since the xbox360 relies so heavily on LIVE, shouldn't it be free? I'm not talking about all the content, I'm just talking about the account and the online gaming.

I believe that it should be free if all you wanted to do was play online, but charge for special map downloads and other content.

Is this already happening or is it just a good thought?

I think they are considering making basic Live free and charging fees on these "microtransactions". This is to make it more appealling and probably more competitive against whatever Sony has planned.

EDIT: Live isn't REQUIRED in the traditional sense. It's simply mandatory that the games devs make are Live "Aware". I think this means that games will update stats on the servers if there is a connection.

It should also be free because (here in the UK) you HAVE to have a credit card,

As when companys even get my application they start to slip into the red, I have no chance of getting one, so if Live where a requirement they either need to find other ways of paying for it, or lose customers like myself.

They have prepaid credit cards.

i missed the part about it being heavily dependent on LIVE...
how will it be any more dependent than the current console?

Not as I said in the UK.

Honestly, I am paying for a console that would, in all reality, (as a normal consumer) cost me $3,000+ to build and play a PC that would match the graphics that this console will have. I am not going to bitch about paying $50 a year to have their online services.

I am not bitching abut having to pay it, I would gladly pay it.

i cant though, MS wont let me as I dont have a credit card, and my debit card that i use everywhere both online and offline they dont accept.

So as I said, they will have to find some other way of paying for it, or lose customers (I know 3 people who love xbox but have no cc of the top of my head)

What about a debit card, thats what I use. Can your bank offer you a debit card?

And its not some small bodge it and legit Debit Card, MS in the UK only take visa / Mastercard and american express.


Hopefully it will change in the future, if they intend to make every next gen xbox on live out of the box, they will have to change it to accept bank debit cards etc...

Shows you how much attention I am paying today

lol


I would even by a started kit every year (£40) , I wouldnt want live for premium content, I would only use it to play the odd game online (I am not a big gamer anyways)

It used to annoy me, but I got over it after arguing with a "Xbox Live Customer service Rep" for 30 minutes ove rthe phone,since then I have decided I can live without live

I think that if you have a Xbox1 Live account, it should carry over and you should be able to play xbox1 and xbox2 games online with it. That way, you won't have to pay $100 a year if you want to play xbox2 and xbox1 online.

yeah honestly I don't ever use live... I signed up when Mortal Kombat Deception came out and every 3rd game would drop despite everything checking out ok. So I probably played that for about an hour... Then DOA Ultimate which was fun for a little while but it's the same friggin game I played years ago on my DC so it got boring pretty quick... then Halo 2 came out... played a bit but it's so rampant with cheaters its just plain not fun unless you're playing rumble training (hardly anyone bothers to cheat there) and that gets boring pretty quick.

So for the 5 or 6 months I've had Live I've probably played about 7 or 8 hours total on it and really didn't get much more out of it than I would playing solo or with a couple of friends over... I finally got around to Cracking open Rally Sport Challenge (I got it with my Mt Dew Xbox last summer but never played it until now ) I really like solo so far but my cable internet got knocked out earlier this week (some excavators digging a foundation for an addition to my house). Maybe Forza will offer some good Live action but I'm not holding my breath.

So far the most I've got out of it is some extra content for a few games like Rally Sport Challenge and Splinter Cell. Both of which if I just waited a little longer I could have got from OXM.

So when it comes down to it I hope basic live on X360 is free. I don't play it enough to warrant the price, not to mention if it's $50 a year + micro-transaction fees for added content then it definitely wont be worth it for that...

If I could see international rankings, send messages to friends and play a few racing and fighting games for free that would be great. Then I could only pay for the content I wanted or subscription fees for the more involved games...

I bet MS will be taking a % of every micro transaction fee and with that they could easily afford to give live for free...

Looking at the stats it would seem that only about 10% of all Xbox owners are actually on live... Considering most people who have broadband have wireless (too lazy to wire ) If you plug your Xbox in and power it up... you're on live already... Fancy that, if it's free you just have to select a gamer-tag and you're good to go

Twisted, if you haven't tried it yet, Burnout 3 makes Live totally worth having. Road Rage mode is by far the most fun you'll have online if you like racing games. Party Crash is pretty fun too, but it gets old after a month or so. Just a suggestion seeing as you like racers.

I totally seond that. The only reason I got XBL to begin with was for Phantasy Star, after that Burnout was the only other game I can play on line with and enjoy it.

hmm I'll have to try that... My GF has Burnout 3 but no live account (or network hook up at that) so I've only ever played solo. I might have to "borrow" her disc

If I hadn't been banned from XBL (I left my modchip on when I booted from disc during Halo2 which is how I found X-S to begin with...) I'd be playing Burnout 3 everynite. It's that good. There is something for everyone and noone cheats (that I found). Enjoy!

sounds good to me

I didn't even TRY to use my modded Xbox for live... I keep my MtDew Xbox un-modded for live and the modded one is used for stuff like DVDs (Progressive Scan Hack) and a few games (that have been hacked to play in Progressive Scan) or if I'm going to bring my Xbox to a friends house.

