6 Reasons Why Xbox Live is Failing 10 Years Later

This past week was the celebration for Xbox Live’s 10 year anniversary. While this is the PlayStation University, congratulations are in store for the service that brought online gaming to the forefront of the console experience first off. Before Xbox Live’s inception on the original Xbox, online interactions were mostly limited to the PC community. PlayStation Network is still much younger than its Microsoft counterpart, but Xbox Live could learn a thing or two from how Sony has been running its online portal. Below are my 10 reasons that Xbox Live is failing 10 years down the road. Note: Unless otherwise stated, my points will be discussing Xbox Live Gold vs. PlayStation Plus.

6) People Don’t Care About the Free Stuff that You Actually Do Give Away

If you’re unclear on what I’m referring to, some education is in store. In a way of celebrating 10 years of Xbox Live, Microsoft decided to manufacture some extremely limited edition consoles to ship out to its most dedicated fans that have been there from the very beginning. Explain to me how this makes sense. If they have been fans since the beginning and are still members, why are you sending them a console they already own? I’m sure those gamers would have been much happier with something like a lifetime Gold membership, or at least a few free years…but that would be more lost money for Micro$oft so we can’t have that!

5) Lack of Automated Updates

In a way to combat the connection inefficiencies, Sony offers automatic game update downloads and patching for your installed software. This is a great feature that cuts down on time spent not playing games. Basically, you set up a time for your PS3 to kick on and check for updates. This isn’t a major plus or minus on either side, but it is a sign of where M$ priorities lie in the issue of making wallets happy vs. making customers happy.

4) Demos vs. Game Trials

You might ask yourself “How are game trials better and/or different than a game demo?” Well class, thanks for asking, there are a few reasons! First, it is the final game itself, not a demo build of the game that is likely unfinished. Second, it lets you see how the game actually starts and whether or not you would enjoy the core game itself. Finally, a demo is a pre-constructed preview of the game that often is too short, and is even more often, not representative of the final product. 1-hour game trials let you play the  actual game and see if you like it…for free. Xbox Live only has demos, PS Plus has both.

Keep reading for three more reasons why Xbox Live is failing…

About the author

David Jagneaux

I am The Dean (Editor-in-Chief) of PlayStation University. As a lifelong lover of both playing games and communicating, I knew that gaming journalism was the perfect fit. Over the years I have honed these skills in order to distinguish myself as an ambitious and creative writer passionate about gaming and the games industry.

Readers Comments (37)

  1. Couldn’t agree more, I am not sure what is worse: that Microsoft is so greedy that think this is good business practice, or that Xbox users are willing to put up with this blatant profiteering.

  2. i pay xbox live and i dont regret for betting in xbox live. playstation doesnt have party system ,this is huge, has huge updates that take 30 minutes, doesnt have so many good arcade titles, and dont make start with the lattest issues the psn and like 2 months without psn, so i think i will stick with xbox live

  3. @ fire, um did u not read the article with plus u dont have to worry about those long 30min. updates so u can spend more time playing your game instead of sitting through long updates. i for one know for a fact 360 fans are jealous of PS+ service cause i hear it all the time with my 360 owning fans wich includes 2 of my brothers and about a dozen friends. So yea now i sit back as Sony pretty much caught up to 360 in sales overall and laugh at all those haters from a few years back. So if u dont own a PS3 im guessing u must like the nickle & diming tactics Microsoft puts on u as a fan on top of all that advertising u are paying to be plastered on your dashboard. One thing i do know next console cycle my 2 bros & friends said they wont buy MS products and are all switching to PS4 or Orbis.

  4. I have both a PS3 and an Xbox 360. Pay for Live and Plus. And I’m about to put your little list here to shame:

    #6 – Why are you complaining about a hardware company that gives you a brand spanking new console for free and saying that people don’t want it? IT’S FREE!!! People will take it. People will love it. People will display that thing in a glass case and proudly display it. They could have not given their most dedicated fans anything and this wouldn’t have even appeared on your list. It’s your opinion that people don’t want it which is a stupid opinion.

    #5 – Oh, I’m sorry Live doesn’t have a way to save users 10 seconds for game updates by doing it automatically. You know why? Because Live’s updates aren’t 5-20 minutes long like on PSN! Nuff said.

