Morning all!

Personally, I think this is a really stupid way to justify the cost of a Gold account... I pay for Gold, have for long enough to get that free point dealie, but with the options available to other platforms for free, that offer more or better service than what Gold is for free, I'm having a harder and harder time justifying the cost.

I should note that Live as a whole is infinitely superior to any other unified platform out there, but the part of it that you PAY for is looking dumber and dumber over time.

@weedgan : Wow, don't quit your day job to be a lawyer man.

@weedgan: Here in Canada its $70 per year, with our strong dollar it's kinda spittin' in our faces, not to mention we still don't have video marketplace.

My question is what does Microsoft plan to gain by delaying demo's n whatnot one week for silver accounts? gamers aren't THAT impatient.

Um, I meant to say I spend $50 a year...

Up next, RRoD exclusive for one week to all XBL gold account holders!

@Crackhippo

Well your strong dollar isn't really MS fault. And Video Market Place isn't that good anyway, just use youtube. And 70 dollars still is not that much for a year, really it isn't.

@Danpowered

Ok, I wont then. Thanks for the advice. Awesome avatar.

What would happen if XBL went free, it would be overran by idiots and children even more than it is now. I've been a member of XBL ever since Mech Assault came out, and thats pretty much the start of it, I don't mind paying that much, and MS has no reason to make it free because it's revenue for them, there a buisness. Its kinda like, well if you don't like Wendys then go eat McDonalds.


And you have to thank MS for one thing, not ONCE have they ever raised how much it is to pay for the service, NOT ONCE FOR FIVE YEARS, now considering how damn poupular its gotten I'm pretty damn thankful for that becuase, if only say 1000 people played WoW do you think they'd charge the same for it as they do now? HELL NO!

12 months of Xbox Live in Australia = $110 AUD which = $96 USD.

Bullshit.

The problem Microsoft is facing is that it doesn't know how to make their service better. Hence, instead of offering more stuff and better services to gold live accounts like they should be doing, they gimp the silver accounts. That's not how you make friends, MS.

Many don't seem to care all that much, but it's another brick in the wall. While Microsoft has every right to do so, it also gives us a clear example of why monopolies are bad: Because they can get away with whatever the hell they want. This dick move looks like main branch MS behavior, not typical of their xbox division. I wonder what's going on, over there...

I got Live when I got my 360 and I am very happy because of it. Having the chance to play online with other people is great as many of my friends don't have 360s or the time to play all the time like I do.

However, I would say this is a backhanded move to the 360 audience. No one can possibly benefit from a potentially large crowd not being given the chance to have access to content the at the same time as everyone else.

While I know it's simply demos (at least as far as we can tell) what if begins to be more? "Want that extra level pack? Sorry, not for another handful of weeks for YOU, cheap ass!"

I think if MS wanted to "add benefit" to a Gold account they should provide every Gold member with some sort of discount on XBLA titles/other pay-for content or a monthly stipend of something like 100/150 MS points per month just for being members. The system could work like GameFly where you sign up, then after 3 months you reach a "level" where you get $5 or something off a used game purchase. Then after 6 months you get a 5% discount on used game purchases, then after a year you get 10% off used game sales (or something similar, haven't been to the site in a while). Either way it would TRULY reward people for paying for the service AND not piss off those that can't afford it.

What do you all think?

Hooray, hopefully this means when new demos and other downloadable updates come out (Bioshock...), it won't take ages anymore since there's no Silver accounts downloading!

Or, realistically, it won't have any impact on us Gold members at all. Seems like a pointless move: nobody's going to upgrade because of this, and no Gold members are going to be throwing parties over it. Why do it?

This is just dumb. Paying for Gold already doesn't give me a whole lot that I don't get on the PS3 for free (which is why I don't pay, and buy online multiplayer games for the PS3, even if the 360 version comes out way early and is better - damn you, Orange Box!). This is only going to make it worse. Microsoft should get rid of the 60 bucks it costs to play online games instead of giving Sony yet another competitive advantage.

