Xbox Live Free......

thepharcyde · 4 Jan 2009 at 16:16

If MS hosted the games, I would happily pay with no issue. But the fact that host advantage comes into play a lot with the Live setup, it is not perfect by any means.

You can watch replays on COD4 and wonder how you died with 2 bullets!! Game completes 'free for all' and oh lookie here host 25 kills 2 deaths, closest competitor 9 kills 23 deaths!!!

And the 'Host has left' message.
'Cannot migrate host'

Its a bit of a farce

Nor · 4 Jan 2009 at 16:20

thepharcyde said:
If MS hosted the games, I would happily pay with no issue. But the fact that host advantage comes into play a lot with the Live setup, it is not perfect by any means.

You can watch replays on COD4 and wonder how you died with 2 bullets!! Game completes 'free for all' and oh lookie here host 25 kills 2 deaths, closest competitor 9 kills 23 deaths!!!

And the 'Host has left' message.
'Cannot migrate host'

Its a bit of a farce

Agree with that. Hosted servers would be a huge improvement for XBL. Peer to peer gaming does create an uneven playing field in some games, especially FPS games.

Red Porsche · 4 Jan 2009 at 16:31

Nor said:
Agree with that. Hosted servers would be a huge improvement for XBL. Peer to peer gaming does create an uneven playing field in some games, especially FPS games.

I dont see why they dont have dedicated servers. Millions of paying gold members pay an average of 35 quid a year is a hell of a lot of money. Not sure how much dedicated servers would cost.

Ampeg · 4 Jan 2009 at 16:56

Ive been a member since beta and i really do like the service and roughly £3.30 a month doesnt seem like a lot. Have to say I do agree about dedicated servers though, there have been two or three games I havent been able to play online at all because of horrific lag. Given what they must earn from XBL youd think the least they can do would be to provide servers and maybe pull them in favour of p2p once a games popularity begins to decrease.

MouseMat2004 · 4 Jan 2009 at 17:04

I hope not. I got given 2x12month subs for xmas (Well a 13m and a 12m plus I had a 3month already loaded) I'm covered upto 2011 now

I guess thats another little issue, if you do make it free, you'll get very annoyed people who have just bought a 12m sub etc.

I do agree that hosted servers would be nice and would allow for more players. Host advantage can be very obvious sometimes.

McManicMan · 4 Jan 2009 at 17:28

there is no difference in playing online games between the 360 or PS3....

Now if you want say to talk online whilst your mate is playing another game then thats different and does it really need a charge of £40 (for the average person) per year to do so. IMO no.

For me thats the ONLY advantage the 360 has over the PS3 on its Live service that i miss on PSN

Nor · 4 Jan 2009 at 18:47

McManicMan said:
there is no difference in playing online games between the 360 or PS3....

Now if you want say to talk online whilst your mate is playing another game then thats different and does it really need a charge of £40 (for the average person) per year to do so. IMO no.

For me thats the ONLY advantage the 360 has over the PS3 on its Live service that i miss on PSN

Can you compare achievements with friends on PSN out of interest?

Streeteh · 4 Jan 2009 at 18:51

Nor said:
Can you compare achievements with friends on PSN out of interest?

Yus

Nanoman · 4 Jan 2009 at 19:05

If you actually use both youll realise that there isnt much difference apart from headset users. The only thing Live has that PSN doesnt (that I use) is cross game chat which aint worth £28. I laugh a people that say 1 is like omgz11! so much better than the other.

Streeteh · 4 Jan 2009 at 19:09

Thing is, xbox live is better, even if it's a marginal difference in some peoples eyes it does offer more features than the PSN which is why they can justify charging for it. The moment that the PSN introduces some more of the major differences (cross game and party chat) then i think MS will need to rethink their pricing strategy as people will realize that the same quality service could be provided very easily for free.

You pay because at present it is the best online service on offer for consoles, not because it costs more to maintain.

JBeck · 4 Jan 2009 at 19:37

Streeteh said:
You pay because at present it is the best online service on offer for consoles, not because it costs more to maintain.

