[eastmen]

Originally Posted by betan

As I implied, my expectation is image based, virtual drive like solution (so it should be retro).

g4tv is claiming that hte games will come with a special symbol on the back .


I'm guessing we will see too human (mabye ) gears of war 2 , ff 13 , left 4 dead and some others perhaps patches to big games in the past like gears 1 and gta 4.

[iceberg187]

Originally Posted by RobertR1

I'm curious if the HDD install is only for newer games vs older games also.

"[The hard drive install feature] will allow you to install any game that you want. It's optional, of course," said Xbox Live general manager Marc Whitten. "You can [install] any game that ever shipped, any game that will ship... every game."

http://www.shacknews.com/laryn.x?story=53629

[J_Saint]

Originally Posted by DrJay24

$15 for a different color plastic?

It includes a Play & Charge Cable and matching red rechargeable battery pack.

[DrJay24]

Originally Posted by J_Saint

It includes a Play & Charge Cable and matching red rechargeable battery pack.

Ok, that's cool then.

[AzBat]

Originally Posted by J_Saint

It includes a Play & Charge Cable and matching red rechargeable battery pack.

Thanks for posting that. I had just seen that. Much better deal now.

Tommy McClain

[obonicus]

The copy to HDD thing is intriguing (especially since I have an underutilized Elite, with 80+ gigs free), the dashboard/avatar thing not so much.

It's disappointing that you need to have the disc inside; it kills much of the convenience of the feature for me, though I wonder how dramatic the load-speed increase will be. I imagine that it'll make games like Lost Odyssey much more tolerable.

[eastmen]

Originally Posted by obonicus

The copy to HDD thing is intriguing (especially since I have an underutilized Elite, with 80+ gigs free), the dashboard/avatar thing not so much.

It's disappointing that you need to have the disc inside; it kills much of the convenience of the feature for me, though I wonder how dramatic the load-speed increase will be. I imagine that it'll make games like Lost Odyssey much more tolerable.

what were you expecting , ms to give you free games.

If they didn't include the disc having to be in the tray and checked you'd just have kids buying a game , ripping it to the hardrive and then returning it or selling it back to a store.

ms are many things , but i never thought they were dumb

[obonicus]

Originally Posted by eastmen

what were you expecting , ms to give you free games.

If they didn't include the disc having to be in the tray and checked you'd just have kids buying a game , ripping it to the hardrive and then returning it or selling it back to a store.

ms are many things , but i never thought they were dumb

It's not surprising, but it's still disappointing.

I wouldn't mind, for instance, if new games came with DRM that required an internet connection to play games off the HDD. It'd be especially useful for quickly hopping into an MP game. (And, as unpopular as this is, this'd hurt the used games market, which I imagine more than one publisher would be okay with. Naturally, we're drifting close to PC territory here, but then again consoles are the new PC.)

[eastmen]

Eh , a disc change takes a few seconds and most likely you will only have 1 or 2 games your really playing at the moment anyway.

The way we are with xbox live we quickly settle on the multiplayer game . This year it will most likely be goew 2 and then i will most likely be playing fable 2 or fallout on my own. So I will only keep 3 discs by the player and the rest can go some whre else .

[expletive]

Originally Posted by obonicus

It's not surprising, but it's still disappointing.

I wouldn't mind, for instance, if new games came with DRM that required an internet connection to play games off the HDD. It'd be especially useful for quickly hopping into an MP game. (And, as unpopular as this is, this'd hurt the used games market, which I imagine more than one publisher would be okay with. Naturally, we're drifting close to PC territory here, but then again consoles are the new PC.)

Agree, i'd like to see games come with a serial # you attach to a Live account that allows you to play a game off the HD. They ust released a tool to migrate licenses for DLC from console to console so that problem is already solved. It sure makes it much cooler to be able to go from game to game in a Live party if you dont need to swap the discs in between ( i would imagine).

The fact that it would hurt the used games market may be a reason MS would be reticent to go down this route, they dont want to piss off gamestop that much, yet.

What would be cool is if they would allow this HD-DVD drive to be able to validate a disc so i could have 2 discs in at once. At least it would be good for something these days.

