Last week was an interesting week for the Xbox Live Indie Games Channel. On the one hand, the first Indie Games Summer Uprising titles were announced. This is a great thing, but it's a shame that Microsoft still seems unsure or uninterested in how to better promote the best that XBLIG channel has to offer. Time continues to prove that XBLIG's lack of a more robust vetting or segmentation process for releases currently forces folks to wade through an exhausting sea of mediocrity to find hidden gems.

Zeboyd Games--developer of Cthulhu Saves the World and Breath of Death VII--posted some interesting info on their blog after the games (previously XBLIG-only) became available on Steam. Zeboyd claims that they "made more revenue in less than a week on Steam than we have in over a year and a half on the XBox Live Indie Games service." Assertions like this might give other indie developers pause when considering which distribution platforms to target.

Here are my favorite indie stories of the week:

Addo Games talks about developing Robots Love Ice Cream - Husband and wife team Becca and Burton Posey are hard at work on a new iPad game called Robots Love Ice Cream, that's currently seeking funding via Kickstarter. The duo was kind enough to chat with us about how development is coming along, and the importance of early promotion for indie titles. I'm just excited because defending planets from robotic invaders using different types of weaponized ice cream sounds like fun.

IGC's Interview with Speedrunner HD developer, DoubleDutch Games - Indie Games Channel in the process of reaching out to the developers whose games have been selected for the Indie Games Summer Uprising, and Casper van Est of DoubleDutch games got back to us so quickly, you'd think he was racing across town at breakneck speed to defuse a bomb, or something. He tells an interesting tale of developing SpeedRunner HD and its humble beginnings as a Flash game, and discusses a bit about getting involved with the Uprising.

Indie Games Summer Uprising: The Trailers - Speaking of the Indie Games Summer Uprising on XBLIG, we also rounded up new trailers for each of the Uprising's eight announced games. The overall quality of the selections might pleasantly surprise you, especially if you've ever randomly waded into the XBLIG catalog in search of something cool.

My personal favorite trailer from the Uprising selections belongs to an action-puzzle game called Cute Things Dying Violently by ApathyWorks. You can check out all of the Summer Uprising's trailers here.