    #4 – Depends. Some games start super slow and don’t pick up until an hour into the game. Fallout 3 is a good example. I’d rather have a demo of Fallout 3 that starts halfway through the game and experience the real fun the game can provide not just the tutorials. At least all of Live’s downloadable games (aka Arcade games) DO have demos unlike PSN.

    #3 – This is so far the only valid point. Yes, it sucks to have to pay for Gold just to access Netflix and YouTube. But most people already have Gold to play online so they don’t even worry about it. In fact, I didn’t even know Netflix didn’t work without Gold until about a year after the Netflix app appeared on Live.

    Also, the free selection of games does seem like a good deal. But then again, most games that are free on there I should have already played if I was gaming on just one console. Deus Ex: Human Revolution, RE5, Borderlands… I’ve played all those games already, so now I’m just paying for Plus to play the lesser downloadable games for free.

    #2 – Ads are so unnoticeable that they’re not even worth having their own number. Also, the new update made the organization of the dashboard WAY better so you’re just making up reasons now.

    #1 – Wasn’t this already part of #3? You couldn’t even list 6 legit reasons without repeating one?

    • I appreciate the comment. I have also used Xbox Silver, Gold, PSN and PSN Plus. In regards to your responses:

      6) It isn’t that giving away a console isn’t a cool promotional idea, but that’s all it really is. Outside of a logo design on the console and a slightly shinier controller, there isn’t a difference. Gamers could display the console or sell it or something like that, but it just seems like if they have been a member all these years, if they were going to do something at all, it would have been cool to see a bit more.

      5) Not all Live updates are 10 seconds and not all PSN updates are 10+ minutes. I understand that it’s not a big deal to most, but at the same time it’s just a convenience/time saving factor that is very much appreciated.

      4) Demos and trials of games like Fallout 3 don’t happen anyways. The logic of my argument is that demos are nice, game trials are very nice and having both is nicest. You would be wrong in dismissing the fact that, a lot of the time, demos do not accurately represent the final game.

      3) This logic confuses me again. Not everyone that has an Xbox always pays for Live Gold. A lot of people only pay when a new multiplayer game they want to experience comes out. A lot of families don’t even play online much, but use their 360 as a media center. If Microsoft expects for the 360 to actually become the center of a living room, like they have said, why do they charge people extra money to access things they have already paid for? Just because a lot of people probably already pay that other fee is NOT justification for REQUIRING it.

      Also – the statement “should have already played” doesn’t make sense to me. Not all gamers buy every game that comes out (I know I don’t.) This service not only gives you access to great exclusive titles (LittleBigPlanet, inFAMOUS) but also great mutliplatform titles that you may have missed out on, like the ones listed.

      2) This is clearly a matter of opinion, I guess, but I don’t see the point of ads if they are already charging people just to access half of the console’s features.

      1) No, it was a bullet point within the overall argument in point 3, but it deserved its own separate explanation.

      Thanks for your comment!

      • Quote: “3) This logic confuses me again. Not everyone that has an Xbox always pays for Live Gold. A lot of people only pay when a new multiplayer game they want to experience comes out. A lot of families don’t even play online much, but use their 360 as a media center. If Microsoft expects for the 360 to actually become the center of a living room, like they have said, why do they charge people extra money to access things they have already paid for? Just because a lot of people probably already pay that other fee is NOT justification for REQUIRING it.”

        You paid for a laptop/desktop computer. You paid for a tv. You paid for Rent/or owning a house. Do you get anything free from it? Do you watch free cable/satelite tv? Do you get free internet. Is your water and electricity free? No. Why? because you have to pay extra for everything. Justify Why you have a tv but no free tv shows. Your logic does not make sense. Even Apple computers do not come free with anything.

        • Your examples don’t really apply in this situation. Yes, I paid for the TV and I could pay for cable, internet, Hulu Plus, Netflix etc. The difference is this: I don’t get charged a membership for the rights to view the content (I already subscribe to like cable or Netflix) on a TV that I have already paid for.

