Xbox Live is over-praised and over-priced

1) It's not worth the money

"But it's like the same cost as one game for a whole year, what are you poor?" If someone tried to sell you shoelace insurance, arguing that it's only the cost of one pair of shoes for a whole year, would you sign up? Heck no. I dont care how cheap it is in comparison to something else, tell me why i should pay for it.

$50 is the absolute maxium Microsoft could get away with, not a figure which seems like you're getting value for your money. Just because people pay it doesn't mean they're happy to. I paid £50 for a pair of jeans yesterday, but that doesn't mean i was happy about it.

2) You dont really get anything for your money

Before you list off a zillion features and the billions upon billions of things available on the marketplace - i know, but all of that is available to silver members too. So if i'm not paying for all that stuff what am i paying for? The ability to play games online. Which microsoft has no involvement in, save the xbox live servers which host your gamertag/achievement info and what-not.

And what other features are offered to you for your money? Microsoft decided gold members get demos before silver members. So if you're a silver member, a demo will come out on the marketplace and it'll have big red restricted logo on it which wont go away for a few days. That's not giving gold members anything. You still get the demo on the same day exactly as you did before. All that does is annoy and screw over silver members.

3) Dedicated servers

Every developer aint bungie, and every game aint Halo. Not everyone has the time, the money and the talent to make an online game work as well as Halo does.

Gears of War = laggy, buggy, frustrating online.

Modern Warfare 2 = laggy, buggy, frustrating online.

When i'm paying a premium just to play games online, they should play flawlessly. Laggy, unreliable games simply aren't acceptable.

Conclusion; if you're going to charge people $50 for something, they should know exactly what they get for that money. A microsoft rep couldn't tell me what i get for my $50, nor could anyone here. I am basically charged to play my games online, on a console i paid for, with a disc i paid for, and on an internet connection i paid for. It's like charging you to wear your clothes after you've bought them.

What they can do to fix it:

1) Leave it as it is and cut it to $25 a year

2) Actually GIVE you something for your $50, like dedicated servers on all first party games, early access to beta tests or arcade games at discounted prices.

4) annoying avatars. hate those things!!!

Agreed. I never thought it was fair how MS locks away the MP section of a game just to scam their consumers $50 just to play a part of a game that they have already paid for. PSN works well enough for me and it's free. MS better start thinking a new stuff to make that money seem justified

4) annoying avatars. hate those things!!!

I_AM_MEGATRON

I really like xbox live.

It's still a better service than PSN, and the monthly fee is cheap.racing1750

It's still a better service than PSN, and the monthly fee is cheap.racing1750

[QUOTE="racing1750"]It's still a better service than PSN, and the monthly fee is cheap.Doctor-McNinja

I'd buy your paintings :)

[QUOTE="racing1750"]It's still a better service than PSN, and the monthly fee is cheap.SAGE_OF_FIRE

[QUOTE="racing1750"]It's still a better service than PSN, and the monthly fee is cheap.Doctor-McNinja

Hmm yeh, well i have both systems, and XBL is worth that small monthly fee :)racing1750

[QUOTE="racing1750"]It's still a better service than PSN, and the monthly fee is cheap.SAGE_OF_FIRE

30 euro for a whole year on ebay isnt that expensive..
But ye when you pay for something before you can play online it must be good. ( while there are still many problems/lag issues whit online play )

[QUOTE="racing1750"]It's still a better service than PSN, and the monthly fee is cheap.SAGE_OF_FIRE

and what are your thoughts on the proposed subscription for PSN by Sony

i agree. while it is the best online service on consoles, people act like its the best thing since sliced bread...when it fails in comparison to the dedicated servers found on pc games.

[QUOTE="racing1750"] Hmm yeh, well i have both systems, and XBL is worth that small monthly fee :)Doctor-McNinja

I considered buying a 360 to play with all my friends, but paying to pay online is a big NO NO!!!

2 more things that grind my gears- no predictive text tool for messages and the on-screen keyboard is arranged alphabetically. It notifies you when friends come online but not when they go offline. PSN does/has both these things, from launch. And (in my experience) offers a smoother online performance.

I'm one of those who know it's somewhat of a scam but has paid for it for years and will continue to. MS must love customers like me :P

*sighs* you don't have to pay the full price at once, you can pay for XBL per month which is 5 pounds here in the uk, and thats dirt cheap.racing1750

That would work out to 60.00 per year... you could almost buy 2 brand new games for that price. It's cheaper to pay it all at once.

[QUOTE="racing1750"]It's still a better service than PSN, and the monthly fee is cheap.Doctor-McNinja

[QUOTE="SAGE_OF_FIRE"][QUOTE="racing1750"]It's still a better service than PSN, and the monthly fee is cheap.The-Mosher

2 more things that grind my gears- no predictive text tool for messages and the on-screen keyboard is arranged alphabetically. It notifies you when friends come online but not when they go offline. PSN does/has both these things, from launch. And (in my experience) offers a smoother online performance.

