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XBox Live is coming to Windows 8
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13-09-2011 9:59pm#1Well, I can see this being a really fun thread...We are confirming that we will be bringing Xbox LIVE to the PC with Xbox LIVE on Windows. We are very excited about Xbox LIVE coming to Windows 8. Xbox LIVE brings your games, music, movies, and TV shows to your favorite Microsoft and Windows devices. Bringing Xbox LIVE to Windows 8 is part of our vision to bring you all the entertainment you want, shared with the people you care about, made easy. At BUILD we are showing that it is easy for developers to create games for Windows 8 that take advantage of the power of Xbox LIVE. We have much more detail to share about the capabilities of Xbox LIVE on Windows and look forward to the opportunity to do so in the near future.
It's kind of hard to give a solid opinion on this since there's been so little information released so far but it certainly raises a few questions. Is this the beginning of the PC/XBox cross-platform gaming which was hinted at a couple of months ago? Would this mean backwards compatibility between platforms or just online play? Does this mark the end of GFWL as we know it? Will it result in a complete redesign of the old service or is it just a name change? Will developers be under the same limitations when it comes to submitting patches via the service for PC? Will they have control over their own pricing? Will the service itself be free?
And most importantly, how funny is the internet rage going to be?
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Well, I can see this being a really fun thread...
It's kind of hard to give a solid opinion on this since there's been so little information released so far but it certainly raises a few questions. Is this the beginning of the PC/XBox cross-platform gaming which was hinted at a couple of months ago? Would this mean backwards compatibility between platforms or just online play? Does this mark the end of GFWL as we know it? Will it result in a complete redesign of the old service or is it just a name change? Will developers be under the same limitations when it comes to submitting patches via the service for PC? Will they have control over their own pricing?
And most importantly, how funny is the internet rage going to be?
Dunno about the rest, but as for the bolded part.........hilarious and facepalm inducing in equal measure, with a bit of Professor Farnsworth "I dont want to live on this Earth anymore" thrown in.0 -
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Even Microsoft don't know what to do with their PC gaming service. They want their Windows offering to be good enough to take market share away from the likes of Steam - but not good enough to take anyone away from the console, where MS have total control (gaining revenue from each piece of media sold, peripherals, advertising, and yearly subscription fees).
Compete with Steam, whilst ensuring the best experience can be had on their console. I can't wait to see future advertising campaigns.
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The best test to do there was ask have they used it.ShadowHearth wrote: »I don't give two ****s about fanboism, but system it self was pain in the w
Hole. It was even worse when you had a steam game working in games for windows platform. It was just really bad.
I didn't heard rants about glorious pc race bitching about console software being on pc, but I really heard bitching about quality of it.
I only had one experience with it and that was with Bioshock 2. It...did not end well. But then again, I also used Steam from the start so was quite aware of how bad that was to. I guess the difference was that Steam improved dramatically over time whereas GFWL floundered due to MS not improving it. If it's going to be integrated into the OS however, I'd wager it'll get far more attention.
See I love Steam, it works great, has a great UI, great sales and is just simple to use. But I still don't like the idea of one publisher having that much power over a platform. As odd as it sounds, I'd be more comfortable with an OS vendor who is hands off (I can't stress that last point enough) delivering a more integrated solution for all of my games.ShadowHearth wrote: »It is really too soon to judge it. I can't see nothing that it can give, what steam is giving already. Steam even has achievements for all those achievement junkies.0 -
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Quite true. Microsoft, however, not only have the resources and talent to equal them in every way, but they also have the ability to integrate directly into the OS and thus across multiple platforms with this service. Of course, that doesn't mean squat if they don't pull it off properly and hey, it wouldn't be the first time they've dropped the ball on something like this.Well, it's not like Steam doesn't have a handful of competitors. But they have just done it right.
Nope, not Steamworks, I literally mean a Steam-esque service built in at an OS level which includes all the features that Steam has. Look at Windows 8 as it is, it's ready going to have it's own App Store built in, why not extend that to games? While that infrastructure is being implemented, why not add automatic patching into the system? Microsoft recently bought Skype as we're all aware, hello built-in communications tech. Skydrive backend already there? Say hi to cloud saves and configs. See what I mean?Now though, I think you might be talking about Steamworks. That part I can understand, but it is rather nice that there is a unified thing across all games and whatnot. I do agree that I wish that steamworks and other APIs like it were themselves cross-platform - that is, it would be great if you achievements on you XBL ported over to your game on Steam, or you could otherwise basically share the same profile. Thats sort of the holy grail for the gaming industry and it has been for years. Early concepts though basically envisioned it like Reboot though, where your same game character ported into other games. Realistically though the idea that you should be able to have one unified profile (in whatever flavor you like - Origin, Steam, etc) would be nice.
As for the future, well my own personal utopia is simple. Each retailer and/or publisher has their own online store. Game purchases are kept track of on their end, with the files stored locally yet available for redownload later with no restrictions. Patches are pushed out automatically when available.
Sound familiar? Sure, but here's the kicker, all of this functionality is exposed via a publicly available API. This would allow third parties to build a front end, either desktop or browser based, which can access these stores for searching and purchasing, keep track of purchases/store game lists and store saves either locally or connect to your preferred cloud service. Games can be launched locally and friends tracking can be done using whatever app you wish. These services can be switched using a simple plugin system.
The best thing about this? It's completely open, you wouldn't be restricted to using the client with one store and as a result, you'd only ever need one client on your machine. This would force companies to actually be competitive since they'd be directly up against each other within the same distribution channel. it would also encourage companies, not necessarily games developers, to work on well-written, powerful and usable front end applications.
Any chance of something like this happening any time soon? Certainly not, but it's certainly attainable at some point, at least technically. What it would require is the companies to come together to agree on a secure yet usable standard and for each of the major players to realise they can't control the market themselves.0 -
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Robert ninja wrote: »Wow what a useless thing to create. I can't see any merit at all in using such a service. I guess the staff at MC had nothing better to do but create this. Gotta look busy n' all.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrSTkSqztAA
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