          Think of it like this: does your computer make you pay an extra fee to watch Netflix? No, you already bought the computer, pay for internet, and pay for Netflix. Requiring Gold to view that content makes no sense at all to me. It’s the extra fee that I take issue with, not having to pay for cable.

        • Your logic makes no lick of sense.

      • #6 – They’re getting a new rare console, with a rare controller, with 250 GB of memory, and a free year of Live… I don’t know what more they would want. At the current price of a console, that’s about a $360 prize, at least, without considering the rarity factor.

        #5 – MOST 360 updates are 10 seconds and MOST PS3 updates are 10 minutes.

        #4 – Agreed. It is better to have both. However, I personally hate having to download a 1.5GB trial that takes an hour to download just to play a 30 minute to an hour section of the game. It might be a better representation of the finished game, but I have never played a demo that strayed significantly from the finished game. Most demos simply dumb down the difficulty (or make you immortal) for the sake of getting you through the entire demo, but I have yet to find something more severe than that.

        #3 – The reason for Live is to access their network. This isn’t much different than you paying to access cable or satellite on your TV. You can buy a stand-alone satellite system from DirecTV, but it’s not going to do you any good without their service. And even after you pay for their service, you still have to pay extra for premium channels like HBO, Showtime, Sport Packages, and even On-Demand movies. These are extraneous deals that DirecTV has made with the networks to be able to pass along access to their customers. So they need to charge all customers (not just the ones who pay premiums for it) an extra fee to keep these deals up and running. It’s a business. The only way to stay in business is to make a profit. This is akin to how business on Live is conducted, and why you must pay for Gold to access Netflix, Hulu, ect. This is also the reason why Sony’s entertainment department has been having financial issues since the release of the PS3. So in short, yes, free is better for customers… but it’s bad for business. And I understand why they do it from a business point of view.

        Also, most of the games offered through Plus are major console releases/exclusives that should definitely be in most hardcore gamers’ collection, and many casual gamers have bought because of word of mouth. And again, it is a good service, there is no denying that. But let’s label it what it is which is a rental service similar to GameFly. None of these games are yours to keep, and none of them are technically free since you are paying for the service. Backgrounds and icons are nice to keep but in reality, they’re worthless. 360 gives you a bunch of them for free as well as Avatar Awards but no one ever brings that up as a positive point, because it’s so insignificant.

        #2 – Ads are just a form of additional revenue (going back to the business point). And like I said, they are so unnoticeable that it shouldn’t be an issue unless you’re looking for an issue to make.

        #1 – Then you shouldn’t have brought it up in #3. Learn from your mistakes for the next time you make a list. Now you have other people calling you out in the comments for only coming up with 5 reasons and a repeat.

      • I think the better way of explaining #6 is thumbs up to a brand new console… The good side = a brand new console for another room in the house. The bad side = another Gold Live acount to pay for just to access points made in #3… I’ll take the free year of Gold membership over another console or better yet A free console + free Gold membership for a 3 month or 6 months or a year… now that is what i call a very well handled thank you for 10 years.

        • Why would you need to setup another account? You can use your current account on as many consoles as you want and just keep your saves in the cloud. I have 2 Xbox 360s (one in my bedroom, one in my living room) but only one account that is accessible on both consoles.

    • I agree:
      #6 Sony fans are not used to being appreciated, completely alien to them.
      #5 Only 2 minutes for me to do a full dashboard update, including reboot. PSN users get 20 minutes, sucks to be you.
      #4 Your full of $$$$, xbl has both demos and trials.
      #3 This is a moot point. I don’t know about ps3 fans but xbox owners mostly use their console for online gaming. Since we game online, we would buy gold whether use of netflix is free or not. PS+ does have all thoughs free old games that I played about 3 years ago. Is my “envy” showing?
      #2 Ads are located on one tile, thats it! Sounds like you need to sack up.
      #1 You’re pathetic, 6 reasons = 5 and 1 repeat reasons apparently.
      You fail at life

  5. you get what you pay for, everyone knows xbox live is the much better for online gaming, psn has had quite alot of issues over the past few years

    • I just knew that someone in the comments was going to bring up “Xbox has better online.” Just because you pay for it doesn’t make it better. The only difference in how good the online is is how well the netcode is written.

