why should online service be free? I think roughly $4 dollars a month isn't too bad to have a company manage servers, connections etc. Tell me people, what else should a company provide for free because you purchased one of their games? When you buy a computer, internet access isn't free, when you buy a tv, cable isn't free. This is capitalistic America, not communist russia. When PS3 comes out with their service and Wii does too, the competition will be there to drive down the price, and if either one of those two companies offers online for free, then chances are microsoft will comply.

I'm sorry but I think that the "gold" is a rip off--PS2 does not charge for their online, and my 360 ran out at the beginning of this month. I have not gone online since. Why should I pay $50 more after I just bought the $65 game, the $52 extra controller, and used 1/2 gallon of $3.18 gas to get to and from the store where i made the purchase from. Microsoft like PS3 is trying to make residule money to supplement income lost, and is ripping people off for a service that should be free. I dont know about any of you but If I have to save up for a game a month (which I do), extra cost each year in addition to my daily cost of living, buying gold aint worth it in the long run.

It doesn't matter what it is at they are making a fortune.

60% doesnt surprise me. I am kind of tired of people saying"why own a 360 if you dont go online?". They own a 360 to play next gen games. Not everyone can get or afford broadband,and that is why almost half of the 360 owners out there are not online.

I'll be more subtle this time so my message that was completely on topic doesn't get deleted.

It is surprising to me that only 60% of the people that own an Xbox, or Xbox 360, are on Xbox live. I don't see why a person would own an Xbox without going online, because the vast majority of their first party games are not close to good enough to play through on a one player mode. This isn't in attempts to piss anyone off, it's just the truth. How many games are out there for Xbox that you can play over and over....or maybe play for more then 5-6 hours. Fable I suppose is one, anyone else have one? I think the 60% marker should be closer to 80 or 90, because as of now...that 40% not on Xbox live, are simply not on Xbox.

Halo 3 alone will boost that % by 10.

I'll be joining this Christmas

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I've had live for 2 Years 4 Months now and it still isn't boring and i don't find it expensive at all for the service you recieve as I carried my account over from the original XBOX and with 360 im just getting more for the same price, the only downside is the cost of some downlads/arcade games and that M$ should have some online comps to win some gold. I used to play WoW which costs twice as much as live (6 months on WoW = 1 Year On Live) which i could never understand so live is more fun and better VFM but from 10% --> 60% is a pretty big jump.

it's the most fantastik thing on the market and sure will keep it that way,against the oth3r next-gen consoles

I just don't see the PS3 matching this type of service. Sony has proven too many times in the past that they are not wiling to provide this type of ongoing customer service the way Microsoft has. $50 bux well spent.

i am glad to pay 50 bucks for my xbox live because im assured of a better online session then if i was on the ps2. Its not like the money was not put to good use, look they keep the servers runnin good most of the time and everything is centralized into one place,
The ps2 is good as well as fun to play online but look at what you get when you get it for free; i believe that its up to the company that makes the game to upkeep the server or they prob pay someone like gamespy to take care of it, also it is hard to keep track of your friends vs what the xbox live has , and finally not all games are played over broadband.
There is though a couple of things that bug me bout the xbox live; some of the content i feel is to expensive when they should be free, i understand that most of the money we spend in the market place goes straight to the publisher not ms which i think is a good deal, also the price for the points are a bit much.
overall i still feel that the xbox live is far better than what the ps2 can do and as long as they keep the price point down to a reasonable price i will continue to contribute to online gaming on my 360

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Like Datluckyplaya said i also agree, unless of course Huxley can really bring in alot of players which I hope.

And this is coming from a PS3 fanboy. I really don't see the rest of Sony fanboy's doing much with online even if many devs support it. Sony for the most part has had games that cater to a 1 or 2 player exp.

Anywho it'd be nice if both systems could get free downloadable MMO's like Silk Road online ect. & play online with their PC counterparts.

good to see more than half but what the hell are the other 40% doing.......time to get online ppl....best gaming experience everrrrrrrrrrrr............

Cheap Solution for Wi-Fi: there is this "wireless bridge" which is like an adapter for the ethernet port and turn it into a 802.11g Wi-Fi, should cost you around $50, cheaper than the official adapter. Though you need some knowledge in order to set it up, so read the manual!

"I don't understand why they are making such a big deal out of 60%, fact is they should have at least 90% of the people who own 360 going online. I guess this is what happens when you sell systems using the skew mechanics. Honestly, this is the most lame news since they told us about us about the number of downloads they had, talking about making a mountain out of a molehill."

Did you ever consider that many people don't have a high-speed connection or none at all? Or perhaps that some people have the console purely as entertainment for their children, etc? Although to be honest, I really don't care about numbers and facts anyways.

