Online pay to play?

Hey all,

We recently bought a 360, more-so for the wife than for me (I am more of a PC gamer) but I was hoping to have a concrete answer to a couple questions.

a) Can I play online for free? As in, the "silver" account that comes free with the system (1 month gold), can I play against anyone or with anyone else online? I was under the impression I HAD to buy a gold account to play it online. From what I've gathered, the gold account gives you things such as achievements and other things I could care less for. I just want to, as an example, rent CoD4 or something, and join and play on servers. Is this possible with a free account?

b) I could care less about things in the marketplace (i.e. videos, demos, etc), but my wife would like to buy song packs (i.e. we already purchased NiN, SoaD) for Rock Band, is this possible with a free silver account? Another example would be the extra maps made for purchase in CoD4.

c) I gathered that the 360 does not come with a wireless connection integrated (i.e. our Wii and PS3 both have it)...am I blind, or is this how it is?

d) Are there actual plans, not rumours, for a mouse/kb support to allow for RTS and FPS gameplay? I cannot stand using the controller for those two game types.

e) I recently setup my Vista Ultimate box with Media Center and configured it to communicate with our 360. I thought, as with the PS3, I could stream XVID/DIVx content from my PC to my 360, but it does not recognize it as a legit video file. I know that with the PS3, all you need to assure is that you have the right codec(s) installed on the PC for the file to stream and play properly. I want, as an example, to watch my movies I backed up on my PC (compressed XVID) without having to copy them to my 360. Can I burn the files to disc and pop them into the 360 and watch like that? My MP3 files and WMV files work fine, obviously.

I think that's it for now, I'll keep this thread opened in case some of you can answer me shortly. I am running on a free gold account (1 month trial). I just want to avoid spending 60$/year simply to play online.

PEACE

A) No. You need Gold to play online only, Silver can do everything else though.

B) See above.

C) The 360 does not have Wifi built in, if you want to connect it to your wireless network, you will have to get the 360 Wireless Adapter which retails for around $99.99.

D) As far as I know, No.

E) Download the "Optional Media Update" off of the Marketplace, then all will be well as far as MPEG4 goes.

I hope that clearly answers your questions. To me, the $50 for 13-months is worth it for me, I love to play online on LIVE, best console online experience, I also am a PC Gamer though.

need gold for playing online and it also lets you do everthing else as well but silver doesnt let you play online

In reply (thanks to all who did)

a) Wow. It would seem smarter (in my opinion) to give everyone access to play together (p2p à la PC-server, with central server for authentication only) and charge people for an account which gives things such as achievements/perks for being a member. Access to demos, trials, etc. I dunno, it just feels wrong how it works. I agree to pay for more content, but the gaming aspect should be free...you know, cause you bought the game to play it. Everything else that "adds" to the experience should be chargeable, I agree. It's up to the consumer to decide what he/she should purchase, as stupid as most of it truly is to purchase.

b) So, even though we purchased the game Rock Band, we will not have access to purchase its additional content with a free silver account? I hope this isn't true, I hope I've misread. (i.e the other understanding I got from reading your messages, is that we may have to wait a little before we can buy them) Since we already purchased several songs over the marketplace, after our trial expires, can we continue to play the songs? We're moving shortly (wife got a job out of town) and will likely be without Internet for a while; question: can she still play them offline? Can we continue to buy songs with a silver account? (i.e. buy points from EBgames, add them to silver account, buy new song packs?)

c) 100$ for w.lan access? Seriously? My god. Are there 3rd party adapters (i.e. usb adapter) that will work? Wow...I guess I'll stick with my 50ft CAT5e running the baseboards, across the hallway and down into the living room. :)

d) Sadly, I am not surprised.

e) Thank you Joseph. I'll look into that. Good place to start, anyhow. I found some help on other forums which require 3rd party installs (media control, FFDshow on sourceforge.net) to allow it to run.

Someone said the 50$ (60$ here in Canada) a year is worth the money? I dunno, I have always considered playing online (MoH, CoD1,2,4, BF, WiC) fun in itself, but to pay for additional "extras" which actually don't add any value to your gaming experience? My friend (as I discussed this with him over the phone) explained that when FF XIII is released, it will be a MMO type that charges an additional monthly fee to play online? I'm baffled that people pay, and they will, for this.

