New Xbox Experience coming Nov 19th

[grandmaster]

In fairness, Microsoft has won over the enthusiast crowd. What amazes me about NXE is that they're still spending resources on improving the experience for the hardcore. Avatars are part of a strategy aimed at bringing a whole new audience to the console.

My main issue with NXE is exactly that: by trying to please all the people all the time, MS have risked annoying their core userbase with the Avatars while providing an interface that is, IMO, waaaaay too complex for the casual gamer.

My money is on MS providing the parts for more 'mature' Avatars in the fullness of time. For a cost, of course!

 

[eastmen]

Tou think its too complex ? I think aside from the wii os this is the least complex thing out there. Yes you can get deeper into the menu for all the things a hardcore gamer might want. But all the htings casuals want are right on the surface.

For example to start up a game while in menus is smiple. Go to my xbox a picture of the game you want shows up and u click a to launch.

Some things are even easier than its counter parts . Look atthe avatars and friends list. Nintendo gives you a crazy code you gotta trade with your friend for his. You put that in then you have to go to the miis page and find his mii . With te 360 you go to friends , click a picture of an avatar with a+ next to it. Then it wil show all your friends and what thier status is with visual representation and then on top of that it will show you who they are playing with / whos in thier party .

As for mature avatars... well i think they are going to start making gamer pics into t shirts for the avatars and that will go a long way with fixing one of the problems avatars currently have which is that they dn't have enough options

 

[AzBat]

Anybody seen TheChefO avatar?

Now that's freaky. LOL

Tommy McClain

 

[AlNom]

You think its too complex ?

There are lots of menus thrown at the user from the start. I found that all I needed was in the My Xbox section. I wish I could hide the rest.

I would prefer that Inside Xbox/Spotlight/Video/Game Marketplaces were all under a single tab and if I wanted to look at all that junk I could go there instead of cluttering up my personal experience.

a) My Xbox
b) Friends
c) Marketplace -> and all that follows.

What I found most disorienting was the looped menu. I was looking for something and I kept going in circles (aw haw 360 degrees). At least with the old system, I knew there were defined menus; I couldn't accidentally go to another blade to the right because there was none.

With internet browsing I imagine most would hate it if you scrolled down and found yourself at the very start of the site... if you could call it the start of the site.

 

[Tap In]

...MS have risked annoying their core userbase with the Avatars .

you wouldn't know that by looking at my friend's list last night...:smile: holy crap looks like everyone had a blast taking time with their avatar. the 3d friends list layout rocks. I really feel like this is a new console and I feel more connected to a community than ever. I agree with alstrong that some of the items could go hidden away but if I did that I'd probably miss out on many of the things that will change on a daily, weekly basis that I may want to see (like Inside Xbox etc and online gaming with the stars etc) which was a problem with the blade system.

I just wish the menu defaulted to My Xbox instead of spotlight, but heh, it's the spotlight because they want everyone to see what's going on.

 

[RancidLunchmeat]

Creating the avatar was annoying as hell for me, I didn't want to spend 5 minutes creating the cartoon, but if there was an easy way to skip creating one, I couldn't figure it out.

The menu system also seemed more complicated, and the endless looping bit was irritating.

Sorry, but I don't see the need to have some 'virtual world' as my GUI. Plain, simple menus of options work fine for me. I think all this avatar stuff should be restricted to the 'party channel' or something.

The fact that I took a look at AZbat and saw that he was watching netflix and then the entire 'experience' culminated with freezing my 360, didn't help my overall impressions any.

 

[tcrews]

Creating the avatar was annoying as hell for me, I didn't want to spend 5 minutes creating the cartoon, but if there was an easy way to skip creating one, I couldn't figure it out.

You select one from the screen that is initially presented to you and you're done. That's the quick and way to skip creating one, you use the preset ones they offer. You don't have to edit it.

 

[RancidLunchmeat]

Oh.. and let me mention that editing was annoying too.

Instead of hitting a button for 'complete' or 'move to next item', you have to hit the 'back' button in order to go on to the next editing phase.

Things like that are just irritating. Like hitting the 'start' menu in windows in order to 'shut down'.

I don't want to go BACK, I want to go FORWARD. I don't want to START, I want to STOP.

Somebody over at MS really thinks words have dual meanings when they don't.

 

[NRP]

Add my name to list that doesn't care for the new GUI. Too flashy and generally too complicated. Perhaps it will get easier with use, but as it is, it is trying to be a bit too much in my opinion.