I'm a Mac fanboy and always had lots of reasons to look towards MS with suspicion. Frankly, a lot of that changed for me with XBOX, XBOX LIVE, and now XBOX 360. I was one of the early beta testers for XBOX LIVE back in 2002 and I really believe MS has created a wonderful seamless online experience. The idea of Gamer Cards and Gamer Points was simple, but brilliant, it really elevates the competition. It's great having a single Gamertag versus having to register with new services for every game.

And, for those that said your modem is too far from your computer and you are resistant to purchasing the Wi-Fi adapter, consider buying a PC wireless router and moving the modem close to your XBOX 360. If your PC is Wi-Fi enabled, buying a PC wireless router will be lot cheaper than buying the XBOX 360 wi-fi adapter.

fanboys....

xbox live owns

hey, is it at 80% yet...um, getting Re-re-REALLY bored

%60 percent is a HUGE number of people! considering 3.2 million have been sold, thats 2 million people with xbox live! and btw, sony will never be able to catch up with xbox live, because it sucks. i dont care if its free. i hope it is, because then Sony will go bankrupt even faster. O and poliveto, this is for xbox live GOLD. im sure 95 percent of xbox owners use live, just not all have gold.

I don't have live for my 360 because the cable doesn't reach/wireless is 129.99/if I bought a long cable it would get in the way

cleft5:
I don't understand why they are making such a big deal out of 60%, fact is they should have at least 90% of the people who own 360 going online. I guess this is what happens when you sell systems using the skew mechanics. Honestly, this is the most lame news since they told us about us about the number of downloads they had, talking about making a mountain out of a molehill.

Man... you don't know what's the big deal ? the big deal is that a console who has less than a 1 year of existance has more online users than a 10 years console ever had. That's the big deal. I still to hear from someone who uses Live that says the system's no good.
Drop the guns, even Ninty and Sony suits agree that MS did a great job on the Live service, so I don't understand why can't we all agree on this.

Guys, do not compare PC gaming with 360 Live system, it shows that the ones who do do not know the system. And for the people who claims that the percentage of PC owners that plays online would be > 90%, that's ridiculous, count how many people don't even play games on PC's. At my work that must be those 90%.
Live system is an integrated system common to every game, not just a TCP/IP "aware" bunch of games (like PCs and PS's).
And it costs a lot of money to run datacenters for this.

The guy that said 60% is low must be one of the 4 guys that use the PS2 Live system.

Hey, I am with u Zep, It cost me $50 a year for live, but wit hthe friends list and stuff, its so easy to get into a game with friends online, I love it, and I have ps2, also connected online, but it was hard to find friends, and with most games if someone had dial-up,it would lag real bad, ever try playing a game of Madden again someone with dial-up? It pauses / slows down after each and every play...

Also, I loved resident evil online, but the loading took forever, also it took like 30 minutes just to sign up for an online account, with xbox, u always have ur user name, and u can set it to automatically sign in, no making up a different name / password for each game...that was a pain...although it was free....

The only reason i haven't been online is because my Xbox360 is in a different room than my PC.

I still haven't gone online with XBOX Live. Since my household finally got high speed Internet this year, that will have to change. Hopefully my current router and other gear will work with the XBOX 360. I doubt I will play a ton online, but I'd at least like to try it out and have the option to play when it's convenient.

I have had xbox live for a very long time...I bought my xbox in my freshman year of high school, and got xbox live afterwards. Not only did I pay 50 bucks for a subscription, bit i get an xbox live wireless router on clearance for 50 bucks also, which I still use with my 360. I started using Xbox live since counter strike came out for the original, and I believe that if we all had not been paying 50 bucks a year to play online that this great service would not be nearly as good as it is now.

I remember before I had xbox live when I used to play socom 2 on my friends PS2 online. At the time it was great. What could be better than playing online for free. After a couple of year of playing on Xbox Live, I ended up buying a Ps2, and my friend rebought one. We played some Socom 2, but finding eachother was not as easy. The universal friends list really makes it easy to find your friends online instead of having to call them, and the private chat really helps my friends and I get games going. with eachother. I think the xbox live service is great and worth the few bucks you have to pay a month to go online. After my days of playing rainbow six and halo online, I do not regret getting Xbox live at all. Me and my friends had some great gaming experiences online compared to PS2. I still enjoy PS2, mainly because of Guitar Hero, but I was even paying 50 bucks a year for xbox live when i didn't have a job...which eans that it is cheap...