I'm looking forward to trying Burnout3... lets just hope my internet is working again by Monday

I really don't mind paying for it at all.

I can't get enough of Halo2. It is by far my favorite game and one of the reasons I have 3 xboxes.

Twisted, you should check it out again. They have fixed all of the cheating and are resetting the stats in the next couple of weeks, so you will have a level playing field.

I just hope my existing LIVE account transfers over seamlessly when they launch the new version.

/me puts on flame suit

to be honest I never really liked Halo

The only reason I have ever or do ever play it is because that's usually all my friends ever want to play

I'd prefer to play DOA or PGR over Halo, hell I'd even rather play TimeSplitters (more characters, more weapons, faster game play, bots etc.). When it comes down to it I'm really not an FPS player TS tends to keep me entertained with it's fast pace and goofiness. Halo is more for die hard FPS fans, which I'm not.

Though I did pre-order my Special edition Halo 2 and I got about half way through the solo games before putting it up for something else.

I think if you own an Xbox and not halo: J Allard personally comes to your house and bitch slaps you

I really hope that Live IS free on the xbox360. The only reason I play games that often is for the online play, which is why I originally bought a PS2 since online is free. Though I'm sure that there are many people out there who would sacrafice the capabilities and extra functions of xbox Live just to have it for free. MS just wants our money... can't say I blame them lol

If the Silver account turns out to be true and you can play on weekends its good enough for me, but I will NEVER buy the Gold version.. I'll just have to switch to the PS3 if MS thinks they can tax me out of my money with monthly fees for stuff I already paid for several times (once for buying the console, twice for buying the game and trice for the DSL).

I don't see the big problem with paying out £20 a year for xbox live!

It's not just the price of Live!, but also that you must buy the xbox, the game, and pay for your own internet bill... It's just outrageous how MS wants to suck the money out of people.


... It's not like they're hurtin.

Well... I thought that the money didn't actually go to MS, I thought it went to the companies who create the games, I.E. Bungie?

I'm fairly certain that Sony online games run on the individual server of the game company NOT Sony's server (I could be wrong). Where all Xbox Live games run on Xbox servers. It's a good service and you get a lot more out of it than just playing games online. MS isn't going to just give you shit for free, it's not like they get anymore for a live game than a non live game, and it's not like they're getting a cut of your ISP's profits.

Things are only worth as much as someone is willing to pay for them...
if MS charged $500 a month for live how many people do you think would sign up?
if MS charged $1 a year for live how many people do you think would sign up?

The $50 a year price is a maximum profit point. Which means that they get the highest amount of subscribers for the highest price tag for the service. If they go $10 higher in price they'll loose enough members that they'll make less money, and if they go $10 lower in price they won't gain enough new members to make as much as they were at the higher price point.

As time goes on and the service becomes more desirable these figures change and the price of the service gets adjusted accordingly.

The point is... nothing comes without a price tag... all that matters is how much people are willing to pay.

First of all not all countries especially in Europe use credit cards like Visa or Mastercard, but bank account cards. I know tens of people with an xbox but no credit card, so MS is screwed trying to get their money.

Secondly the console market follows the rules of free trade unlike the operating system market that MS is so used to, so the competitor can outdo whatever youre offering, which means I wont HAVE TO pay MS a dime. That's the whole point here, that MS cannot ask for our money for a service that the competition will offer for free.

And even though the stock holders are the very incarnation of evil itself and expect gazillions of profit from every MS venture, as the richest company on earth, MS should bend over where its needed to secure a leading marketplace.

I would gladly pay 100USD more for the X360 if it meant full live service for free for the lifespan of the system, but I will not pay 100USD as a tax from my credit card to the company that already got my money when I got the game.

So if MS doesnt understand this, I have no problem going out to the shop and dish out whatever EA wants for Battlefield2 and play it for FREE every frigging day for the next year on my PC that cost me 2000 USD to upgrade a couple months ago, but I will not pay MS for a monthly fee even if the X360 costs 150USD.

That's the logic, and I'm sure I'm not alone.

Good point. I never really thought into it that hard. But either way I think it is still unnessecary that must throw this fee on top of everything else. I believe that MS could sell more xbox360 consoles in the future if they made online play free. In the American consumer market it seems that the xbox just has more appeal now a days than it did in its launch, being new to its sony rival the PS2. After giving us a taste of what MS and the xbox have to offer, free online play could possibly make it skyrocket over the ps3... except for the fact that the PS3 is expected to run 3x faster than the xbox360. So free xbox live! may be what it NEEDS to keep up with its soon to be competitor.

Though if you disagree with me, I see you through completely. I'm not a marketing person but this just seems plausible.

I would also pay more for the console itself if live was free. I'm sure they could make more money off that than the yearly subscription service of xbox Live!

Exactly Too_Fast. The free Live service would give MS a huge advantage and would help establish a large and active userbase fast. Think of all the peopl who've never played on Live because its not free. If it was free they could try it at their own peace and get sucked into the fun.