I'm one of those who know it's somewhat of a scam but has paid for it for years and will continue to. MS must love customers like me :P

*sighs* you don't have to pay the full price at once, you can pay for XBL per month which is 5 pounds here in the uk, and thats dirt cheap.racing1750

That would work out to 60.00 per year... you could almost buy 2 brand new games for that price. It's cheaper to pay it all at once.

It's worth it to me.I enjoy the services that it offers. Plus,I usually pay about 30$ (USD) a year for it. I almost always find some deal online - walmart, bestbuy, etc. where they sell a year's subscription card for 30$ or less. It pays to look around.

[QUOTE="Doctor-McNinja"]

[QUOTE="racing1750"] Hmm yeh, well i have both systems, and XBL is worth that small monthly fee :)racing1750

i guess some people just want the best service and are prepared to pay to get it, there ain't nothing wrong with that, and suprisingly MS is a business and wants to make money (i know, shocking isn't it) i don't play online, cause i choose not to pay for XBL, becuase online isn't my thing, just remember, free online is a privilege not an entitlement and if people don't like paying for XBL then don't buy a 360, simplesdelta3074

[QUOTE="racing1750"][QUOTE="Doctor-McNinja"] Really? What do you get for your £60 a year than exactly?

Doctor-McNinja

1. excellent interface

2. the ability to talk to my friends where ever i am

3. XBL marketplace has a ton of content compared to PSN

maybe you think it's expensive, but 5 pounds a month is nothing, and i could pay it all at once for 30 pounds.

Compared with Steam, definitely.

[QUOTE="Doctor-McNinja"][QUOTE="racing1750"] err, a great service?racing1750

1. excellent interface

2. the ability to talk to my friends where ever i am

3. XBL marketplace has a ton of content compared to PSN

maybe you think it's expensive, but 5 pounds a month is nothing, and i could pay it all at once for 30 pounds.

You can do that AND get dedicated servers on PC for free. Now that you compare it to something, it's not that great of a service.

To make a list against PS3's list of selling points. I don't think MS would make " Only $50 a year online" one of them. The Live price is what many would call a hidden fee.

[QUOTE="delta3074"]i guess some people just want the best service and are prepared to pay to get it, there ain't nothing wrong with that, and suprisingly MS is a business and wants to make money (i know, shocking isn't it) i don't play online, cause i choose not to pay for XBL, becuase online isn't my thing, just remember, free online is a privilege not an entitlement and if people don't like paying for XBL then don't buy a 360, simplesDoctor-McNinja

seems like most of the people that have issues with XBL dont actually use it. i couldnt care less how people decide to spend their money and im not hipocritical enough to sit here and criticise them either.

[QUOTE="Doctor-McNinja"][QUOTE="delta3074"]i guess some people just want the best service and are prepared to pay to get it, there ain't nothing wrong with that, and suprisingly MS is a business and wants to make money (i know, shocking isn't it) i don't play online, cause i choose not to pay for XBL, becuase online isn't my thing, just remember, free online is a privilege not an entitlement and if people don't like paying for XBL then don't buy a 360, simpleskingtito

every thing you said is subjective.

Dedicated servers do not equal 0 lag

gears of war I played gears of war and didn't have much lag or bug issues the same with gears of war 2.

Lag, Bugs exist in the ps3 version of MW2...

I find xbox live to be worth the 50 dollars a year well 30 dollar a year i pay, enough that i've been a part of since the beta in i believe if memory servs me november 2002, and have it paid till 2011.

[QUOTE="Doctor-McNinja"][QUOTE="racing1750"] err, a great service?racing1750

1. excellent interface

2. the ability to talk to my friends where ever i am

3. XBL marketplace has a ton of content compared to PSN

maybe you think it's expensive, but 5 pounds a month is nothing, and i could pay it all at once for 30 pounds.

every thing you said is subjective.

Dedicated servers do not equal 0 lag

gears of war I played gears of war and didn't have much lag or bug issues the same with gears of war 2.

Lag, Bugs exist in the ps3 version of MW2...

I find xbox live to be worth the 50 dollars a year well 30 dollar a year i pay, enough that i've been a part of since the beta in i believe if memory servs me november 2002, and have it paid till 2011.

WilliamRLBaker

And on top of the $50, you may need to pay $100 more for a wireless adapter depending on the location of the system in your house. So some people out there are paying $100 + $50 per year to play online.

I also think it's funny when people claim that the XBLA is a reason that XBL is worth their money. Why pay $50 to gain access to something that's $5 or $10?

1) It's not worth the money

"But it's like the same cost as one game for a whole year, what are you poor?" If someone tried to sell you shoelace insurance, arguing that it's only the cost of one pair of shoes for a whole year, would you sign up? Heck no. I dont care how cheap it is in comparison to something else, tell me why i should pay for it.

$50 is the absolute maxium Microsoft could get away with, not a figure which seems like you're getting value for your money. Just because people pay it doesn't mean they're happy to. I paid £50 for a pair of jeans yesterday, but that doesn't mean i was happy about it.

