The extraordinary problems that Microsoft's Xbox Live experienced over the holidays were followed up with swift promises of a free game to compensate for the frustration many users suffered. The company has followed through, and has announced that Undertow will be the free game sacrificed to mollify gamers. The game will be free to download all this week, starting tomorrow (Wednesday) and running through this Sunday. "Two weeks ago, Xbox Live GM Marc Whitten posted a letter to Live subscribers apologizing for poor performance during the holidays and promising a freebie was on the way. There are currently no plans to offer a substitute game for those who already own Undertow." Just the same, Major Nelson sent along word to 360 Fanboy that they'd 'take care of you' if you found yourself in that situation.
Actually, I had some trouble downloading Undertow. I kept getting an error stating that content was not available or just getting the same error I got when XBL was down. So while you were modded funny, what you suggested did happen.
Your preface is prologue. I've been unable to get it. And there's like a three day window.
Not that I really care. I think Microsoft needs to apologize for this apology. But I just won't be renewing. Hell, at this rate, I may as well cancel outright.
According to Wikipedia it starts on Wednesday January 23'rd and finishes on Sunday the 27'th, that's a very small time window. Thanks to them not thinking of time zones internationally (again!), I for one happen to be away from any kind of technology for exactly that period (plus a day) - that's not cool. I wouldn't have any serious beef except the fact that people PAID MONEY for a service which was not available to them, much like paying for electricity, cable tv, water, gas, cell phone etc.
Yes that have announced their first profitable quarter. What part of Australia don't you get? Australian games are 99$ -> 119$ (RRP) 13 months schmirteen months, you're paying for what's free on the competing platforms.
I don't feel the service is worth it and due to other issues with them not knowing how to manage a simple database (http://forums.xbox.com/17297131/ShowPost.aspx) I doubt I'll redeem the 12 month (sorry, 13 month) card sitting in my drawer.
Why complain before you even attempt to correct the situation? Call/e-mail support and explain the situation. You might be able to get that download or perhaps some additional compensation (such as some points). I understand it's more fun to complain on slashdot, but...
I'm pointing out how cheap it comes across, maybe I will call them - but I've heard their helpdesk is far from useful (yet it was back in the XB1 days when they had barely any members)
I think it's a great deal, considering that as as daily XBL gold user, I haven't really noticed any problems other than slow response times connecting, and an error signing into messenger. As of today, things seem much snappier in the menus though. Joining online games has been problem free (Halo3, COD4, GRAW2). I'll take the game anyway, of course.
Yes, yes I know they provide a good service with Live and yes I know infrastructure isn't free but hey Sony's service is free. Before anyone says it, it is not even HALF as bad as people claim, it may not be as good as live but it's certainly not terrible (see: Wii)
Compare Xbox Live to Steam, and it's hard to see what exactly Microsoft is providing for $50/year.
Friends list and notifications? Check. Clans? Check. Achievements? Check. Gamer profiles? Check. Voice chat and instant messaging? Check. Downloadable content store with demos, trailers, and full games? Check. Automatic game updates? Check. Instant access to network features during a game? Check.
But Steam does all that for free.
Oh, and Steam also lets you play on dedicated servers: more players in each game, l
Yes the steam comparison is fantastic, great example - not only that but to my knowledge Steam has just as many members as Xbox live,........ pretty good service when you think about it (and it's come a long way)
50$ US a year - but 70$ US a year for the Australians too - let alone other countries which get taken advantage of. (this is not a physical product, it needs no region coding, it needs no language changes, it's a subscription, why 20% more expensive? - sad)
Well now, I didn't expect that one... Do you know what Steam is short for? Steaming pile of shit.
That is perhaps the worst piece of software I've used.
It takes forever to load (on a dual dual core with a raid 0 (2x 150 raptors) and a 8800). 3rd party games are completely unsupported (oh but they will sell them to you). I bought Call of Duty 4 and could not play it for weeks. Even halflife had issues with crashing and such. Apparently the anti cheat software wasn't compatible with vista 64. meanwhile back at
Do you know what Steam is short for? Steaming pile of shit. That is perhaps the worst piece of software I've used.
Sorry to hear it. My experience, on the other hand, has been almost perfect. There's been some downtime, but never for as long as XBL was down, and in any case it's free so I can put up with a little less than five nines of reliability.
Never had any crashes, but there have been a few times when I've had to restart Steam because some of my games disappeared from the list. Each time, Steam has come back up quickly, loading faster than iTunes or Trillian.
Of course, I'm using XP, not Vista. Maybe that's your p
Oh god you're one of 'those' guys, convinced Steam is still shit from back early 2001 or whenever it was launched. It's a very very very different service now, if you're having problems with the latest builds of steam on a modern machine, go have your machine looked at.