I love Xbox live, I'm glad it's growing. If only they had made a way to where I don't have to play with all the annoying little kids. They really need to make an age bias section for online gaming. Sometimes I think PC gaming is more productive for multiplayer. It's more organized because it's played by more mature gamers... rather than the childish screams, mamma jokes and non-serious players.

Pro, underground, and recreational doesn't live up to what it should be.

wheres that 60% when it comes to playing JOUST?!?!

WHERE!?!?!?

I really like xbox360 ! There is no better console ! And they will win Next gen wars...

But there is one thing !!! Online gameplay shuld be FREE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

acctually to be fair, I understand what ur saying, there is a lot of stuff u have to pay MS points for, but honestly the Ghost Recon pack was worth the money, they added a bunch of ew maps, added a few new weapons, and re did the lighting on other maps, which doesnt change much, but does make it a bit different, they also added some camo patterns and stuff like that,

So I think they did a good job of the addon, but ur right, like Perfect dark, its 400 MS points for 4 maps....so its like $5 for 4 maps, because u can get th points at 500 for like $6.50 or somthing....but still, the speed and style pack for PGR 3 was a decent buy, 12 cars on each one, or if u want u can get the cars seperate for 60 MS points each...that is if u like / play that game a lot like me

I used to love XBL on my old Xbox but it wasn't for multiplayer games. It was for all the free download updates for all my games. Splinter Cell levels, Star Wars KotoR add ons and others. And they were FREE. Now I get XBL Gold and I have to pay for all my updates? It's a rip. You should get a ton of free credits when you buy XBL. 2.50 for horse armor in Oblivion? Seriously, it's not that much but after you've bought all the new updates you will end up paying a ton of cash and stuff like horse armor adds almost no additional gameplay time. Ghost Recon was out for like, what, a month and they already expected 15$ from you to buy a couple of multiplayer levels? I understand if these were huge updates but a lot of them are nothing. You can't even get free gamertag pictures with Gold. It adds no value but multiplayer anymore and that kind of bugs me. I don't play online much anymore because I like games like oblivion. So until they add something for single player games I don't think I'll be renewing my account.

thanks nikeportugal I will try it out

Most people, like myself, still live in the "sticks" where there is no high speed internet other than satellite (and you cannot play games on it as there is too much latency). If I had high speed internet available then you bet I would be on XBox Live!

Darn. I thought that they were going to drop the price of Gold by 60%.

sweet, Go XB Live soon itll dominate the market, even when ps3 comes out

mynamesdenvrmax, no offense, but Xbox Live isn't exactly lag free. See: Halo 2. Still, I get the point, and it's better then the PS2 online.

Marks

Tell microsoft to help get broadband everywhere then you will see that percentage skyrocket

Tell microsoft to help get broadband everywhere then you will see that percentage skyrocket

If they didn't meet the 50% mark, you could be sure the resident GS Microsoft hater, Tor Thorsen, would have had his name on the byline.

As for lag...I play BF2:MC, Chromehounds, and PDZ online with no lag. Ironically, the less powerful XBLA games like Uno and Gauntlet seem to be laggy as heck.

lol so many people with computers complaining about having to pay for an online server... but I'm willing to bet money that they're paying for their World of Warcraft subscription

I had got the 3 months free subscription when I bought my 360 and after that time was up, probably within the month I was already getting the 12 month subscription lol. It's a really good service and I think it is worth the fee they charge. I game on both the PC and the 360, and even though I wouldnt mind playing for free online with the 360 like I do with my PC, they do run a great service thats worth the 50 bux a year And i mean, cmon, its only 50 dollars a year lol.

Id rather pay for a GOOD online gaming service, than not pay for a crappy lag filled one like PS2 had

It is still absolutely ridiculous that Xbox Live gold requires a subscription. No matter how small it is, I will always say that free online gaming is the way to go (not including the internet service charge).

Yeah I have to agree with Zidura. The entire process is very streamlined and it gets you into the games quickly to do what you came to do, play.
Sometimes I will be waiting to go somewhere or waiting for a phone call or something and I'm like "okay I got 15 minutes or so what can I do?"
I turn on my 360, pop in Halo 2, jump online really quick, play 2 matches of Multi-Team or a match of BTB Slayer and then hop off ready to do what I have to do.

I never owned the original Xbox but I am loving the 360.

I love gaming on PC too, that is why my pc is "Hooked up" With a BFG GEforce 7900!! I love pc gaming, but I think microsoft is doing great for consoles...

Also, there are other good games besides halo, like PGR 3, tons of people still play that, especially online, as for PREY, on ign.com they felt a lot differently than gamespot, giving it all 9.0 I think it is better than gamespot said, but multi-player is weak, as for chromehounds, theres no excuse there, online is good, sp is super weak....oh well win some loose some

cool good one ms