It's Rated! [Xbox 360 Fanboy, also the pic.]

Behemoth posted some new screenshots, and says the devblog will update with more character profiles even though the game's finished. Any guess what the points cost for this thing will be?

Castle Crashers is Completely Completed[Castle Crashers Development Blog, big thanks to GeorgeLiquor and Spade0013]

Castle Crashing The Beard [Kongregate]

The devs say they hope to show off the statues, which are made of "genuine genuine bronze", during this year's upcoming Comic Con. They also showed off one of the statues gnarly arms. Apparently, casting bronze isn't as easy as one would expect.... I'd expect it to be really hard.

Gnarly Arms [The Behemoth Dev Blog]

Castle Crashers Development Blog [The Behemoth]