But I have to ask: Why the hell do you continue to pay them if you are -so- unhappy with them? Seems to me your time and money might be better spent elsewhere while they wake up and realize they can't dick people around simply because they don't live in the US. Of course, they'd realize this a -lot- sooner if people would quit throwing money at them despite the bad service.
Yes, you're right. As a symbolic gesture, they should offer the free download in a window that closely approximates the time that the service was unavailable for Live's users.
That's not the point of my post, hence RRP The Xbox 360 is also cheaper than 569$ - that doesn't change the fact the RRP is 569$
We pay RRP 99 -> 119$ RRP for games, the Americans pay 49.99 -> 59.99$ RRP for their games.
both markets we can get deals, the sad thing is the Americans START 25% lower than us in cost on items which are basically IDENTICAL, it's not like they do a control R to replace all instances of color with colour for us now is it?
> XBLA Games were all supposed to fit on a 64MB Memory card
50 megs was the old limit, but it's been 250 megs for some time now. Microsoft is supposedly willing to bump that to 450MB on a case-by-case basis (not sure they've ever had to). They do make 512MB memory cards for people who just won't do the HDD thing...
I was unknowingly included in a class-action suit against my former wireless provider, and received part of the settlement (minutes to be used on any network, nothing impressive).
Now, this has gotten me wondering if by downloading this game there is some sort of clause or recognition on Microsoft's part that you have in fact accepted this as acceptible compensation, barring you from raising any future disputes about the issue.
Seeing as you don't actually pay anything for the Silver service, vs the Gold, I would consider this a bonus to silver members, assuming they get it. The free game is compensation for lost ability to use the services you paid for, namely multiplayer online gaming.
XBL outages don't just mean that online multiplayer is unavailable. It also means that you can't download demos and trailers, and that you can't shop the XBL Marketplace.
But the key part is, you don't lose any paid time. Downloading the demos, trailers, etc will all be there until XBL crumbles. Someone who purchased a three month Gold membership only has three months to do those Gold activities.
Access to the silver service is included with the purchase of any 360. Without access to Live, both silver and gold members cannot access parts of their 360.
Online gaming (gold) is just a small part of the Live service. MSN, marketplace, chat, mailing service, achievements system, leaderboards and more are all part of the package. Xbox live arcade games played on a friend's 360 also need to access Live in order to work beyond the trial versions.
Enetring my profile, then having to wait for 5 minutes until a c
No, but instead, if you have arcade titles you bought on a different Xbox which you've since had to replace, you'll be unable to play those titles if Live isn't up.
Xbox's silver benefits are advertised. That's an expressed warranty that if you get a 360, this service is part of the product. Just because Silver subscribers do not pay additional fees does not mean they don't deserve to use what they already paid for.
And of course, we all know what the xbots would say if the PS3 network, you know, the free one that works, was this unreliable. Or if the PS3 itself was this unreliable. Or if PS3 owners were gouged, for example with $100 wifi adaptors that certainly cost
Seeing as you don't actually pay anything for the Silver service, vs the Gold
Ignoring the $399 people paid for the console that was advertised as offering it.
I don't pay a monthly service fee to Microsoft to "permit" net access on my PC either. I bought the OS with it made pretty clear that I could reasonably expect access as part of what I'd already paid. If they sent out a forced update to all copies of XP that disabled net access in an effort to encourage users to move to Vista, I'd consider it pretty legitimate to be pissed off there too.
Why should Silver members get anything? They weren't paying, so they didn't suffer any material loss whatsoever. Whether the outages were excessive for a $50/year payment is one question, but I don't see how Silver can complain. Heck, what can you even do with Silver other than download updates and post a Gamerscore?
Actually, I was a gold member at the time. I let it expire, and as of tomorrow I'm a silver member. Also, not all of the gold members are paying gold members. When you first join Xbox Live, you get a free month's worth of gold membership for the same reason that the first month of World of WarCrack is free.
Dedicated servers, only if the developer offers them and can be terminated at their whim. You can still play Mechassault for the original Xbox on Live, more than 5 years later.
A system so open that there is no system. Its all up to the developer. Some do it well and some don't, and theres no oversight or requirements.
No universal access to the system from within games. To send or look at messages you have to leave a game and go to the main PS3 screen (whatever they call their dashboard)
Do they have a unified friends list yet? I'm truly not sure.
The problem with PS3 online is its too much like PS2 online: there isn't any strategy really. You may balk at the paltry Live fee, but you get what you pay for.
