It’s always been a dream of mine to drive a Zamboni.
The demo will provide fans an early chance to experience the new simplified controls and relive the excitement of this past season’s thrilling Stanley Cup™ Final for a brief three minute period as either the Pittsburgh Penguins or Detroit Red Wings at Joe Louis Arena in Detroit.
The demo for Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is now on Xbox Live. The 900MB demo is available in all XBL regions, so people all over the world can enjoy the game.
You wanna take a wild guess as to what’s my least favorite movie franchise of all time? I just never “got” it, sorry.
I’m not the most avid Live player and my friends can attest to that. I’m just not very fond of getting my arse handed to me by 12-year-old girls. However, I do like to see what others are playing and how good they are, so I may actually download one of friends list apps through iTunes. You see, Microsoft requires that all apps pertaining to Xbox Live be free. So you filthy developers out there trying to make money will soon get a scolding from Microsoft.
Will Microsoft ever make their own app for the Apple platform?
1337pwnblog [via joystiq]
I, along with 30 Helens, agree with Don Reisinger on the subject of Xbox Live. Xbox Live Gold memberships should be free. I actually can’t speak for the aforementioned Helens, so let’s just say that Don and I are in complete concurrence.
But don’t expect any new features. However, this will prepare our RROD boxes for the new update this fall.
Thanks for the heads up, Major.
There’s a phishing scam going around Xbox Live right now that promises free Microsoft points by visiting a Web site. After entering your XBL info in the Web site, it sends the same message to everyone on your friends list.
Friends, it’s simply stealing your login info. You get no points, no glory, and you’ll annoy your friends in the process if you give up your info.
To paraphrase Rangers FC, just be Ready, and you’ll avoid this type of nonsense.
You gamers should know how great Xbox Live can be, but do you know how the service came about, or what Microsoft’s plans for it in the future are? (You may also know how incompetent many XBL players are—playing Team Fortress 2, it never ceases to amaze me that on my team of eight players, six were engineers, one was a useless dunce, and I was the only scout trying to get the briefcase. Teamwork!)
If you’re even remotely interested in that, I suggest you make your way on over to the recently revamped Edge Online, which has a nice little feature on Xbox Live. Given that it’s from Edge, a magazine I’ve praised here many times in the past, you can expect all sorts of Big Boy treatment of the topic.
If you like Edge, may I also suggest the Game Theory podcast, which similarly treats video games as a proper topic, and not like some pastime for kids?
The demo for Madden 09 is now—or will be in the next few hours—available on Xbox Live. (PS3 owners: a demo is salted to appear on PSN around the same time.) Go crazy, football fans, playing the same game you’ve been playing for the past 20 years.
That’s two NFL stories in as many days. Clearly something has gone wrong here.
The very exclusive Microsoft Gamefest conference is in full swing right now somewhere here in the Northwest, and they’ve dropped a couple of newsworthy items. First of all is the revision of the Games for Windows – LIVE system they’ve got going on. Starting today every multiplayer feature of LIVE is free on Windows: chat, shared friends lists with the 360, achievements, and so on. That’s nice; probably they needed more Windows folks to sign up. I personally don’t really enjoy the community aspect of gaming, but a lot of people do and this might make it a little more appealing.
More importantly, they’re giving Windows users some love by redesigning the interface and adding a LIVE marketplace (soon, anyway) which will serve up games, demos, and presumably DLC. Sounds good.
Remember this?
We should know for sure by E3, but for now it looks like Microsoft will release a 60GB Xbox 360 sometime this month. An internal e-mail, which I refuse to copy-paste here out of respect for the original source, Xbox Family, supposedly sent from Microsoft to GameStop and Best Buy details the company’s plans.
In addition, Microsoft will release a stand-alone 60GB hard drive for Core and Arcade owners, and people with a 1st gen Pro, like me. Speaking of which, this new 60GB SKU is supposed to replace the current Pro model. The hard drive comes with three months of Xbox Live, a wired headset and an ethernet cable. Fancy.