Anyway, with the recent E3 (as well as other recent gaming events) and obvious amelioration in game design for all systems, it'll be interesting to see if M$ can continue its trend of charging so much for so little when other platforms offer it for free. We bought ours so we could play with some of our friends online at times, but to pay to play? c'mon... :(

Thanks for the head's up guys. Obviously a couple answers/opinions are always welcome. :)

PEACE

Silver can play Lost Planet colonies and Shadow Run online but everything else gold is required as far as fps rts they are designed for the system so no BUT those two above you can play with your wife over the computer while she uses the 360 (you buy the game twice for two different systems though).IvanElk

Those two games are those crossplatform games I read about months ago. I think it's an awesome and interesting idea, I'm just hesitant to see the rampant problems cross-platforming, especially when dealing with PC gaming hardware vs compatibility. Have you tried either of the two yourself? Anyone else play crossplatform.

Oh, and I doubt she'll play those with me. :) I used to play LOTR BFME on our LAN with her. 2 vs. the AI :) And once, I played 1vs1 on Call of Duty UO. She actually pinned me out once with an extremely long range sniper headshot....now that I think about it, that was kind of hot. ;)

PEACE

[QUOTE="IvanElk"]Silver can play Lost Planet colonies and Shadow Run online but everything else gold is required as far as fps rts they are designed for the system so no BUT those two above you can play with your wife over the computer while she uses the 360 (you buy the game twice for two different systems though).mach-stem

Those two games are those crossplatform games I read about months ago. I think it's an awesome and interesting idea, I'm just hesitant to see the rampant problems cross-platforming, especially when dealing with PC gaming hardware vs compatibility. Have you tried either of the two yourself? Anyone else play crossplatform.

Oh, and I doubt she'll play those with me. :) I used to play LOTR BFME on our LAN with her. 2 vs. the AI :) And once, I played 1vs1 on Call of Duty UO. She actually pinned me out once with an extremely long range sniper headshot....now that I think about it, that was kind of hot. ;)

PEACE

As far as cross-platform games go, they run perfect. I have played both Lost Planet Colonies and Shadowrun (on both 360 and PC, check my Gamercard) and they run really well, if a player has a subpar computer, it just puts them at a disadvantage. Anyway, as far as codecs on your own PC, they aren't really required, but I would go with a codec pack. I really like Vista Codecs Pack, so that's what I would recommend, you can get it here. As for paying for Xbox Live, the value is up to the individual, but I do agree that the value is slowly diminishing as other services catch up.

If you need to know anything else, just hit me up.

~Joseph

b) So, even though we purchased the game Rock Band, we will not have access to purchase its additional content with a free silver account? I hope this isn't true, I hope I've misread. (i.e the other understanding I got from reading your messages, is that we may have to wait a little before we can buy them) Since we already purchased several songs over the marketplace, after our trial expires, can we continue to play the songs? We're moving shortly (wife got a job out of town) and will likely be without Internet for a while; question: can she still play them offline? Can we continue to buy songs with a silver account? (i.e. buy points from EBgames, add them to silver account, buy new song packs?)

c) 100$ for w.lan access? Seriously? My god. Are there 3rd party adapters (i.e. usb adapter) that will work? Wow...I guess I'll stick with my 50ft CAT5e running the baseboards, across the hallway and down into the living room. :)mach-stem

B) Even after your gold trial ends, you will still be able to Use your DLC Tracks and Purchase new ones with a Silver account, also, you can still use the ones you've downloaded already without LIVE/Internet access.

c) 100$ for w.lan access? Seriously? My god. Are there 3rd party adapters (i.e. usb adapter) that will work? Wow...I guess I'll stick with my 50ft CAT5e running the baseboards, across the hallway and down into the living room. :)

mach-stem

[QUOTE="mach-stem"]

c) 100$ for w.lan access? Seriously? My god. Are there 3rd party adapters (i.e. usb adapter) that will work? Wow...I guess I'll stick with my 50ft CAT5e running the baseboards, across the hallway and down into the living room. :)

gamer26690

you can get ones that put into the ethernet port that fool the 360 into thinking its wired my friend had one it was a netgear brand i think

Oooh, excellent idea. :) Thank you very much for that! :)

c) So, I looked around and found a couple Ethernet to Wireless bridges...the funny thing? They are about 100$, and most are used on ebay. I guess I am s.o.l. :(

I ran a smaller length of CAT5e to help clean up the mess, but since we are selling the house in the near future, I figure I'll simply arrange my next system setup in the new house to include the x360 within the next room, or along the same baseboards.

