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XBox (Games) Entertainment Games

Xbox Live Volume 2 Released 36

Posted by CowboyNeal from the new-and-improved dept.
Xs writes "As if the first Xbox Live Starter Kit wasn't selling well enough, Microsoft has released a new Starter Kit. This time the kit includes demos of MechAssault and MotoGP. Plus, a complete online version of Tetris Worlds. To make things even better, they are no longer bundling in Whacked! I hope to be picking one of these up soon. Full stories at Xbox IGN and GamerFeed.com."
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Xbox Live Volume 2 Released More

Xbox Live Volume 2 Released

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  • Xbox Live, Year 2 (Score:4, Insightful)

    by jvmatthe ( 116058 ) on Friday May 02, 2003 @01:17PM (#5863166) Homepage
    So here's the question: How will Microsoft price the second year of Live service for first-adopters?

    See, if they price it at $10/month, as has been tossed around from time to time, then it seems to me that people would just give up on the whole GamerTag value-add and get another $50 starter kit. Heck, with different games added in and a spare headset, that might not even be a bad idea. Is it really worth $70/year to current subscribers to keep the same handle within the service? Maybe...but I imagine a few will see an advantage to using that $70 savings on a new game (or a couple of used or budget-priced games).

    If, on the other hand, they price it at $5/month, then for only $10/year over a starter kit you get to keep your online handle. That's getting much closer to the point at which people might pony up the extra dough.

    My prediction is that they're going to shoot for somewhere in the middle, say around $7/month ($84/year) and just count on getting the $50 from the starter kits for those people who can't stomach the full price.

    One thing I don't know (and yes, I'm too lazy to research it right now) is whether a Live kit is tied to a specific Xbox. Or, perhaps I should say, once an Xbox has been online with a specific Live kit, whether it can be reinitialized with a new kit (allowing the $50 choice I mentioned above).

    Anyway, this is one of the more interesting announcements that I'm looking forward to at E3. Microsoft has apparently put together a good service; now, can they find the right price point to keep people using it?
    • no, you can save your Live Account info to a memory card and take it with you, you are not tied to a specific Xbox. I really enjoy live, but so far the "Killer App" has not emerged. MechAssault could have been great, but they flawed the lobby and friends list. UNREAL is fun, but I usually play without the headset because there is always some 8-13 year old yelling "TALK TO ME! WHY DOESNT ANYBODY TALK TO ME" It is fun to have the headset for playing domination though if you have a strategy minded team.
      • I thought that MechAssault was a really lame online game (and single player too)...I got bored of it after my first deathmatch, though maybe CTF will bring me back. Anyway, RtCW is shaping up to be a HUGE Xbox Live hit. Comes out in less than a week! Plus, there is Crimson Skys, True Fantasy Live Online, PSO, Capcom vs SNK 2 EO, Midtown Madness 3, and a few other promising Live games. The real XBL games this year will be RtCW and Crimson Skys, IMO. Maybe Perfect Dark Zero will be online? That would be
    • That's exactly why I'm waiting for both the console price cut AND a definitive word on where this Live pricing is going before I get anywhere near the Xbox.

      My brother already has one and lives a few towns over, would love to play him online, but can't go into it blind like that.
    • I would think they would price it at something high like 10 dollars a month, but then at the same time off a 50 dollars a year deal to. That way they can get long term adopters and give people who want to just try it out a short term solution. I think that would be the best idea. On a sort of related note, I hope Nintendo decides to launch some sort of online plan at e3. More competition could lead to really sweet (if not free) online prices.
    • The important part of Live! is your gamertag, which is kept as a file. You can have up to 7 stored on the Xbox, and 1 on each memory card you own. You can delete them.

      The new-kit method (which I thought about when a local retailer blew out their Live! kits), would require you cancel your old account + delete your old tag. The new one will be automatically put on when you enter the new validation code + your CC number.
  • Tetris worlds online may be the killer app that online console gaming needs. Online FPS and racing are fine, but Tetris is the "common gamers gaming crack".

    I would love to see how many parents suddenly are willing to play the kids system online for the first time with this one. If this works, console online gaming could become a normal everyday thing.