No, we pay because we have to, if we want to play online with our mates that's what is required. It has nothing to do with being better.

wannabedamned · 4 Jan 2009 at 19:43

Do I think Xbox live will be free? No, Because people pay for it

Do i believe it SHOULD be free? Yeah, Peope are essentially giving MS free cash, For something Sony give out for free

I'm pretty sure a hardware infrastructure costs more to run than a P2P one.

Xbox live only beats PSN in features, which are software at the console end.

At a ping for ping, latency standpoint, I believe most cases PSN is more stable, and constant. And doesn't rely on someone having a Host having a good internet connection.

Streeteh · 4 Jan 2009 at 19:51

JBeck said:
No, we pay because we have to, if we want to play online with our mates that's what is required. It has nothing to do with being better.

Ok fair point, i'll reword it, the reason why microsoft feel justified to charge you for it is because it is the best on offer at present. If the PSN equals it at some point in the future they will have to rethink their pricing.

Pete19s · 4 Jan 2009 at 20:36

Im more than happy to pay for a live sub, however not the £40 that Microsoft charge. A price-drop is long overdue when a 12 month sub is easily available for between £26-28. Sort that out along with the issues stated above and they will be onto a winner.

JBeck · 4 Jan 2009 at 22:00

Streeteh said:
Ok fair point, i'll reword it, the reason why microsoft feel justified to charge you for it is because it is the best on offer at present. If the PSN equals it at some point in the future they will have to rethink their pricing.

It depends how you look at things...

When you're actually in the game, shooting, getting shot or racing, then both have the same end effect.

However, the 'integration' of live is better and has some really neat touches. They really are streets ahead in that repect. It does lack a simple thing though - a region filter, very important to me as I'm sick of gobby yank idiots and their crap laggy games.

MS will never ever do live for free as they make a serious amount of money from it. That is their justification for charging, it has nothing to do with the fact it's 'better'. A worthy point is the fact that Sony offer dedicated servers for free, where MS charge for P2P gaming. For that there is (imo) no justification.

I have and enjoy both, I'd just rather not pay for one of them

Edit - I personally think that MS should let you game on a Silver sub and have access to the marketplace on a Gold, or something along those lines.

orderoftheflame · 5 Jan 2009 at 07:30

JBeck said:
Edit - I personally think that MS should let you game on a Silver sub and have access to the marketplace on a Gold, or something along those lines.

That makes absolutely no sense to do. :confused:

Charging people to go into the marketplace, just so that they can in turn spend their money? You want to have the marketplace open to all, so anyone can spend money.

V4NT0M · 5 Jan 2009 at 09:26

Nor said:
I'm glad it's not free to be honest. Reduces the number of idiots online, and ensures a good whack of cash is spent on developing and improving it. Onling gaming on the 360 wouldn't be as good if it was free.

Surely more idiots is always better than less idiots?

Mr Jones · 5 Jan 2009 at 09:34

Skyfall said:
Surely more idiots is always better than less idiots?

The 360 already has enough annoying kids who can afford Live. Think of the amount of that increasing because now any kid with an internet connection and an xbox will be Online?

I am happy paying MS for the Live feature and would look forward to MS doing some kind of age limit login - so anyone above the age of say 18 or 21 can play Adults only gaming sessions on say Vagas 2 type of gaming. I really really hate kids that think it's funny popping their team mates on friendly fire tactical shooting games.

JBeck · 5 Jan 2009 at 10:45

orderoftheflame said:
That makes absolutely no sense to do.

Charging people to go into the marketplace, just so that they can in turn spend their money? You want to have the marketplace open to all, so anyone can spend money.

No wonder you're confused, you've obviously missed the point.... Paying a Gold sub would give you access to free material on the marketplace.

TerryWogan · 5 Jan 2009 at 11:51

I'm happy to pay for it because it's a great service. Demos, etc. are uploaded swiftly and the whole thing is very easy to use. HOWEVER, the fact that it's full of advertising as well, AND the new dashboard defaults to the advertising section when you turn the console on is absolutely ridiculous. If they want to charge us, the ads shouldn't be there.