And its not as if online games suffer from too many players.. if anything people feel they've not gotten their moneys worth when their game has no players a few weeks from launch.

The supposed Silver account goes A LONG WAY in this respect especially IF the weekends are free or if the Free weekends are announced clearly for everybody to see.. so hopefully MS is at least 80% where I want them to be with the Live service.

I agree that the free service is a great idea...I just wonder what the benefit of a paid subscription is...

What is the "SILVER" account?

50 a year is like, $1 a week. its really not that much

MS loses money selling you their consoles. It costs them lots of money running dedicated servers so Live users can have a decent online gaming experience. I'd also hate to see their internet bills... the bandwidth consumed must be enormous. The fact is, Xbox Live is a pretty damned good service for $5 a month. Considering all these MMORPGs that are out there that charge you $10+ a month for access on top of a $50 charge for the game, and that's just a SINGLE GAME. Xbox Live allows you play online with dozens of titles. Do you want MS to make any money at all from Xbox? Asking for a full-featured Live for free is absurd.

Given, Xbox Live needs to have a standardized interface. Halo 2 is great online, but the fact that you can't pick the exact type of game and map you want to join as you can in other titles, it really is a big "brown spot" on an otherwise clean surface. Still, $4-5 a month is a great deal for Xbox Live.

I don't think MS is going to make Live free, as they have a large customer base who has already paid for a year + of service. If anything, they'll make a limited version of Live available to those w/o credit cards and the cheapskates. Maybe free weekends as some reports have suggested, coupled with a temporarily assigned gamer tag (Weekendslug93045 or something).

from what i gather, XBL will only be free for everyone on weekends.



i think gold subscribers get it all the time, implying that silver users DONT. I think its just a permanant promotion... hoping that if they really like the service, they will buy a gold subscription...

sounds like absolute micro$$oftness to me

No, thats not right.

According to the info we have thus far, a silver account will be the same as a current Live account. You will get all the stuff you are used to with a silver account and you have to pay for it, probably the same amount, $50 a year.

Gold accounts cost considerably more per month, $30, but you get access to every xbox game there is. You can download full games and play them whenever. I think you can download both Xbox1 and Xbox360 games onto your HDD.

To all those bitching about paying for a service, come on get real. Nothing in the world is free get over it!

Why would they do that? Just get gamefly. Plus the stock xbox 360 will come with an optional (at the most) 40GB HDD, which means you couldn't hold many games on there anyways. You'd spend hours just downloading games. Plus people could just download then disconnect and stop paying their bill (till Micro$oft files a lawsuit). Micro$oft is not the type of corperation that would do something this stupid.

Just wait till May 12, they're releasing all information about the xbox 360 to the press.

That's 2 days guys.

I've read silver is free, gold is regular priced, platinum costs $30 a month.

currently there are two "confirmed" (assuming you accept the leak as confirmed) accounts. silver requireing no subscription (except for the $300 system) and then a gold wich has full live capabilities. however there have been some rumours about a "Platnum" live account for downloading your games to the HDD for free (weather that is one year after the games release or immediatly is not clear). I highly doubt that the platnum rumour is true. just some theory someone had after hearing about removable/exchangeable hard drives. While we all would love a platnum it just won't happen

Napster has/had the $10 a month service where you can download all the music you wanted, but you couldn't play it anywhere but Napster while you were online. MS could easily do something similar with downloadable games.

but then what if you were transporting your xbox 360 to take on a trip or something of you have a party and move it into the other room where you don't have an internet connection?

I think to do this they would have to install a wireless reciever if they really only allowed you to play them while on live!

And if not it sounds only good for people who always have their xbox in one place.

I, myslef bring my xbox to friend's houses, in the car on trips, I bring it downstairs to my bigscreen if I have friends over. So, maybe to just me, this doesn't sound really great unless they add a wireless reciever into it, which would probably jack the price up another $50-$80. Plus the price point is not confirmed st $299 but possibly $399.

We'll see in two days.

All three next-gen consoles are going to have WiFi built-in. WiFi cards aren't expensive, you can get them for ~$20US. MS won't sell enough 360s at $399 initially, the basic 360 will be $299.

Actually, if they did have downloadable games, it would probably use their Janus/Play FOr Sure DRM, like in Napster and Rhapsody to go. You have to plug it in to your computer within a certain time or else it will stop playing your songs.

i see them having two live services, one for everyone that allows people to DL content and use that marketplace thing to make MS money, and the other for paying people to actually play the games... i thought that before the leakked info came out... it didnt make sense to me that they would have this marketplace thing and make the live dash built into all games, when only a select few would have live... having two services makes sense... at least to me... but what do i know, im an idiot

the game on demand type service will be STREAMING so it's not like it downloads the whole game and then you play it


the benefit to something like that over a blockbuster or game fly service is its INSTANT...

just imagine your modded Xbox now and you go to your list of games on the hard drive and there before you is every Xbox game ever made at your disposal.... you can click and play any of them

it will sort of be like that... I think it's worth $30 a month