  • need more Live enabled games (Score:3, Insightful)

    by boomerny ( 670029 ) on Friday May 02, 2003 @01:22PM (#5863208)
    I'd like to see Bomberman come to Xbox, and Live enabled would make it that much better. Also, a good RTS is needed, like a Starcraft or Myth.
  • Just goes to further prove you cant judge a game by its demo. The full verison has a lot more features and is a great party game. Its got funny characters and some really inovative level designs

    Fry up a pig, put it in a can SCRAPPLE!
  • Can we get the new DVD? I'd like Tetris worlds but I have a first gen xb-l

  • Remember Dreamcast (Score:3, Insightful)

    by BigNumber ( 457893 ) on Friday May 02, 2003 @02:13PM (#5863681)
    Anyone who ever played online with the Dreamcast knows why console gaming and online play don't really work well together. There is nothing more frustrating than getting 3/4 of the way through a football game and having the other person quit because they were losing. Games with more players and cooperative play games have a better chance of succeeding. It seems like the quality of gamer on the console side just isn't up to the same standards as PC online gamers.

    The only benefit I can really see to console gaming online is that it would be much more difficult to cheat. I finally quit playing Counterstrike (which I loved, btw) because it seemed like every third person was using a hack of some sort.
    • It seems like the quality of gamer on the console side just isn't up to the same standards as PC online gamers.

      This may be true, but it's also understandable, as many console gamers have little to no online experience (as far as gaming goes). One hopes that this will eventually improve, but until then, you can always just play with friends...
    • There is nothing more frustrating than getting 3/4 of the way through a football game and having the other person quit because they were losing.

      Happens constantly when playing StarCraft on Battle.Net. Reason I quit playing the game. There is a LAN group in my area that gets together often enough to fill my quota for CounterStrike without having to play against the Internet Cheaters.

    • Yeah, hi. Quitting while losing is JUST as common in PC online as it is on the console. You likely just don't notice because you're not playing games where it would be that noticeable and/or frustrating.

      Specifically, people quitting Warcraft and Starcraft games is just as common as any such problem on the console, and the same goes for virtually any two-player game.

      As for your "quality of gamer" comment, that's just flamebait/trolling/etc. I quit playing FPS games online a long time ago because I was

    • I really think the solution to that is to have more stats. If central servers just crunch numbers, the bandwidth usage can't be that expensive for the game maker/publisher. If you have stats, people will be less likely to quit out early. And also, the only way to allow a player to quit out early is through a resign command, thus giving victory to the other person....it would still suck that the game was over, but I bet it would lessen it a bit.
      • This is exactly what Microsoft were recommending at Xfest. They gave a great seminar about using stats and leaderboard rankings to influence matchmaking and one of the things they heavily suggest is that games penalise quitters and cheaters in terms of matchmaking and overall ranking.

        You can easily do this for quitters by chalking a stat at game start and at game end; the difference between these numbers is how many games they bailed out of.

        Now that game developers have gotten to grips with the technical
  • Tetris is a good start, but what the service really needs is a bunch of simple multiplayer games to suck people in. Casual gamers love simple games.
  • I hate their new clickthroughs. If you add ?fromint=1 to any IGN URL, there's no clickthrough. Please remember this when linking to IGN.

  • Still waiting for ReVolt (Score:3, Insightful)

    by WildBeast ( 189336 ) on Friday May 02, 2003 @05:37PM (#5865430) Journal
    Yes that's what they should've bundled. And why did they cancel this game? It was really fun during the beta test. Unlike other games, we actually had time to have some interesting discussions going on during gameplay. In my opinion, ReVolt brought the best Xbox live experience.

    I'm still angry about that one. Release the damn game, I will purchase it.
    • That is indeed cheesy that they went with "demos" instead of a real game. That's one of the reasons I have yet to get the Live service. Just on principle, I avoid it because I feel that including only demos is pretty lame.

      I, too, looked forward to ReVolt and would have bought Live just for that game. Now, my Xbox sits unused (except to play DVDs) due to the $50 game prices (the same games are $40 on PC with more features).
  • I remember being asked to shell out $50.00 for the beta kit that supposedly had Revolt. I was going to, but figured the final release would have it and I wouldnt have to deal with lag or whatever might be beta.
    Well the final release didnt have it.
    It was one of few games I couldnt put down on the Dreamcast and would love to see a online version whether its Xbox or PS2.

    Anyone know?
  • Just like the XBox console needed that must-have, XBox-only game (Halo), XBox Live needs one. I would guess that the two games that have the best chance of being that game are Halo 2 and Doom 3 (If MS gets the console-only rights). What does everyone else think?
  • Which will probably be $40 or so, I'd imagine. It's not like it costs them much to run the matching server. $40 is more than they deserve.

    I'm waiting for xbox live games worth playing. Aside from mechassault which I'd like to play but don't want to invest that much money in, what is there worth playing? Tetris worlds, that's nice, it comes with it, but I'm sure as hell not going to pay to play tetris online. Think about that. There are any number of free online networked tetrises, and any asshole with any

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