      Tekken 6 and Mortal Kombat are great fighting games, but the netcode is horrible. If both you and the other player aren’t playing with a very good internet speed, then there will be either lag or button lag on both games on both systems.

      Mortal Kombat on the Vita has great netcode. Runs better than both the PS360.

      Persona 4 Arena. Why not Google this. The developers themselves said the 360 version has issues with lag.

      Eurogamer did an article on PS360 latency called the lag effect. Here’s a quote. “While P2P gaming generally has a less than stellar reputation with online gamers, we actually found that the latencies between players in Uncharted 3 where amongst the lowest in all the games we tested.” The article is a good read and not 360 vs PS3, but lag in general.

      So hopefully that helps out with the XBL Gold makes online better myth. A myth created by butt hurt 360 owners that have to justify their yearly Xbox Live payment.

      Now if you excuse me. I’m going to play some survival on Left 4 Dead without having to pay a yearly fee.

  6. I find it laughable that people bring up the psn shutdown that was so long ago and we got free games. if your going to mention a psn hack what about mentioning all the xbox live members who have had there accounts hacked or stolen and put up for sale on other sites? Dont be a hypocrite!

  7. #6 Has PSN given any consoles to their dedicated users? You said you would rather see people get free membership then a console. hmm. personally id rather pay $60 a year and reap the rewards of being a member on xbox then sit on psn and get nothing. Hell, id be happy with another xbox. i have 2 WORKING xbox’s gave one away because i wanted the new one. And if i had the limited edition. id give display it or something. Its something to be thankful for. You on the other hand are jealous that PSN does not give away anything other then cheap games that have been paid off 1000 times over.

    #5 Updates. big deal that PSN automatically updates. it also burns up storage in your system on all the games you play and updates. i only play a few games at a time and move on. so if it updated my game collection on my xbox it would of updated over 200 xbox 360 games and kill my hard drive. id rather select what updates and when it updates instead of turning on a console with no storage left to save a tetris game.

    #4 Demos Vs Game Trials.
    Id rather look at videos of games and try it either via demo or trial either way im happy at least the game manufacturer took time to make one. and yes its the game producer not xbox themselves that say who gets the demo/trial instead of the console company itself. So your whining about the wrong company. and most times if i want to play the game to get a feel of it. id rather play the game instead of the tutorial trying to learn how to play it then find out hey now i learned how to play it that 30 minutes lets play it….oh wait thats all? damn that sucked. id rather jump in a game and have fun and learn.

    #3. Youtube Netflixs hulu who cares. yeah its nice to have it on the xbox console. and guess what else you can do on the console. You can group watch a movie on it. can you do that with the PSN. no you cant. you cant even party chat or anything close to it.

    #2 Advertisement: There are ads on Xbox live dashboard? damn must be so small i dont notice it. oh…yeah i see them now. the ones advertising for new games coming out on both the PSN and Xbox. oh wait its advertising for the PSN system to? oh that must be a glitch. no it does it more then once the same exact way. hmm. odd….. does that happen on PSN? oh it dont? damn.

    #1. Free Games.
    Okay the free games are games that have been out since PS1. Nice. nothing like some old outdated games giving away because they have already had their profits maxed out 1000 times so lets give them away….hmm im feeling deja vue. yeah you said it before about free games and such. How about making an honest 6 list bash on something instead of a 5 with a repeat of one because you couldnt come up with a really good 6th one. and make the number 1 more important then some crappy old school i got free games stuff. Only reason alot of PSNers are pissed at Xbox is it came out way before the PSN did and its alot better. yeah id rather pay then deal with a cheap knock off. When PSN becomes exactly like Xbox live. then you can make some good posts on why Xbox is worse. Until then PSN is still stuck in the shadows of Xbox. and another thing. Only reason why PSN just now matching the figures is oh look. Xbox been out 10+ years compared to PSNs puny little time of being around. Oh look You forgot PSN outage issues. yeah xbox really not down that much. plus when they are….THEY ANNOUNCE IT.

    • hey david, i think rob is mad lol

      • No, he’s trying to argue the ignorance and obvious fanboyism in this so-called article.

        #6 – Microsoft gave loyal fans/customers a FREE, limited edition, 10th anniversary-branded Xbox 360 console. It was shipped without their knowledge and many, if not all of them were quite surprised when they realised what had come in the mail.