[eastmen]

its not gamestop they have to worry about. Its the buyers.

Gamers will buy a new game at $60 bucks and s ell it a week later after they buy it for $25 and they think gamestop is doing them a favor and they will then add another $45 to it to buy a new game .

Those buyers will be very pissed if they can no longer do that .

the only thing i can think of is that x amount of load ups require a disc to be read. That way say every 15 game players or mabye even a random amount of game plays will require the game to be put in .

[RancidLunchmeat]

Originally Posted by expletive

What would be cool is if they would allow this HD-DVD drive to be able to validate a disc so i could have 2 discs in at once. At least it would be good for something these days.

Can you play regular 360 DVDs in the HD-DVD drive?

[joker454]

Originally Posted by eastmen

Those buyers will be very pissed if they can no longer do that .

Yup, big time. Mind you, I don't lose money by trading them in at Gamestop, I Ebay them and get most of my money back. I buy 20 to 30 games a year and I'm only able to do that because I sell them once I'm bored of them. I have zero interest in any drm laden non optical disc based solution. It's the main reason I don't touch Valve's Steam. It's worthless to me because I can't sell games when I'm done with them. I'm personally really happy with MS's approach. Keep the disc in there for validation, and play the entire game off the hdd. Perfect!

[eastmen]

Originally Posted by RancidLunchmeat

Can you play regular 360 DVDs in the HD-DVD drive?

No you can't , i doubt that the usb band width and the hd dvd drive is fast enough to allow that. but a simple check of the game being in there should be work able, but then again i'm sure ms doesn't want to bring up the hd dvd add on.

Yup, big time. Mind you, I don't lose money by trading them in at Gamestop, I Ebay them and get most of my money back. I buy 20 to 30 games a year and I'm only able to do that because I sell them once I'm bored of them. I have zero interest in any drm laden non optical disc based solution. It's the main reason I don't touch Valve's Steam. It's worthless to me because I can't sell games when I'm done with them. I'm personally really happy with MS's approach. Keep the disc in there for validation, and play the entire game off the hdd. Perfect!

Personaly I buy what really interests me and then I gamefly the rest of the stuff I want. At $15 bucks a month it makes sense .

Once in awhile my buddy will intercept a game at gamestop. Give the guy cash for a game he is trading in. I got metal gear solid 4 for $30 bucks (the game stop ce version) that way.

[quest55720]

After last years E3 I was not expecting much from MS. Honestly I assumed the worst the whole show would be around a new waggle controller. MS blew me away with almost all their stuff today. The new dash board looks very promising. The netflix support is much welcome addition to xbox live for me. The big games gears 2 and fable 2 were better than I expected. Even some of the casual stuff caught my eye. I can see many of my family members loving the games channel including me. I liked the first scene it so I will get the sequal day one. The optional install games to the hard drive is a great idea I hope sony follows suit the key word is optional. Then of course the bomb shell of FF13 gave me goosebumps.

Now it is up to MS to get the price of the system down to get more people to jump in. I can understand them holding right now to clear out the 20 gig units. Once the 20 gig units are cleared out they need to cut the price of all SKUs. I would love a 100 but would settle for 50 for this year.

[eastmen]

quest , i really love the fact that ms is focusing more on the next 6 months. I liked that about last year also .

what sony did with killzone and other games was great at e32005 , however waiting 3 years for them kinda sucks and now any hype i had for them is kinda eh , esp as other games look as good or as close to them and some games like cod4 had such amazing features that i can't imagine them surpasing them.

I really hope the big 3 start to focus on the year instead of stuff 4-5 years out.

oh nintendo did that at last e3 also , they showed all the games i am now playing at home like smash bros , mario kart and wii fit .


as for price cut , $230 for aracade , $300 for 60 gig pro and $400 for the elite isn't a bad deal. most people would buy the pro and some more casuals would go for the aracade , but only hte hardcore would go for the elite . Though it be nice if they added wifi or upped the hardrive. Perhaps a 180 gig drive or even a faster 7200rpm 120 gig drive with more cache would be cool. Give the elite players the benfit of the fastest load times around .