Netflix streaming is very cool however.

 

[Hector]

Updated yesterday, rebooted and tadaaa. 3RL. Now my little white will be away for christmas. Just great

 

[DrJay24]

Does anyone notice weird sound mixing in the Netflix movies, 'm trying to figure out if it's the movies, 360 or Netflx. Some voices are really soft while the sound and music is loud.

 

[Scott_Arm]

I'm warming up to it more. One thing I don't like is the highlighted pane is biased too far to the left. It's not a problem on most screens, but if you're in the movie store or something where the panes are small your eye is not drawn to the selected pane. Not like it isn't usable, but it's a weird choice. It just seems like there's too much focus to the left side of the screen.

 

[makattack]

Anyone else find themselves spending a ton of time on Kingdom for Keflings with their avatar? I thought it was mostly going to be a novelty for me... but the fact I spent all my time with it instead of my unopened copy of Left 4 Dead, that I purchased on the same day has me amused. With this undisciplined approach, my XNA project will never finish.

 

[-tkf-]

Does anyone notice weird sound mixing in the Netflix movies, 'm trying to figure out if it's the movies, 360 or Netflx. Some voices are really soft while the sound and music is loud.

Without knowing exactly what controls you have this sound like the classic case of AC-3/DTS dynamics. Since the movies are mixed for loud playback the voices tend to drown when you see the movie at a low volume. Look for Dynamic setting or something like that. Turn it to max, and it will compress the sound so that effects doesn´t seem so overpowered compared to speech. If you listen at very low volume it may not be enough though.

 

[BoardBonobo]

Updated yesterday, rebooted and tadaaa. 3RL. Now my little white will be away for christmas. Just great

That is just plain unlucky. Very few people have encountered death by update, and it seems that launch units are more susceptible which makes sense. I must say I was a little dubious with this update, but looking forward to the install to HDD feature. This is the first time the 360 has been used since Halo 3 came out and now I have Fable II and GOW2 to get through. If it dies again I won't be replacing it.

 

[DrJay24]

Without knowing exactly what controls you have this sound like the classic case of AC-3/DTS dynamics. Since the movies are mixed for loud playback the voices tend to drown when you see the movie at a low volume. Look for Dynamic setting or something like that. Turn it to max, and it will compress the sound so that effects doesn´t seem so overpowered compared to speech. If you listen at very low volume it may not be enough though.

Thanks for the response, I think it was this particular movie which was screwed. False alarm.

 

[Graham]

I'd have to say the new UI is a success on one very important level: The incentive to explore content.

Last night, I was having a wander through the game marketplace. Looking through the demos, etc. Before I knew it I'd spent a good 45 minutes reading about the demos, watching streamed trailers, looking at the pretty screenshots, etc. I watched trailers for many games I'd never consider, it was all *just there* and stupidly easy to access.

The more I use it, the more I like the structure. The Tomb raider demo is a good example, the combination of nice screen shots, an excellent background image, a very good streaming trailer (the 'watch preview' option) and the 'get demo' button. All they need is a 'purchase and download to harddrive' option .
I wonder if the streaming trailers adjust to your bandwidth as well, I have horrible bandwidth, yet the trailers were going fine last night - although with very noticable compression. The few streaming videos on the old dash were all crazy highres and would buffer for a few minutes before playing a few seconds.

It feels like discovering new things rather than searching for what I already know about.

 

[obonicus]

Is there any way to change your default 'blade'? I really don't care for Spotlight, and it's sorta annoying how it pops back to it always, rather than, say, My Xbox.

 

[AzBat]

I would welcome a way to customize the order of the channels, but personally I would hate to have My Xbox be first. I always liked seeing the yellow flashing icon for Inside Xbox. It let me know when there was new content to look at. With that said, I don't mind so much Spotlight being first or My Xbox being first 2nd or 3rd. Just allow me to move Inside Xbox up a few levels. Continuing with UI change requests, I'd like to make the upper right ticker that displays your Gamerscore or messages/friends to be static. Show all 3 at once and quit flashing between the 2. More suggestions... Add a "Press X" to add a friend on the Friends channel. Right now you have to go all the way to end of the friends list to add one or use your Guide button.

Tommy McClain

 

[Gubbi]

Right now you have to go all the way to end of the friends list to add one or use your Guide button.

Right trigger, then "A".

Cheers