        Regardless of the fact that they have one, it’s gratitude. I guarantee nobody complained when Sony gave every PSN customer a free months worth of PSN Plus because of the outage.

        Oh, I am pretty sure that:

        ~Extremely limited Xbox 360 console
        ~Extremely limited Xbox 360 controller
        ~Additional 250GB HDD
        ~1 year free of Xbox LIVE gold

        would be appreciated when you have spent somewhere over $600 (10 x $60 for Xbox LIVE) for the service. Don’t you think?

        #5 – What does automated updates have anything to do with “making wallets happy”? No one is obliged to give you an update, paying for the service or not. You should be grateful they even bother nowadays, when back in 90s, games weren’t released broken and even if there issues, they could not be fixed with a simple update.

        Besides, if we’re talking about saving time, then your argument is flawed. Mandatory installations for PS3 games versus optional installation. Who gets into the game first? Not like it matters for gamers with half a mind, but I wanted to point that out since it is a big factor for you.

        #4 – XXX MB demo > X.XX GB trial. Not everyone has the storage capacity and not everyone has the bandwidth. This also contradicts #5 because games do want/need/require updates at times, but here you are touting a full game trial over a demo because a demo is the unfinished version.

        Tell me, did the MW2 demo, which came out what, 4-5 months after the games launch, was that incomplete? Not every developer puts out a broken, old version of their game for a demo.

        #3 – I can give you this. As a gamer who has a PS3 and PSN Plus, its value is far more greater than Xbox LIVE gold. But, other than the content PSN Plus offers, that’s where it ends.

        Xbox LIVE has cross-game party chat. It introduced achievements to this generation and was mimicked by PlayStation a while after. While it’s not an incentive to pay for the online service, it was available from the get-go and it allowed gamers to play online and spend hours working on goals to unlock achievements.

        Oh yeah, with the soon-to-be released cross-platform function of the PS3 and Vita, then Sony fans can start touting how their system can do cross-platform while Microsoft’s can’t.

        #2 – Hardly noticeable. Besides, Xbox has the option to either boot up to dashboard or go straight to the game, which skips this advertisements which have destroyed your gaming wants/needs.

        Besides, what difference is there between seeing an advert on the dashboard and having to scroll across the XMB to get to your game/PSN Store? You’re still seeing things which do not interest you in the slightest.

        #1 – You forgot to mention the part where you MUST remain a PSN Plus member to maintain access to the full games you purchase. At least from my experience, the majority of content requires a PSN Plus subscription. I know themes and avatars are free once your PSN Plus subscription has lapsed.

        I’m all for rattling feathers and then sitting back and watching s*** unfold, but you are far too ignorant in this matter. The title alone proved your ignorance and told me beforehand what I was getting myself in to.

  8. PlayStation University? B*tch please! People that still buy into this dying brand because of the brand that was great in the 90’s clearly don’t have an IQ to go to a university, period!
    Troll article looking for hits on N4G is what is the big fail here!
    GTFO!

  9. If XBOXLive is so bad, hod does Microsoft keep making money from it, or have loyal fans? I guess it is due to all those bad business practices.

  10. As an owner of a 360 and a ps3 who pays for live gold and enjoys the free psn online offering, I only agree with item #2, the ad bombardment on live. I tried ps plus when sony was offering it free attempting to make amends for the hacking fiasco, but it didn’t offer me anything extra I felt I had to have. Free games are nice, but I find the vast majority of the time they are games I have no interest in playing. I buy roughly ten games per year, and when I play, it’s mostly single player. I play for half hour to two hours when I game, and I don’t play every day. Honestly, I don’t have time to play free games, I barely have time to finish the games I buy. I would love to play more, but life gets in the way. I bought my 360 first this gen, and picked up a PS3 because I had to have uncharted 2 and some of the other great first party titles. If ps plus was mandatory and free online was not available for the ps3, I would not have bought the system and I would have missed out on many fantastic titles. I hope Sony doesn’t change and go the pay only route because they would be losing customers like me who love the system, but if I had to choose only one it would be my 360. That would be my choice this gen, who knows? Maybe next gen that will change. But I definitely will not be paying for two subscription gaming services.

