Xbox Live increasing $10 per year

[KINGOFOOTBALL]

At least they let you use USB devices for storage/gamesaves now.


I will say this about the 360/XBL as a dashboard and as a service.

It stopped innovating the day NXE arrived. That was basically MS saying "we're playing catchup in the kiddie market so we'll abandon any significant projects"

Kinect ?
Great premise with the dashboard interaction. But them having to dumbdown the cameras twice now for the sake of costs makes me think it will suck.

Dashboard ?
Slow , cumbersome , often unresponsive in comparison to previous iterations.
Avatars that are only unique if your willing to spend obscene amounts of MS points for a fuckin pair of boots.

Media ?
Media Center was rendered useless with the lack of updates and ZERO work on functionality and UI.
Having to go through Netflix and ESPN to give people content shows just how bad they failed.


Lastly... they have every right to increase there yearly fees. But what they are offering is not in line with it. "Free" membership should come with more features. All this extra social/media garbage should be an optional charge. Silver/Gold/Platinum.
Instead they just force everyone to pay for junk.

[Twigg4075]

At least they let you use USB devices for storage/gamesaves now.


I will say this about the 360/XBL as a dashboard and as a service.

It stopped innovating the day NXE arrived. That was basically MS saying "we're playing catchup in the kiddie market so we'll abandon any significant projects"

Kinect ?
Great premise with the dashboard interaction. But them having to dumbdown the cameras twice now for the sake of costs makes me think it will suck.

Dashboard ?
Slow , cumbersome , often unresponsive in comparison to previous iterations.
Avatars that are only unique if your willing to spend obscene amounts of MS points for a fuckin pair of boots.

Media ?
Media Center was rendered useless with the lack of updates and ZERO work on functionality and UI.
Having to go through Netflix and ESPN to give people content shows just how bad they failed.


Lastly... they have every right to increase there yearly fees. But what they are offering is not in line with it. "Free" membership should come with more features. All this extra social/media garbage should be an optional charge. Silver/Gold/Platinum.
Instead they just force everyone to pay for junk.

The latest news is that voice functionality won't even work on launch. LMAO.

But back to the topic. The more I think about it the more I think that it isn't really the cost increase but the way they decided to do it. I was listening to the CAGcast earlier and they made a ton of great points. One of the things that Shipwreck said was that we are obviously getting a TON more for $60/year then we ever got for $50/year when Live initially launched. But he also said we shouldn't be paying anyway.
Cheapy D made the best point of all though. He was saying it wasn't really the increase but teh way MS went about it. Instead of saying "We are adding enhanced voive chat, expanding your friends list, etc and also working to improve your service everyday. With the costs of all this we unfortunately have to increase the cost $10." Instead they tell you they are enhancing voice chat a week earlier and then just say the other day "The price is going up. Deal with it." It couldn't have been a worse way to do it from a marketing or consumer standpoint. He evn went on to say, chuckling his ass off mind you, that they really threw Major Nelson under the bus, which I totally agree. I think he's a toolbox anyway but they basically said to him "Ok Larry, we're going to need you to post on your blog that Live is going up $10. You're probably going to get a ton of hateful messages. Good luck!"
At least spin it positively.

They also went on to talk about the "double whammy of fan fuck overs" as they referred to it as. They talked about the controller redesign and how stupid they think it is that they are forcing you to buy a play-n-charge kit with the controller at $65, which is exactly what I said. Shipwreck speculated that they will probably release th standalone controller a month or so later at the usual $50 but why piss off the consumers in the beginning in the first place?

[I LastWish I]

over / under on the last time Leaffan got laid?

I am going with 14-18months

[KINGOFOOTBALL]

The latest news is that voice functionality won't even work on launch. LMAO.

But back to the topic. The more I think about it the more I think that it isn't really the cost increase but the way they decided to do it. I was listening to the CAGcast earlier and they made a ton of great points. One of the things that Shipwreck said was that we are obviously getting a TON more for $60/year then we ever got for $50/year when Live initially launched. But he also said we shouldn't be paying anyway.
Cheapy D made the best point of all though. He was saying it wasn't really the increase but teh way MS went about it. Instead of saying "We are adding enhanced voive chat, expanding your friends list, etc and also working to improve your service everyday. With the costs of all this we unfortunately have to increase the cost $10." Instead they tell you they are enhancing voice chat a week earlier and then just say the other day "The price is going up. Deal with it." It couldn't have been a worse way to do it from a marketing or consumer standpoint. He evn went on to say, chuckling his ass off mind you, that they really threw Major Nelson under the bus, which I totally agree. I think he's a toolbox anyway but they basically said to him "Ok Larry, we're going to need you to post on your blog that Live is going up $10. You're probably going to get a ton of hateful messages. Good luck!"
At least spin it positively.

They also went on to talk about the "double whammy of fan fuck overs" as they referred to it as. They talked about the controller redesign and how stupid they think it is that they are forcing you to buy a play-n-charge kit with the controller at $65, which is exactly what I said. Shipwreck speculated that they will probably release th standalone controller a month or so later at the usual $50 but why piss off the consumers in the beginning in the first place?