I didn't start the futile comparison, I only corrected an inaccurate one. I believe our positions are actually closer than you might think. You're right: PSOnline is not Live and doesn't try to be. My personal opinion is that being more like Live would be a better user experience, but then again I like Live. But people who compare the prices of the services like to pretend there's feature parity, and thats just not the case. Their open system does have its advantages. MMOG devs certainly seem to prefer the f
No dedicated servers Laggy online play forcing players to rely on other players Net connections/bandwidth
Wasn't it the Warhawk developers saying that they were also including player hosted games because they realized that dedicated servers weren't the best in all circumstances?
Yeah, it was [playstation.com]. Only having dedicated servers is a bad idea. Even your precious PS3 game devs realize that. They even claim it reduces normal latency issues because you can find games closer to home, especially when in other countries.
Developer hostile and closed.
Because XNA is really tough to get a hold of and play with, right? Especially since the development
Developer hostile and closed. System is designed for complete control by Microsoft and function as a revenue source for them alone. See the six month to year delay Epic is going through having to rewrite UT to work around the problems with Microsoft online service and mods.
Microsoft bashing is all well and good when it's true, but I'm afraid I've got to call bullshit on this one as Xbox is the only reasonably open [wikipedia.org] "next-gen" gaming platform out there. That's right, for a paltry fee ANY programmer can sig
Nope. Bought it from Hastings, they wouldn't take it back. They have a no-return policy on Xbox 360s alone. You can return your wii or ps3, but not your 360. They told me to talk to Microsoft.
Wow. I wonder how many broken 360s they had to replace to force a policy change like that. The only electronics I know stores usually have a policy like that on, are TVs over 30" in size (where there might be a scratch or something in the plastic case, or on the screen, or a defective pixel). In those cases they expl
I think your still missing the point that they did not have to do this. I agree that having your service down for a few days sucks but I think they are making good.
I think your still missing the point that they did not have to do this.
Depends on where you live. In some places Microsoft can't disavow any guarantee of service -- which means they owe the members either a refund or an extension to the service. That would be the right thing to do, not offering some crap game as a freebie.
Next week's XBL news... (Score:5, Funny)
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Not that I really care. I think Microsoft needs to apologize for this apology. But I just won't be renewing. Hell, at this rate, I may as well cancel outright.
Scary... (Score:3, Funny)
Sounds a little scary to me. I can just imagine some burly Microsoft tech taking a baseball bat to my 360. Or kneecaps.
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Well that's just dandy. (Score:2, Interesting)
Thanks to them not thinking of time zones internationally (again!), I for one happen to be away from any kind of technology for exactly that period (plus a day) - that's not cool.
I wouldn't have any serious beef except the fact that people PAID MONEY for a service which was not available to them, much like paying for electricity, cable tv, water, gas, cell phone etc.
As someone who ha
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No, games aren't $100 ea.
A "Year" of Live is 13 months.
If you feel this service isn't worth it, please don't buy it.
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What part of Australia don't you get? Australian games are 99$ -> 119$ (RRP)
13 months schmirteen months, you're paying for what's free on the competing platforms.
I don't feel the service is worth it and due to other issues with them not knowing how to manage a simple database
(http://forums.xbox.com/17297131/ShowPost.aspx)
I doubt I'll redeem the 12 month (sorry, 13 month) card sitting in my drawer.
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XBL vs. Steam (Score:2)
Yes, yes I know they provide a good service with Live and yes I know infrastructure isn't free but hey Sony's service is free.
Before anyone says it, it is not even HALF as bad as people claim, it may not be as good as live but it's certainly not terrible (see: Wii)
Compare Xbox Live to Steam, and it's hard to see what exactly Microsoft is providing for $50/year.
Friends list and notifications? Check. Clans? Check. Achievements? Check. Gamer profiles? Check. Voice chat and instant messaging? Check. Downloadable content store with demos, trailers, and full games? Check. Automatic game updates? Check. Instant access to network features during a game? Check.
But Steam does all that for free.
Oh, and Steam also lets you play on dedicated servers: more players in each game, l
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50$ US a year - but 70$ US a year for the Australians too - let alone other countries which get taken advantage of.
(this is not a physical product, it needs no region coding, it needs no language changes, it's a subscription, why 20% more expensive? - sad)
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Do you know what Steam is short for? Steaming pile of shit.
That is perhaps the worst piece of software I've used.
It takes forever to load (on a dual dual core with a raid 0 (2x 150 raptors) and a 8800). 3rd party games are completely unsupported (oh but they will sell them to you). I bought Call of Duty 4 and could not play it for weeks. Even halflife had issues with crashing and such. Apparently the anti cheat software wasn't compatible with vista 64. meanwhile back at
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Do you know what Steam is short for? Steaming pile of shit. That is perhaps the worst piece of software I've used.
Sorry to hear it. My experience, on the other hand, has been almost perfect. There's been some downtime, but never for as long as XBL was down, and in any case it's free so I can put up with a little less than five nines of reliability.
