After today's welcome announcement, I thought it appropriate to post up the responses to all the questions I got from everyone. So, hopefully this answers your questions, and if not, post some more. [Reprinted from Lunar's Duality]

Well, thanks to everyone that sent in questions. Here are all the answers I could scrounge up. If there is still something on your mind, feel free to comment and I'll try to answer as new ones come up. All answers are from me unless noted as being directly from Steve Taylor (President, Wahoo Studios/NinjaBee).

On with the show:

Q from AC91: Release date and price please...

A: As if my NDA allowed me talk about such things... [Update]: Well, the cat's out of the bag now so get it on 6/20/2007 for 800 MS Points!

I am personally beside myself with glee. It's official and I can finally talk about it.

Band of Bugs is coming this Wednesday (6/20/2007) and will be available for 800 pts.

Details after the break.

Here is part 2 of my Level Editor breakdown with two new exclusive screens. Part 1 can be found on XBLArcade here. [All parts reprinted from Lunar's Duality]

Creating maps hooked me right away because the maps did not require a crazy amount of detail to be fun. I could easily test an interesting idea and if it sucked I had not wasted hours working on a bad idea. I just scrapped it and started a new one. However, with some advanced editing techniques you can often turn a bad design into a great one.

Much more after the break.

Finally, everyone can see what I have been talking about for weeks. Steve Taylor (aka stay) of Wahoo Studios/NinjaBee has posted up a Band of Bugs gameplay video on YouTube. Check it out.

It starts with the level editor and also shows some gameplay from Maal's Story (the campaign mode).

I just got a total Pavlovian response from hearing that music -- I am officially way too excited. I sure hope we are getting close to the release because I cannot take this waiting any longer.

[via NinjaBee forums]

[Update]: After some diligent work by staticwrap over at the forums, there is now a hi-res version available at GameVideos. Enjoy!

[thanks staticwrap]

The long wait is finally over. Here is the first part of my breakdown of the Level Editor which is, in my mind, the best part of a great game.

NinjaBee has said that they used their editor to layout all the levels in the single player campaign and I absolutely believe them. It takes a little while to get used to using the editor, but the slight learning curve is only a result of the editor’s robustness.

Every available button is used in the editor. The d-pad allows you to switch between the following: tiles, doo-dads, units, and items. The left thumbstick handles moving around the map itself, and the right thumbstick handles choosing the specific piece you want to place in or on the map (in the top picture, all the different tile choices are shown at the top).

(More after the break)

Hopefully we haven't Band of Bugged you out yet because according to the UK Official Xbox Magazine the game is an astounding 8 out of 10. This score made it tied with Colin McRae's Dirt as the second best game this month only being beaten out by the European juggernaut of Forza Motorsport 2. The following is a list of the other arcade titles that were rated this month in addition to Band of Bugs:

Band of Bugs: 8/10
Centipede/Millipede: 5/10
Gyruss: 4/10
Luxor 2: 7/10

[Via Xbox Archive]

In other blogging news, NinjaBee has just setup a creator's blog for Band of Bugs over at IGN. So, if my previews haven't sated your need for everything Band of Bugs, head on over and give it a look-see.

It's NinjaBee's way of trying to get their game seen amongst the current flood of XBLA titles.

This game just cannot come soon enough.

[Update]: Apparently NinjaBee isn't content doing the whole marketing thing alone. Two exclusive screens have just popped up on GamingTalkHQ. Go here, see stuff. [Thanks, KC]

Now that I am drawing toward the final bits of my Band of Bugs Preview I would like to invite you, the XBLA community, to ask any Band of Bugs questions that might be pressing in your minds.

Of course, I have yet to cover a couple key topics (I know, I know, get to the Level Editor already) but I want to collect your questions in order to post a bunch of answers at once. So, anything that I did not cover that you are dying to know about (besides release date and price, of course)?

Post your questions here or at my blog and I will do my best to answer them (NDA willing) or get them answered!

Yet another update to my Band of Bugs Preview.

Two topics on the docket for today: Camera and DLC.

First, the Xbox Live Vision camera support. If you play other camera-enabled games this will all feel familiar to you. In multiplayer matches, when you arrive in the pre-game/post-game lobbies, you will see either a person's gamerpic or his/her camera stream. Once you are in the game, the streams and pics are relegated to a small section on the right side of the screen. Within the lobbies the video feeds add something fun (when is it not fun to witness the look of defeat on your enemy's face?), but in-game the windows are so small that they are barely interesting.

Read More for info on DLC.

After a long hiatus, I bring you the latest part of my Band of Bugs Preview:

Band of Bugs, in typical NinjaBee fashion, pushes the boundaries of Xbox Live Arcade. Even being on the cutting edge, NinjaBee still instills confidence in their ability to pull it off. After all, they had Outpost Kaloki X out for the Xbox 360 launch and helped pioneer full campaign DLC when they shipped expansions for it (some are even free!). But I digress.

Chief among their challenges and innovations in Band of Bugs was allowing user created maps into online multiplayer matches. BoB will be the first XBLA title to allow this. But the best part of this feature is how easily and quickly this happens in-game.

Read on for the rest.