For the Magazine: What do you love about Live?

[Cerebral_Wolf]

Well it is free for Gold members, they don't charge us any extra for it do they?

[Venomous Albino]

Technically it isn't free though. You pay X amount every month/year for a Gold membership, and access to Facebook, for example, is one of the things included in that price. All these new things being added to the dashboard are undeniably making the Gold membership better value for money (even if most of them are things that should be free to anybody), but they're not free, because Gold isn't free.

Not that I care; if I want to go on Facebook, I'll use the laptop, because the Facebook on 360 is a bit naff*.

*plus my Gold membership ran out on the 25th

[Johnny Shoulder]

And what is this that I read in the mag that Activision wants to start charging people to play online COD:MW? Cash cow alert!

[Venomous Albino]

There's no way Activision will start charging people to play Modern Warfare 2, or even Black Ops, as the backlash would be astronomical. The only feasible way they could charge people an extra monthly fee for playing COD online would be if they were to make an exclusively online MMO-style COD game; one that would be constantly updated with patches and free new maps on a regular basis. Personally, I can see this happening in the next few years. Activision has the most popular online multiplayer console franchise on its hands and no doubt knows it, and I dare say we'll see a MMO-style COD game in the not-too-distant future.

[matchstickgeezer]

I actually think in 4 years Activision wil set up a 'channe'l' for tv whereby they can bypass consoles...

I think they will definitely start charging then

[Venomous Albino]

I recall reading something about Activision mentioning their intention to bypass consoles altogether at some point. I wonder if they've realised that to get the likes of Guitar/Band/DJ Hero, Call of Duty etc up and running on something other than a PS3 or 360 would probably require some sort of other console or maybe freeview style box, and that if they did that then people would have to shell out for what would basically amount to another console on which to solely play Activision games and they'd probably go bust in a few years. Because I don't care how good Call of Duty is; I'm not buying another machine just to play it.

On an Xbox Live related note, I think its best feature is definitely Xbox Live Arcade. After a shaky start and a fairly lacklustre selection, it's really flourished and come into its own in the past few years. The fact that it offers everything from quick-go puzzlers to stuff like Shadow Complex - all of which are cheap and cheerful - means that if I have a period of time where there jack all coming out in terms of boxed releases that interests me, I can always hop on Live and see if there's anything on XBLA worth checking out, and there usually is.

[biron_w]

I like being able to set my chat to friends only so I don't have to put up with 10 year old kids trying to give me abuse,even though i'm playing MW2 which means they shouldn't be playing it. Or people singing down the mics,or playing crap music in the background. And not having to put up with annoying yanks. And racist yanks. Or racist english people.
Basically not having to put up with the ridiculous amount of idiots you get on live.

[ClownTrousers]

I'd be almost (almost) willing to bet that there won't be another generation of consoles, that the Activision desire is the way things will go. Maybe. If not the next generation, then the one after that.

Anyway Live - I'd like it if it wasn't 95% Microsoft trying to sell me things. What'd be nice would be if some of the free videos they "provide", any of these videos, weren't advertisements. The whole party, talking, friends thing = great.