Xbox Live confirmed for Windows 8

Xbox live on Windows 8 demo

 

Doesn't GFWL just need a rebrand?

I bet most of the apps will be <$20 by nature, with Steam still handling the big titles initially.
But here's where it gets a bit more interesting. If the next Xbox is x86 and off-the-shelf/close-cousin bespoke, you could see easy ports to Windows...

and publishers toying with lower pricepoints for big games if they decide not to to release through Steam and/or (mainly) normal retail. How about $40 flat?

Steam doesn't care about non-VAC cheaters or pirates (GCF freeloaders that use a hacked Steam), but try playing hacking into the AppX update / authentication cycle. The last time someone tried to download something off the marketplace free, it got them a ban till 9999.

 

It needs more than that really, XBlive needs to be one and the same across every device. For example last time I was playing an XBLive supported game on PC I could see my other friends on Live but I couldn't chat with them. Chatting with others on XBLive is common as it's a very social place, so why wouldn't it let me do it across the PC/360 boundary? Limits like that simply have to go. Further...I really shouldn't be able to tell the difference on XBLive if I'm on console or PC, they should be functionally one and the same.

Pure speculation on my part....but I'm starting to suspect that the next Xbox will basically be slightly improved laptop grade hardware of the time shoved into a console and effectively running a subset of Windows 8. Windows phones and tablets will represent the baseline and they will each run each others software but they will represent a subset of the Windows app world. Xbox console will be a superset that runs it's own apps as well as all phone and tablet apps using Kinect or the controller instead of gesture swipes and touch. PC/Laptop will also run phone and tablet apps just like the console does using mouse/keyboard instead of gesture swipes and touch. PC/Laptop and Xbox console will each have their own apps unique to themselves, I don't think those will cross. But I really do think the line will start to get very blurry, and I expect the next Xbox console to more or less be running a flavor Windows 8 without the desktop part in there. There doesn't seem to be much reason in my mind to keep separate sku's going when one OS can more or less rule them all, with phone/tablet based stuff representing the low end that can be totally run/emulated on the higher end pc's and consoles. Finally, one common XBLive interface across them all unifying the entire experience.

Interesting times are coming our way

 

Live should become the social and entertainment hub across all MS devices. The 360 successor should just be another device with fixed hardware that can support Live.

 

Or rather, Xbox (the fixed-hardware box for Direct X) dies and is replaced with LiveBox (the fixed hardware box for using Live!).

 

Only 2 years ago I would habe agreed, but today every major electronics store has Apple computers on sale. Maybe not all over the world, but certainly in the US and most parts of Europe. Maybe its the iPad effect, everybody has to sell those since last year. And where the iPads are - at least some iMacs and Macbooks are usually on display as well and AFAIK their're quite popular too.

The days of MS as the big Monopoly and everbody else as the underdogs are over (only if you're limiting yourself to desktop OSes, but that'd mean missing the big picture!). Google and Apple have risen and even surpassed MS in many areas, if not in market- then at least in mindshare.

As for the Win8 marketplace - I don't see how that's supposed to be a bad thing? Did you even watch the demos? You don't have to sell your software through there. You can have your apps (for example a traditional Desktop App) listed and just have the store link to your own sales website if you don't want to use MS's licensing model. I see this as a win-win scenario for all Windows developers really.

Back to topic, I think its a good direction to integrate Xbox Live into Windows. GFWL was a half hearted attempt, they'll have to do better this time around. If I can chat between Xbox/W8 (and later maybe even WP8), seamlessly use my profile (and share licenses - e.g. for music and movies) on all machines at the same time and maybe even get cross-platform multiplayer in certain titles - now that'd be cool. At least if they manage to get all of that working outside the US too ...

 

Well, since Windows Phone Apps are silverlight (on top of CLR) or XNA (on top of CLR), the XBox could (technically) run them today, since CLR apps are architecture independent. We already know that CLR apps run on the XBox, because the XBLIG apps are all XNA based.

 

cross platform MP game vid Win 8 Win Phone assuming Xbox is next

 

Now we're talking!

 

Talking about social/flash type games ... not real games. Nothing will change, part of them still wants people to just stop playing real games on the PC. It's the part which usually wins, so they're still digging their own grave.

 

Certainly from my point of view that's a definate possibility. If Windows 8/XBL for Windows is designed to further seperate PC's from high end gaming then I don't see me moving to it which will be the first Windows update in over a decade that I haven't been there for day one.

On the other hand if they do it right and intergrate well with the high end games via XBL - effectively giving the PC it's own gaming centre (like the games explorer in Vista/W7, but actually worth something) then I'll be at the front of the queue. Assuming the rest of the OS is up to standard anyway - so far I'm on the fence about that.

 

You guys have no vision, and you're too negative. Why does every new development have to lead to something terrible?

 

I have vision ... I also have common sense. The name says it all really.

If they wanted to co-brand they would simply have called the entire platform Microsoft Live ... but that's not what this is about, the XBOX and the PC are meant to be "separate but equal".

 

I've always been first in the queue for each new version of Windows and I was one of the biggest supporters of the games explorer and GfWL concepts when they originally came out.

I'll be made up if this is a drive to strengthen PC gaming but my faith in MS's willingness to support high end PC gaming has been beaten to virtually zero by their behavior in recent years. It's down to them now to turn it around but we'll see in the next 12 months or so which view point has more merit.

I hope it's yours.

 

Depends if this allows MS to make money on PC gaming or not.

 

Losing market share to Apple and Android makes them negative money.

 

yes gamers have been flocking to macs

 

Well yes, xbox gamers.

 

MS already makes money on xbox gamers...