£40 - $82 dollars. Nintendo and Sony can do it for free, you can do it better and free too Microsoft. Oh wait, seems greed says you can't.

As so many before me have stated, 50 dollars a year is not a lot of money and isnt going to send you running for welfare anytime soon. Simply put, I think XBL is the best online service and will be for many more years and more then warrants the purchase.

At least now it should help open up the network a little bit when I try to download something that just got released because those silver accounts cant get it right away.

I don't see why it is a inconvenience.

This is just another plan so MS will get more people to sign up for Gold so they can make more $ of you suckers who bought an Xbox.

@zagu

That's the smartest thing I've heard all day man!

@ weedgan

Regardless of how much the gold service costs I'd sooner not spend money on a service I wouldn't use, I just don't play online 360 games. I buy their console, their games and their merchandise and I don't appreciate this slap in the face. As mentioned many times, their competitors can afford to run a free gaming network and provide bandwidth to support downloadable content, why can't Microsoft? I mean this is Microsoft we're talking about, hardly on a shoe string budget are they?

It's not even an inconvenience but I do see it as an annoyance to silver members. Free DLC is for people who have already laid money down on a game, don't they deserve it off the bat? Demos are essentially advertising and if someone has a positive experience they will put cold hard cash down on the product, where's the sense in restricting access for a week? All in all I just don't see the point and it's hardly going to entice people to gold memberships.

Most of all, I think Major Nelson has a f*cking cheek suggesting this is common knowledge. It's been saying that very message about some 'free' Lumines content that has been up for many weeks now and there is no indication that it will ever be available to silver members. I bought the game and put up with the ridiculous micro-transactions and you'd think I'd be liable for a free thank you.

@AngelicLiver

Yeah well if you don't play online, then what are you trying to say? You say you buy there games, console, and merchandise? What about peopel that pay for live and do all the same things you do, does that mean they should be entiteld to just the same as you because you dont play online? No, it doesn't.

and I'll tell ya something, people hate MS just to hate them, jsut because there MS. The big buisness that blah blah blah is so greedy.....fine go ahead and hate them, but everyone can see that this is a fuckin band wagon argument for the people that are against MS. I don't have anything against PSN, but i think people that belive PSN will stay free forever might be surprised what happens in the future....

These limits aren't new. I had a silver account when the Command and Conquer 3 demo came out and I had to wait a week.

What a stupid move, demos help me weed out which games to buy and which to avoid a lot of times. This just means I'll be more likely to miss out on those smaller, less advertised games. Bad job MS, bad job.

Its fucking layme, but M$ needs their monies!

How is XBL superior to PSN again? I thought the whole point is that you play games online? No? Ive played plenty of games on PSN and only experienced lag like 5% of the hundreds of hours ive played. You're gonna have to prove to me that XBL is better than PSN than just a few free downloads bc Sony is doing a better and better job every week with their content.

@ weedgan:

Are you out of your mind re: the propaganda? We regularly "bash" Sony and Nintendo when the news calls for it, so calling us out for being biased is completely unwarranted.

And you're right, $50 won't be a huge hit to the wallets of most (when compared to the hundreds of dollars they've already spent on the console, internet connection, home theater system). But that's not the point. I love Xbox Live, and I think it is still one of the best services available for content distribution and online play.

However, trying to defend this move by saying "Stop being cheap" or "A lot of people already pay for Xbox Live and love it," is silly, and doesn't really address the issue. Quite frankly, I've had no issue paying the money for the service, and I still don't. But you can't ignore that there are other services that offer similar (if not identical) features to Xbox Live, and they don't cost a cent.

I'm not going to argue that Microsoft aren't doing extremely well with Live, or that they're not making money. But as a consumer, you look at multiple products and you have to compare their value and features. A little over one year ago, there was no service that could touch Xbox Live in terms of features and value; ignoring the fact that that is changing is foolish.

@weedgan, I dont think the numbers speak for anything except people that want to play online. Microsoft gives you no choice and at the time there was no other online console service. When news starts to spread that PS3 is offering much more (i.e Home) for totally free, XBL is going to look helluva less appealing.