But yeah, E3 starts next week, and Peter and Devin will be having a blast running around from meeting to meeting, playing mud-colored FPS after mud-colored FPS.
via 1UP
If you haven’t already been informed of this then I have great news for you! Today is Bungie Day and to celebrate you can download a gaggle of Halo 3 goodies from Xbox Live that include themes, gamer pics, and the ultra frosty Cold Storage map as well as a price drop for the Legendary Map Pack down to 600 MS points. I guess I should dig up my copy of Halo 3 and take out Gear of War. Yes, I still play GoW. I can’t wait for E3 next week, so I can get a hands-on of GoW2.
Do you guys know Adam Sessler, the host of G4’s X-Play? He has a problem with all the swearing, racism and general malfeasance found on Xbox Live and other forms of online gaming. And with good reason: a lot of the “trash talk” on XBL is non-sensical bunk. But, is telling 10-year-olds to lay off the swearing really going to work? They’re a bunch of dumb kids spouting profanities.
Let them be low lives.
Microsoft believes it can, and ought to, make changes to the Xbox Live interface. While the Marketplace and general Live interface was designed, maybe, for a couple hundred items, there’s now more than 17,000. Too confusing, too cluttered for the average consumer.
Basically, Microsoft is looking to re-organize the way XBL is laid out. How that happens, when that happens—in time for the expected Fall update?—remains to be seen.
And yes, to a point I’d agree with Microsoft. The constant scrolling, going from page to page, doesn’t exactly make looking for a new (free) picture set or whatever all that engaging.
New, exciting info on the upcoming special edition of Gears of War for the Xbox 360. The special content is split into two halves, GoW junk and GoW 2 junk. (I use the word “junk” with only the upmost of sincerity.) As far as the GoW
As for the GoW 2 hotness, there’s a picture pack and some trailers.
Yeah, nothing to stand on a roof and shout about, but worth a quick mention. Hence, the above.
Other than some under-the-hood code to prepare for the big spring update, there are “no other changes or enhancements in this update…in other words no new features.” And what of the vaunted spring update? “At this point we have nothing to announce.” Why would they even release this update now, when they have nothing to say? Why not release the update and the information at the same time?
In trying to log into Xbox Live last night, I kept getting error messages left and right. Naturally, I assumed it was just Time Warner behaving as expected (read: awfully), but it turns out there was a legitimate problem last night. Kotaku speculates that the just-released Call of Duty 4 map pack may have had something to do with it.
I just logged in now (had to download an Orange Box update… yes, I still play that game, 18 minutes at a clip) and all is well. Thank heavens! What would I and countless others have done without Xbox Live’s warm, non-judgmental glow?
Whatever upgrade is being done to Xbox Live on April Fools is anyone’s guess, but recent surveys and speculation might lead some to believe Netflix is coming. Was Monday’s meltdown a result of this? Hmm…
I just logged onto Xbox Live and found this message waiting for me and thought I’d share.
Microsoft is on the prowl for cheaters on Xbox Live. Those who have been known to tamper with their Gamerscore or Achievements are probably waking up to a horrifying discovery. Their accounts have been reset to zero and they’ve been publicly labeled as cheaters. Yikes.
You’re looking at the first baby conceived because of Xbox Live. The baby girl’s parents met while playing Rainbow Six Lockdown, the daddy in the Bronx and the mommy in Georgia. The story is that the two would-be parents didn’t initially see eye to eye—you sunk my battleship! or somesuch—but then decided to meet each other in real life, or IRL as my old WoW crew used to put it. The mother called it a “leap of faith” that they met. That’s one way to put it, sure.
There’s a larger issue at work here—meeting people IRL after meeting online. I first met Biggs at some “office” (read: chat room) get-together after only conversing online; it was sorta weird, yes, but now we’re two peas in a pod. I think he initially offered candy or a puppy or something. I’m still waiting for that damn puppy.
The Power of Xbox … It’s an Xbox Baby! [Xbox.com via ComputerAndVideoGames.com]
