Xbox 360 - Up Close & Personal with Live, the Console and the Wireless Controller
by Anand Lal Shimpi on May 20, 2005 12:57 AM EST- Posted in
- Trade Shows
Microsoft Demos the new Xbox Live
Our first demo with the new Xbox Live takes place while playing through a game. During the game, we receive a Friend Invite from Striker. Please excuse the poor quality of the picture, but you get the idea of how the invite will pop on the screen:
After hitting the 360 button, you are brought to the Friend Invite screen:
From the Friend Invite screen, you can accept the invitation, decline, reply, block, play any messages or view the person's on-line profile. A particularly interesting element of this screen is the user's Gamercard at the top right of the screen:
The next item on your Gamercard is your Gamerscore (GS for short); the Gamerscore is a counter of all achievements across all games that you've played (online and offline). Beating levels in Halo 2 single player, completing races in Project Gotham Racing 3 or winning online matches will all contribute to your Gamerscore.
The final item is your Zone. Currently in Xbox Live, you are matched up against players that are all members of one large pool. While that was a good idea when Live started off, now with over 1.5 million subscribers, such a broad match making system can be a bit painful at times. The problem is that you have casual gamers paired up with very competitive players, which isn't always the best idea.
Now, you'll be able to select the Zone in which you'd like to play. The Zone will determine what sort of players you are matched up with, whether it is Family players (e.g. members with kids online where you should watch your mouth), competitive players, or a zone where anything goes. You can change your Zone before any match depending on your fancy. We are a fan of the idea, but we do wonder how Microsoft will ensure that the Zones remain true to their function (e.g. what will keep vulgar folks from corrupting the innocent minds of children playing in the Family zone?).
Now back to playing your game. If you are playing a game, you can also initiate an invite by hitting the 360 button. Just as before, the game will continue to play in the background (whether paused or not is determined by the developer depending on the nature of the title):
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fishbits - Friday, May 20, 2005 - link
"Honestly we aren't nearly excited as Microsoft is about the new Live Marketplace, simply because the name implies that we'll be paying for quite a bit that finds its way in there."I don't get where this is coming from. I'm able to buy from brick and mortar stores or online, and this is a good thing. I'm able to shop and buy 360 stuff on Live (or choose not to buy) and that's a bad thing? Looks like an actual workable micro-payment system to me, something that's been much in desire.
Really, I'd much rather have devs/content providers busting their humps to provide games and goodies that are worth cash, especially in the pennies to few dollars range. If the item sucks, people won't buy it. If it's good, the creator gets rewarded, encouraging the creation of more quality low-priced goodies for us to enjoy.
Of course software companies could try and sell gimped games in retail, where you need to buy additional stuff off of Live to really enjoy it. I think that would be a recipe for their demise though.
slashbinslashbash - Friday, May 20, 2005 - link
Anand,Thank you for this coverage. It's amazing to me that there are numerous "gaming" websites out there, none of which tell me what I want to know (things like: how the hard drive is removed; what the sides of the unit look like; multiple views of the controller so I can see how the top buttons are placed). Gaming websites basically provide me with press releases. You, on the other hand, cut straight to what I consider to be the important stuff.
It's funny. If you'd have asked me two years ago (you might have even done so in a forum poll or something) whether Anandtech should go into covering video game console hardware, I would have replied to the negative -- that that was taken care of, there are too many gaming sites already, etc. I would have thought that it would be outside your core competency. It was the same way with digital cameras. I thought that Steve's Digicams was good enough. Boy, was I ever wrong!
You are doing a great service to the world by providing the truth and having unbiased, straightforward reviews. Thank you.
Tefl0n - Friday, May 20, 2005 - link
Looking more and more like Sega had some influence on that controller(think Dreamcast). which isnt a bad thing.TheSnowman - Friday, May 20, 2005 - link
Yeah the Killzone demo is all real time just like the geforce3 can render Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within in real time and just like The Getway looked every bit as good as the footage from the PS2 unvailing. Seriously, if you want to enough you can belive anything; but it doesn't make it anything more than BS hype.Reflex - Friday, May 20, 2005 - link
#8 - If those formats are supported currently, then yes. I don't think they are however...#3 - The Killzone 2 demo was not in game, that has been confirmed with the developers who stated that it was made 'to the PS3 spec' in the sense that thats what people can expect them to be shooting for. It could not have been done on the PS3, they started working on that in November, but PS3 test kits only came out two months ago and still do not have everything needed to make a demo like that.
#1 - The controllers recharge when plugged into the USB ports. So you don't have to worry about battery expenses.
her34 - Friday, May 20, 2005 - link
"If you have a Media Center Edition PC, the Xbox 360 will also act as a Media Center Extender, streaming any SD or HD content from your MCE machine."the video file on the pc can be any format? it can be xvid or h264?
how exactly does that work? does it get re-encoded on the fly? or does it just stream the file and the codec gets installed on the xbox360?
Jeff7181 - Friday, May 20, 2005 - link
Awesome... AA batteries... I was afraid that was an "assembled by Microsoft" battery pack that costs $69.95 and won't hold a charge after a year.dripgoss - Friday, May 20, 2005 - link
I'm stoked for one. The live integration and media possibilities looks cool. Progressive and HD native along with small wireless controller is a definite plus. I'll be buying one...GhandiInstinct - Friday, May 20, 2005 - link
Why is E3 sucking so bad this year? Nothing new, and the worst is that games that are supposed to be presented aren't even there, i.e: Stalker.What happened? BOO!
Cygni - Friday, May 20, 2005 - link
The controllers are rechargeable... you wont be swapping out batteries like its a wavebird or anything.They are also RF and not IR. Im not going to complain. A solid RF controller (like the Wavebird) is hard to beat, especially if its still light, like was mentioned. I wonder if the rumble actuator was taken out of the controllers? Hard to imagine a wireless controller being lighter than an S.