Oh, and I did tons of research into getting XVID files to play over WMC Vista 64bit...for anyone out there, do not try it. It will not be worth your time. Even if you do accomplish to run the content through Windows Media Center, the 3rd party software (FFDShow and Media Control plugin) tends to crash randomly (too much tweaking involved). Once you accomplish the bug removal, there's always the problem of running the stream from your WMC to your x360.

What I ended up doing, which saved me TONS of headaches, is share my library through WMP11 and do manual runs from the Media dashboard menu. Again, for those with the 64bit version, and even the 32bit version I hear there are issues, get your movies to work in WMP11 and run them manually from your x360.

PEACE

As a PC gamer who has switched to 360 gaming it was a weird thing to have to pay to play online, but for what it costs it is worth it. Yes you do need a Gold account to play online, though with Windows Live allowing cross-platform play (PC vs 360) now free, multi platform titles are also currently available to play on your 360 with only a silver account - there are only 2 or 3 games that support this however (Shadowrun, Lost Planet Extreme Colonies (or something) and an RTS game I can't think of the name).

If you already have a long ethernet cable, just stick with using that - much cheaper than getting the wireless adaptor, and since you already have the cable, totally unnecessary.

There is no in game support for keyboard and mouse, so as a PC gamer you really don't want to look at RTS games, and probably not many FPS either. There is an adaptor that allows kb/m play - the XFPS - but it is expensive and not very good - there is a lot of lag with your controls and while there are several complicated things you can do to tweak it, as with getting xvid to work, it is a bodge job and really not worth the hassle. Either learn to play them with the controller, or get the games for PC where available.

See, it's not that I CAN'T play, but I tried out the BF Bad Company demo (it's my only example as of yet) and it took almost 5 tries just to get my reticle over the enemy. :P I ONLY played console games previous to my playing PC titles, so I know the differences. I also tried CoD4, and on the PC, I don't worry about claiming my headshots (i.e. unless I use the M4 or G36c to spray) but in the console version, I rarely if ever got a headshot. Like anything, I will work at it. :) I just wish the mouse+kb support would be something they could work on.

Hell, even a "pad" like those RTS gaming pads would be fine. Small, efficient and does what you want it to do (programmable button).

My console only has one USB port, but Rock Band came with a USB 2.0 powereed hub, will other devices work using this?

Thanks for the input guys

See, it's not that I CAN'T play, but I tried out the BF Bad Company demo (it's my only example as of yet) and it took almost 5 tries just to get my reticle over the enemy. :P I ONLY played console games previous to my playing PC titles, so I know the differences. I also tried CoD4, and on the PC, I don't worry about claiming my headshots (i.e. unless I use the M4 or G36c to spray) but in the console version, I rarely if ever got a headshot. Like anything, I will work at it. :) I just wish the mouse+kb support would be something they could work on.

Hell, even a "pad" like those RTS gaming pads would be fine. Small, efficient and does what you want it to do (programmable button).

My console only has one USB port, but Rock Band came with a USB 2.0 powereed hub, will other devices work using this?

Thanks for the input guys

mach-stem

Your console has at least 3 USB ports. And you'll get used to the controller.

b) So, even though we purchased the game Rock Band, we will not have access to purchase its additional content with a free silver account? I hope this isn't true, I hope I've misread. (i.e the other understanding I got from reading your messages, is that we may have to wait a little before we can buy them) Since we already purchased several songs over the marketplace, after our trial expires, can we continue to play the songs? We're moving shortly (wife got a job out of town) and will likely be without Internet for a while; question: can she still play them offline? Can we continue to buy songs with a silver account? (i.e. buy points from EBgames, add them to silver account, buy new song packs?)

c) 100$ for w.lan access? Seriously? My god. Are there 3rd party adapters (i.e. usb adapter) that will work? Wow...I guess I'll stick with my 50ft CAT5e running the baseboards, across the hallway and down into the living room. :)

mach-stem

B) You can download anything from the marketplace with a Silver account. The only difference is that it may only be available a week or so after Gold members have access. Any songs downloaded go to your hard drive so you do not even need to be online to play them once you have them.

C) You can get the wireless adapters on eBay cheaper but I dont think MS has allowed any 3rd party manufacturers to make an adapter.

need gold for playing online and it also lets you do everthing else as well but silver doesnt let you play online

Ruhdezee

he answered it.

but 50 bucks a year isnt nothing, i mean it isnt bad at all.