Never had any crashes, but there have been a few times when I've had to restart Steam because some of my games disappeared from the list. Each time, Steam has come back up quickly, loading faster than iTunes or Trillian.
Of course, I'm using XP, not Vista. Maybe that's your p
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It's a very very very different service now, if you're having problems with the latest builds of steam on a modern machine, go have your machine looked at.
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But I have to ask: Why the hell do you continue to pay them if you are -so- unhappy with them? Seems to me your time and money might be better spent elsewhere while they wake up and realize they can't dick people around simply because they don't live in the US. Of course, they'd realize this a -lot- sooner if people would quit throwing money at them despite the bad service.
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Are you listening, Major Nelson?
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The Xbox 360 is also cheaper than 569$ - that doesn't change the fact the RRP is 569$
We pay RRP 99 -> 119$ RRP for games, the Americans pay 49.99 -> 59.99$ RRP for their games.
both markets we can get deals, the sad thing is the Americans START 25% lower than us in cost on items which are basically IDENTICAL, it's not like they do a control R to replace all instances of color with colour for us now is it?
Size? (Score:2)
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last I looked it was something around 53MB
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50 megs was the old limit, but it's been 250 megs for some time now. Microsoft is supposedly willing to bump that to 450MB on a case-by-case basis (not sure they've ever had to). They do make 512MB memory cards for people who just won't do the HDD thing...
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Constitute an Acceptable Settlement? (Score:2)
Now, this has gotten me wondering if by downloading this game there is some sort of clause or recognition on Microsoft's part that you have in fact accepted this as acceptible compensation, barring you from raising any future disputes about the issue.
Can anyone confirm this?
Undertow? (Score:2)
"To make up for failing to live up to our promises, we're going to take a big, greasy dump on your chest. You're welcome."
I thought I'd be hard-pressed to find a game on the 360 worse than Bullet Witch. I was wrong.
Re:Gold vs. Silver (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
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Without access to Live, both silver and gold members cannot access parts of their 360.
Online gaming (gold) is just a small part of the Live service. MSN, marketplace, chat, mailing service, achievements system, leaderboards and more are all part of the package. Xbox live arcade games played on a friend's 360 also need to access Live in order to work beyond the trial versions.
Enetring my profile, then having to wait for 5 minutes until a c
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Just because Silver subscribers do not pay additional fees does not mean they don't deserve to use what they already paid for.
And of course, we all know what the xbots would say if the PS3 network, you know, the free one that works, was this unreliable. Or if the PS3 itself was this unreliable. Or if PS3 owners were gouged, for example with $100 wifi adaptors that certainly cost
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Seeing as you don't actually pay anything for the Silver service, vs the Gold
Ignoring the $399 people paid for the console that was advertised as offering it.
I don't pay a monthly service fee to Microsoft to "permit" net access on my PC either. I bought the OS with it made pretty clear that I could reasonably expect access as part of what I'd already paid. If they sent out a forced update to all copies of XP that disabled net access in an effort to encourage users to move to Vista, I'd consider it pretty legitimate to be pissed off there too.
Apologists let them get away with sellin
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Re:XBox Online Has Become A Joke (Score:4, Informative)
Dedicated servers, only if the developer offers them and can be terminated at their whim. You can still play Mechassault for the original Xbox on Live, more than 5 years later.
A system so open that there is no system. Its all up to the developer. Some do it well and some don't, and theres no oversight or requirements.
No universal access to the system from within games. To send or look at messages you have to leave a game and go to the main PS3 screen (whatever they call their dashboard)
Do they have a unified friends list yet? I'm truly not sure.
The problem with PS3 online is its too much like PS2 online: there isn't any strategy really. You may balk at the paltry Live fee, but you get what you pay for.
Parent
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Their open system does have its advantages. MMOG devs certainly seem to prefer the f
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No dedicated servers
Laggy online play forcing players to rely on other players Net connections/bandwidth
Wasn't it the Warhawk developers saying that they were also including player hosted games because they realized that dedicated servers weren't the best in all circumstances?
Yeah, it was [playstation.com]. Only having dedicated servers is a bad idea. Even your precious PS3 game devs realize that. They even claim it reduces normal latency issues because you can find games closer to home, especially when in other countries.
Developer hostile and closed.
Because XNA is really tough to get a hold of and play with, right? Especially since the development
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Microsoft bashing is all well and good when it's true, but I'm afraid I've got to call bullshit on this one as Xbox is the only reasonably open [wikipedia.org] "next-gen" gaming platform out there. That's right, for a paltry fee ANY programmer can sig
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Wow. I wonder how many broken 360s they had to replace to force a policy change like that. The only electronics I know stores usually have a policy like that on, are TVs over 30" in size (where there might be a scratch or something in the plastic case, or on the screen, or a defective pixel). In those cases they expl
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