A. No voice = no purchase. Kinect is quickly heading to flopsville.

B. WTH is this guy doing podcasting ?


C. The play and charge thing is grimy. Felt the same about the Red controller. If it wasnt for Amazon/Buy.com super deals I would never buy a new controller.

D.Agreed with the overall delivery. Just stupid. Listen Gates isnt there anymore. Cant expect MS to be as smart and focused as they used to be. I dont like anything xbox has offered in terms of service/features in 2 years outside of netflix. Kinect was a last hope to win me over.
I hate PS controllers and Gears of War is exclusive so Im not budging anytime soon.

[Twigg4075]

B. WTH is this guy doing podcasting ?

LOL. He's been a member over at CAG (Cheap Ass Gamer) for a while and is a huge G.I. Joe fan, hence the handle. He's been a regular on the podcast, joining Cheapy D and Wombat, at least six months ago. He also does all their game reviews.

[KINGOFOOTBALL]

LOL. He's been a member over at CAG (Cheap Ass Gamer) for a while and is a huge G.I. Joe fan, hence the handle. He's been a regular on the podcast, joining Cheapy D and Wombat, at least six months ago. He also does all their game reviews.

Thought that name was familiar.
Glad it wasnt the joe guy. A fuckin parrot repeating his last words would suck on a podcast.

BTW youve officially bummed me out on Kinect. The ability to pick up sign language and voice commands not being present REALLY turns it into an expensive eye toy.

[stevsta]

kinect will have voice capability at launch but only with english, spanish (mexican), and one other language however they plan to have more languages out next quarter

in regards to sign language they took it out as it wasn't cost affective to leave it in but they said in the future it will be a part of the kinect

I hate the people that say kinect is just an eyetoy b/c it is definitely way more and eyetoy is basically just a laptop camera with motion detection Kinect is the future and in a couple of years its amazing to just think of the possibilities of what it will be able to do

[killgod]

Didn't they say it won't pick up other accents of English? Like Brits/Aussies, etc?

[stevsta]

Didn't they say it won't pick up other accents of English? Like Brits/Aussies, etc?

yep but really the commands it has functions for dont really require that much of an accent like start, stop, menu, etc

[KNUBB]

I hate the people that say kinect is just an eyetoy b/c it is definitely way more and eyetoy is basically just a laptop camera with motion detection Kinect is the future and in a couple of years its amazing to just think of the possibilities of what it will be able to do

I hate to tell you but that is what it is

[leaffan]

Anyone remember that shit software that used to come with web cams back in the day, specifically on Logitechs cams. It came with these "games" where you would play volleyball or this wierd pop the ballon or bubble game.

Remember how shitty that stuff worked. Thats exactly what kinect is going to be unless they have some real time motion detection shit going on but judging by how crappy the demo's were at E3 its going to be a pos.

[leaffan]

The latest news is that voice functionality won't even work on launch. LMAO.

But back to the topic. The more I think about it the more I think that it isn't really the cost increase but the way they decided to do it. I was listening to the CAGcast earlier and they made a ton of great points. One of the things that Shipwreck said was that we are obviously getting a TON more for $60/year then we ever got for $50/year when Live initially launched. But he also said we shouldn't be paying anyway.
Cheapy D made the best point of all though. He was saying it wasn't really the increase but teh way MS went about it. Instead of saying "We are adding enhanced voive chat, expanding your friends list, etc and also working to improve your service everyday. With the costs of all this we unfortunately have to increase the cost $10." Instead they tell you they are enhancing voice chat a week earlier and then just say the other day "The price is going up. Deal with it." It couldn't have been a worse way to do it from a marketing or consumer standpoint. He evn went on to say, chuckling his ass off mind you, that they really threw Major Nelson under the bus, which I totally agree. I think he's a toolbox anyway but they basically said to him "Ok Larry, we're going to need you to post on your blog that Live is going up $10. You're probably going to get a ton of hateful messages. Good luck!"
At least spin it positively.

They also went on to talk about the "double whammy of fan fuck overs" as they referred to it as. They talked about the controller redesign and how stupid they think it is that they are forcing you to buy a play-n-charge kit with the controller at $65, which is exactly what I said. Shipwreck speculated that they will probably release th standalone controller a month or so later at the usual $50 but why piss off the consumers in the beginning in the first place?

Good christ you need to stop listening to these terrible podcasts. Specifically a Cheap Ass Gamer one were all they do is bitch about money and are the stingiest people ever.

On the plus side I did do some re reading and it looks like us canadians arn't getting a price increase outside of the 1month golf cards. So that dumb fuck canadian you posted who had in his email that he'll never buy xbox shit again or something needs to go jump off a bridge.

Its a good thing you don't live in canada. You surely would of been flipping your lid over the price of games here.

[jms493]

I read voice control will work at launch expect some European countries. They dont play video games anyway.

At launch, according to Pitzalis, voice control will be available in the US, UK, Mexico and Japan.

[leaffan]

Voice control should be rather easy to implement considering microsoft has had it in windows for the last 5 years and other companies have been doing it forever.

[Twigg4075]

Good christ you need to stop listening to these terrible podcasts. Specifically a Cheap Ass Gamer one were all they do is bitch about money and are the stingiest people ever.

Have you ever listened to it? They are some pretty knowledgable dudes. Not to mention CAG is one of the biggest gaming sites/communities on the planet.