  11. AuthorLearnToWrite November 20, 2012 @ 14:59

    Terrible list. Ads are NEVER in your face, they’re there in the dash for you to click on or leave. It’s very simple, you can play games online, watch downloaded videos, play demos, arcade titles etc and never see a single ad.

    The LAST thing a PS3 fan should EVER bring up is download speed of content. I have a PS3, the download system is PATHETIC. It downloads slower than the 360, any GB+ file takes 1 hour at LEAST on my 60GB PS3, and then an additional 5-20 minutes to install it. When my files corrupted and I cleaned the file system, I downloaded my 3 PSN titles and a trailer or two, I left the console on for 7 damn hours.
    Another time I downloaded 5 demos, Uncharted 1, Heavenly Sword, Folklore, R+C:ToD and something else, I left the PS3 on for 10 hours while it downloaded and installed crap.

    That’s a MAJOR setback for me, take into account 50% of my PS3 game library have patches/updates lasting 30 mins to an hour, every 360 update is 5-10 seconds, with only about 3 games in my entire hundred game library on 360 having a 20-30 minute updates, BF3 for example.

    Sorry, with these pathetic download times and data retrieval, as well as poor game chat support and NO party system PS3s online will never be better for me.

    PS+ is a nice deal though, but I don’t play my PS3 anywhere near enough to take advantage of it, and that’s because of the poor online infrastructure.

  12. PS+ is the best value in gaming hands down. Comparing XBL to PS+ fueled PSN is just not fair.

  13. Xbox Live was a huge advancement for online gaming, at the time. That being said, playing online over the PC is vastly superior and it costs me nothing. Additionally, Live’s prices are ridiculous compared to Steam. My 360 gathers dust between exclusives for a reason.

  14. 6) Never heard of this before, sounds cool!

    5) I’ve owned a PS3 and an XBox 360 but ended up selling my PS3 as every time I switched it on to play something (usually once a month when I had time) I had to download a firmware update for the console which took 30+ minutes on my connection plus another 30+ minute update on the game I wanted to play, by which time I was bored and switched it off. In comparison I can switch on my XBox after not playing for a good 3 months, not have to download any firmware updates (unless they are making some big noticeable changes) and updating a game takes a couple of minutes at most, every time!

    4)Xbox Marketplace has demos of major release titles and offers free trials of Arcade games.

    3)An XBox Live Gold subscription costs the price of one game (£35) for an entire year, its hardly breaking the bank and in my experience is a much better service than Playstation Network which is laggy on online games and the voice chat using the Playstation official headset (something which you get free with an Xbox console) always seems to be poor quality and garbled on all games where as on XBox its always clear. I also don’t recall the last time XBox Live was shut down for months due to hackers.

    2) Advertising doesnt phase me, I see it everywhere I go and I see it on any online service I use so I ignore it and play my lag free online games.

    1)If online multiplayer is free on Playstation what exactly does paying for Playstation Plus give you because “free” games aren’t free when you have to pay for a service in order to get them!

  15. I`ll quite happily pay $5 a month for the party system thank you, until PSN can do this then its not equal, its not on a par, its lacking a major feature.

    I can be playing forza, while my son plays battlefield, while my mates play other games and we can sit in one place in our own little chat room per say. now if you don’t have many friends and don’t talk a lot then I can see why this wouldn’t be an issue for you, but most of us have friends and relatives with the same machine that we can talk to….

    This is just an article for website hits, flamebait and fanboyism, how about the next time you decide your gonna do an article you make it about owning both a PS3 and Xbox and enjoy what both systems can offer you, being a gamer and all.

    • Thats an opinion, yet you tote it as simple fact. I personally will take free games over party chat. I’ll also take not paying any extra to play online when I don’t have to, thus why its been PS3 from day 1 for me. These are my opinions, much like the writer of this article has his opinion. A difference in opinion will often spark controversy, especially in the gaming world. So, being just for “website hits, flamebait, and fanboyism” is a ridiculous claim. He even made valid points vs your one claim (party).

      Thus, ignoring those other points makes you look fanboyish more so than the writer. Just my observation.

