News Microsoft readies games-on-demand for Xbox 360

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/2009/06/19/microsoft-readies-games-on-demand-for-xbox/1

Microsoft is preparing to launch the new games-on-demand system for the Xbox 360 and is rebranding the Xbox Originals service.

 

"business-related issues" aka piracy?

 

Wow, they are finally following sony in releasing full games on download with real prices and none of that points crap.

When will they scrap the points all together?

 

Sooner rather than later i hope. I hate having to buy points.

 

As well, I think by "business-related issues" he maybe referring to the fact that retail stores would go ape. Old games dont matter at the moment since most would buy second hand, rent or download than buy new.

Digital distribution is the future though - the high street shops better have a contingency plan.

Also I'm with mike on the MS points - never bought a thing with them since I would have to buy the points in bulk and not just pay for what I want. So unfortunately that has put me off all DLC, themes, pictures, films etc on the X360 so far.

 

Good idea, should have done it ages ago.

The only problem will be pricing.. the games will be just as expensive as the retail shops like GAME (but more convenient to buy if you want it there and then), and more expensive than amazon / play etc.

Just like Steam really.. A wasted opportunity really, as every game Ive bought recently has either been from Tesco or Amazon... Steam/GAME retail are just too expensive. Cant see this being that different... especially if they are planning to put older games up there like Bioshock, which I think I picked up for £10 !

 

I'm sorry Mike, but PSN is awfull, theres only 2 or 3 full PS3 titles on it, and the amount of choice is soo limiting it's un-real, kinda why i stick to my PC for games, use the PS3 for Blu-Ray.
I'm happy that companies are pushing for Digital Distribution, but i prefer a hard copy of something like a Game/film etc, so as long as there is a choice, i'm happy.

Sam

 

How big is my 360 HDD for all these games I'm going to download?

 

More bandwidth for BT to complain about!

 

I got Bioshock for £3.49 in the Steam sale at Christmas, so it's not always the case that Steam is more expensive than shops.

 

I'd only consider buying them if the prices are cheap, if it's anything like the DLC, it will be high and stay high, I imagine it will be full RRP, so for things like Dead Rising you could expect to pay £20.

 

Yay! If I delete some stuff off my hard drive I can fit one 360 game! Awesome!! /sarcasm.

Microsoft needs to allow user replaceable HDDs. My 20GB HDD is not big enough for anything, and because I have the Halo edition Xbox, a new HDD won't match. I will have to swap the HDD caddies. Which isn't a big deal sure, but I'd rather pay < $100 and get a 500GB HDD. I could download all I want and not have to worry about running out of space.

That is the only thing I hate about the 360. Limited HDD space.

 

USB Hard disk perhaps?

Also, good on Microsoft, it's a step in the right direction.

 

You can't install games on an external hard disk.

 

You can buy a specific 120Gb laptop drive, do a bit of do-hickery and put it in the caddy you have and have a 120gb halo edition hard drive for as cheap as you can find this drive. There are several guides around the internets about how to do it.

 

Okay, this is exactly something I always wondered!

I'm going to Google it later. Did you read any of the guides? Isn't there software you can use to transfer your data from your old HDD to the new one via a computer and a sata to usb adapter?

I think I remember seeing the software, but I never saw a guide on swapping in your own 120GB HDD.

 

Technically PSN does not have limited games because it caters for PS3 and PSP. There are more than 3 Full retail games for PS3 and alot of Full retail games for PSP which Sony is currently in the stages of releasing all PSP games on the PSN.

Anyhow, we are talking about the proposed changes to Xbox live here. PSN and Xbox live both have their bad points, however some of the good points of PSN are real prices and full Retail games.

MS are taking the good parts from PSN to improve on the bad points of Xbox live which is a great thing. Real prices and full retail games will improve xbox live. You dont use points on steam do you? Dont know about you but I want to know exactly what im buying costs

I would like to have the option to buy the odd full retail game on 360 (if reasonably priced) However I wish MS will unlock the darn hard disk too and allow you to switch it for any laptop drive so that if I do buy alot of games, I can fit them on my Disc.

MS have avoided full retail games because Core/Arcade users wont benefit. If only they didn’t bother with those options and removed the file limit for developers.

 

Wish they could allow you to "rent" a game for an hour or two, or for a certain percentage of the game storyline, so you can test out whether you like it or not, if you do, then you pay the remainder of the price (minus the price you paid to "rent" it) and continue playing.

 

Same here, I have a 120GB drive and it's pretty much filled up. They should at least offer larger drives, and lower their insanely high prices. Possibility of replacing/upgrading the drive with whatever you want would be even more ideal tho.

 

Demos? or you mean like shareware.