2) You dont really get anything for your money

Before you list off a zillion features and the billions upon billions of things available on the marketplace - i know, but all of that is available to silver members too. So if i'm not paying for all that stuff what am i paying for? The ability to play games online. Which microsoft has no involvement in, save the xbox live servers which host your gamertag/achievement info and what-not.

And what other features are offered to you for your money? Microsoft decided gold members get demos before silver members. So if you're a silver member, a demo will come out on the marketplace and it'll have big red restricted logo on it which wont go away for a few days. That's not giving gold members anything. You still get the demo on the same day exactly as you did before. All that does is annoy and screw over silver members.

3) Dedicated servers

Every developer aint bungie, and every game aint Halo. Not everyone has the time, the money and the talent to make an online game work as well as Halo does.

Gears of War = laggy, buggy, frustrating online.

Modern Warfare 2 = laggy, buggy, frustrating online.

When i'm paying a premium just to play games online, they should play flawlessly. Laggy, unreliable games simply aren't acceptable.

Conclusion; if you're going to charge people $50 for something, they should know exactly what they get for that money. A microsoft rep couldn't tell me what i get for my $50, nor could anyone here. I am basically charged to play my games online, on a console i paid for, with a disc i paid for, and on an internet connection i paid for. It's like charging you to wear your clothes after you've bought them.

What they can do to fix it:

1) Leave it as it is and cut it to $25 a year

2) Actually GIVE you something for your $50, like dedicated servers on all first party games, early access to beta tests or arcade games at discounted prices.

When was its 50 dollars a year, I thought it like 4.14 a month. :/ArisShadows

13 months for $39 @ amazon for me....thats $3/month.....i could find more while volunteering at my hospital this sunday in three hours

I have to agree. I used XBL for Demos and Online only, then when my subscription was up I stopped using it...it wasn't worth paying money. I get free online on the PC.

Not to sound smug here, but i think i've proven a point. I've basically been told to stop complaining and dont buy it if i dont like it. Nobody has said anything to convince me that i SHOULD buy it, which says a lot. Doctor-McNinja

Yes,yes...if by proving your point you meant you hated an online service, then yes you have indeed proven your pont

If you look at it in terms of what you get by having a silver membership and then compare that to what you get for a gold membership, you're right, it is overpriced. But that isn't how the business works. Lets look at some of the selling points of Xbox Live over PSN:

1) Completely integrated online service with socialfocus, likecross game party chat, party watch for Netflix, 1 vs 100 Live.
2) First to get Netflix, a better Netflix integration, has Twitter and Facebook integration.
3) More Demos, Arcade Games, Indie Games
4) More exclusive DLC and Community Events

You know what all of those have in common? They all cost MS $$$. The ability to design and scale outservice features, find and integrate new outside services for XBL users to experience, provide better rates for content publishers to promote more content than PSN, run interactive events like 1 vs 100 Live, and negotiate exclusive DLC contracts with publishers, they are all things MS puts money into in order to improve XBL.

Yes, XBL silver members get to enjoy many of the benefits mentioned above without paying a cent, but I would argue that without the large number of gold subscribers providing funding, many of these things wouldn't be the great features that they are today. Do I think a lower price point is justified? Absolutely, I would love to see them drop it $10-15. Do I feel like I'm getting ripped off by paying for it? Absolutely not.

If you look at it in terms of what you get by having a silver membership and then compare that to what you get for a gold membership, you're right, it is overpriced. But that isn't how this works. Lets look at some of the selling points of Xbox Live over PSN:

1) Completely integrated online service with socialfocus, likecross game party chat, party watch for Netflix, 1 vs 100 Live.
2) First to get Netflix, a better Netflix integration, has Twitter and Facebook integration.
3) More Demos, Arcade Games, Indie Games
4) More exclusive DLC and Community Events

You know what allof those have in common? They all cost MS $$$. The ability to design and scale out integrated service features, find and integratenew services for XBL users to experience, provide better rates for content publishers to promote more content than PSN, run interactive events like 1 vs 100 Live, and negotiate exclusive DLC contracts with publishers, they are all things MS puts money into in order to improve XBL.

Yes, XBL silver members get to enjoy many of the benefits mentioned above without paying a cent, but I would argue that without the large number of gold subscribers providing funding, many of these things wouldn't be the great features that they are today. Do I think a lower price point is justified? Absolutely, I would love to see them drop it $10-15. Do I feel like I'm getting ripped off by paying for it? Absolutely not.

KodiakGTS

Again, everything you mentioned is completely FREE on PC, in addition to dedicated servers. This thread is not about PSN vs. XBLG, it's about the value of Xbox Live Gold.

Microsoft is doing something right as what 10-25 million people pay for xbl.

But honestly i don't see why people fight over stupid points. Your never going to win.

xbox live is b/a...besides the ppl that stereotype race on their(no offense anyone)