  16. Xbox users “put up with blatant profiteering” for many reason. 1) XBL isn’t down nearly as often as PSN, 2) XBL users credit data has never been compromised and 3) lower latency/ more stable connection

    What’s with this whole profiteering crap? If it weren’t for potential profit, Sony would have never made the ps3 the way they did. Can’t stay in bussiness selling at a loss. If it weren’t for profit Sony, microsoft and nintendo would not be in bussiness.

    • Right or wrong, why does the profit concern you as a gamer? AND this whole XBL isn’t down nearly as often or as unstable as PSN argument became null and void years ago. Its so infrequent, you look nit picky to bring it up. The credit data issue was a blemish, unfortunately, but Sony handled it just fine. The only people that mention it now are 360 fanboys. Big woop.

      Consider this as a consumer: If a company makes so much money via its brand in other departments Worldwide that its willing to sell at a loss to give you superior/progressive hardware, why wouldn’t you support it? I’m simply curious.

      Microsoft makes mad bank of gamers and, at risk of taking a minor loss, denied collaboration for blu-ray. People quote the servers as the reason their massive amount of profit is necessary, but could it not simply be the fact they have more experience with such networks? Hmm

  17. I agree 100% with this article. What i free xbox 360 ofr live users that have had used the system since day 1. Do the math people 10ys @ $60 a year. The users have paid for almost 2 of the limited edition free xbox. PSN updates are 30 seconds for me but xbox updates in like 5 minutes. Playstation all the way.

  18. Personally #2 was all this list needs… it’s absolutely astounding the amount of ad’s on xbox live now. I quit xbox live a couple years ago… it was a little after they came out with those gay avatars but what set me off was a Shick razor advert. Xbox live should be able to sustain itself with just the ad’s at this point… I’m staying away until they do decide to offer it as a free service which is highly unlikely because it would most likely affect their 6 figure payouts.

  19. Observation: Most programs, sites, etc offer a paid option so as to NOT see Ads. Just a thought.

  20. i started reading this article thinking it was a rant
    but these are some really good points
    if id see a similar service on xbox, id be online twice as much to play those resident evil and borderlands

  21. On #6 a lot of people seem to be under the impression that everyone and their mom got an extra system, but that is not the case. maintaining XBL Gold for 7 years requires a few things that go easily overlooked:
    1) Time: one must have bought xbox360 on release. if i got an xbox last year right before they sent systems out there’s no way they’d give me one even if i owned Gold for 100% of the time i had 360.
    2) Cost: The previous point requires having bought 360 at its release cost of $400 for 20GB memory plus Gold for 60 bucks a year (cheapest base price) times 7 years. That’s already a minimum of $820 before any games, and if you seriously try to tell me that you would use xbl gold just for netflix or youtube then you are a fool because, as David described above, you dont have to pay extra to use these services on your computer (also you cant use netflix on xbox without internet, so dont say anything about internet on your computer). This means that at best all you’re getting (if you meet these absurd conditions) is a $200 pat on the back for giving them over $1000.
    3) Luck: Here’s the most important point in my opinion. Microsoft never once indicated that they were going to reward loyal gamers before then. job loss, pay cuts, getting arrested, red ring of death, having a child, etc all have very viable implications that could lead to cutting off gold at any time. you cant seriously tell me you would rather play with 13 your old kids in halo than make sure you put food on the table. and what if your system breaks? you’re seriously telling me that you would keep gold running just so that when you get a new one you’ll still have it? no that’s not smart. the smart thing to do is cancel your services until you can afford to buy another xbox (by this time elete may have come out so you drop 400 more bucks for the 120GB) and gold. Without microsoft saying that they’ll give you a system if you keep gold on you have no reason to do so.
    4) Loyalty: People switch systems all the time. As a competitive Mortal Kombat player i have to play on PS3 because that’s what it’s played on in tournament and there are differences between gameplay (xray speed is slower on ps3 making comboing after with cage, lao, or cyrax have different timings). If i played Street Fighter i might play more xbox, and so on.

    Lets be serious here, there are many reason why the vast majority of people (even xbox players) did not get this system. Obviously they wouldnt give systems away if it would have cost them a substantial amount to do so. be realistic people.

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