[Graham]

I have to say one of the parts of the presentation I enjoyed the most was actually the codemasters 'in the movies' game.
As silly as it all seemed, and ignoring the terrible voice over :P it actually looked like a lot of fun. Maybe it's just because I enjoy silly things like that. Either way the concept is fantastic.

Beyond that the highlight for me was seeing geometry wars 2. That and the gears 2 demo was significantly better than I expected.

[eastmen]

Originally Posted by Graham

I have to say one of the parts of the presentation I enjoyed the most was actually the codemasters 'in the movies' game.
As silly as it all seemed, and ignoring the terrible voice over :P it actually looked like a lot of fun. Maybe it's just because I enjoy silly things like that. Either way the concept is fantastic.

Beyond that the highlight for me was seeing geometry wars 2. That and the gears 2 demo was significantly better than I expected.

Yea it was kinda like going to disney or universal studios and getting called up to join in on the indiana jones stunt show or one of the other shows .

[Tap In]

LIVE Party system. Create a party of up to eight friends, and stay with them from one game to another, or watch a Netflix movie together, or share a slideshow of your personal photos. It works with all Xbox 360 titles, not just upcoming games. LIVE Party allows up to eight people to chat in the dashboard, so you can meet up before playing.

watching the demo, this appears to be more or less just like the "apartment" in HOME.

you and 7 friends can meet in your dashboard party (as 3d avatars) and do whatever... watch a movie or other shared photos and content, game in the same or different games or chat and then launch into gaming sessions together.

alleged release in fall with the update

[patsu]

Originally Posted by Tap In

watching the demo, this appears to be more or less just like the "apartment" in HOME.

Nope. Playstation Home "apartment" is something else. This is just game launching in Home. Apartment is a personal space where you can invite folks to come over, or to share media with. Clanrooms are (static) shared space for specific themes/games. Developers can implement additional services (e.g., 3D maps for strategizing in Warhawk) in the clanroom or lobbies.

I have not heard of a 8 person limit in Home party (yet ?). Each room can hold up to 64 users. The Home beta users would know more, but they are under NDA.

[Tap In]

Originally Posted by patsu

Apartment is a personal space where you can invite folks to come over, or to share media with.

well i understand it's not the same as Home but I just described (above) Live Party as being able invite 7 additional folks to your party with 3D avatars and a visual representation of the space (although not as detailed as a Home apartment by any means) to share media and hang out as well as launch into games and chat... so you can see why I think it is similar. not identical of course.

[patsu]

Originally Posted by Tap In

well i understand it's not the same as Home but I just described (above) Live Party as being able invite folks to your party (on your dashboard) with 3D avatars and a visual representation of the space (although not as detailed as a Home apartment by any means) to share media as well as launch into games and chat... so you can see why I think it is similar. not identical of course.

I am just pointing out that it's not an "apartment" ^_^
That term is reserved for another use.

Now that I think about it... In R1, we can have 20 men in our party for a 40 player game. So I certainly hope that there is no 8 player limit in Home.

[Tap In]

Originally Posted by patsu

I am just pointing out that it's not an "apartment" ^_^
Now that I think about it... In R1, we can have 20 men in our party for a 40 player game. So I certainly hope that there is no 8 player limit in Home.

yea in game lobbies and clans allow a lot bigger party of friends to play games as well on 360, just not in a Live 3D Party.

[patsu]

Right, having that limit in a party would mean we have to break up our group once we jump from R1 (or rather R2) to another game.

[Tap In]

Originally Posted by patsu

Right, having that limit in a party would mean we have to break up our group once we jump from R1 (or rather R2) to another game.

yes if you have a tight knit group that large, it will suck if party size is limited in the Apartment.

Most parties in the ~6 years I've been playing on Live are less than 8.

We have maybe a group of 3-6 that will gather for Halo or CoD matches to play against others but of course most of those game are total 8-24 player affairs.I think CoD3 was the biggest at 32 and we still rarely got more than 6 together at one time. Safe to say 20 party groups would be handled as Clans and are the exception rather than the norm, at least on LIVE.

You can still send in game invites and have the others join you in the in game lobby too after the party launches.