New Xbox 360 Experience

Xbox reinvented, evolutioned and create a new revamped experience for users in regards of PS3 new offerings...

Microsoft's not content. Despite ostensibly having one of the best user interfaces of all the major consoles, Microsoft is reinventing the Xbox 360's look. The underlying Xbox Live foundation will remain the same, but Microsoft wants to make life even better for users by making existing features easier to find and use, decluttering the marketplace, and vastly improving the social experience of Live.

The first major change to the system involves basic navigation. The top-level channels now consist of six items that closely resemble the menu structure of Windows Media Center: Spotlight, Games, My Xbox, Primetime, Community, and Videos. Each option contains additional functionality in submenu options and contains major innovations that we'll detail below.
Users who are familiar with the traditional five-bladed menu structures will be relieved to find that the old system remains intact--they appear whenever you press the Guide button on the gamepad. Pressing the button pops up a miniature version of the original blade system. The new miniblades will be accessible anywhere, even while in a game.
Primetime

Microsoft is banking heavily on its new Primetime feature, a brand-new area that gives users a whole new way to play games together. Virtual gameshows are the name of the game here. Microsoft has already demonstrated 1 vs. 100, a game of mental king of the hill against a hundred other opponents. Microsoft will introduce other gameshow-related games to Primetime. Some events will even feature live hosts and offer prizes to keep the gameshow charm. Primetime will let you either participate in the action as a competitor or play along silently as a spectator.

Videos

Microsoft has partnered with a number of content providers to provide thousands of hours of additional content in the Xbox Live video section.
Microsoft announced at E3 2008 that content from Netflix will be viewable via Xbox Live for Xbox Live Gold members. The deal allows users who subscribe to Netflix to watch movies and TV shows saved in their Netflix Instant Queue on their Xbox 360. You will have to visit the Netflix Web site to add or remove titles from your Instant Queue. Any Instant Queue adjustments you make through the Web browser will automatically update on the Xbox 360 within seconds.

Netflix currently offers more than 10,000 movies and TV shows available for instant viewing. Video playback will stream at near DVD quality, and users will also be able to rate movies they've watched via Xbox Live.
Content from companies such as NBC Universal, Universal Studios Home Entertainment, SCI FI Channel, USA Network, Constantin, and MGM will also populate the video marketplace. Videos will be available for purchase in either standard definition or high definition.
The user interface overhaul will also improve video navigation. Staggering the video thumbnails/box covers will make finding content much easier.

Community

Microsoft added a community channel to make socializing easier. The new channel lets you quickly find your friends, see what they're doing, and then make it easy to join in on the action. New community features will let you gather into parties and find new activities to do together. LiveParty allows up to eight users to band together with shared voice and text chat. Everyone in the group shares the same communication channels while playing games, watching movies, or participating in other events. If some users switch to a game that others in the party don't own, the group will still stay in communication with one another in the LiveParty.

MyXbox

The MyXbox section will give you a central location to edit personal items. From here you'll be able to add pictures, edit your profile, and view your achievements. Microsoft will also institute a new medal system so you can show off your most recent achievements. Medals are basically graphical representations of achievements, kind of like graphical badges or trophies.
Microsoft also decided to get into the personalization fray with user avatars. Much like how you can create Miis on the Nintendo Wii and user avatars in Sony's PlayStation Home, 360 users will be able to create virtual representations of themselves in Xbox Live. The MyXbox channel will let you customize your avatar's body, hair, and clothing style. Currently all avatar graphics are being designed by Microsoft's Rare Ltd. studio. Microsoft indicated that many aspects of avatars will remain free, but upcoming content might include premium content for options such as clothing.
In addition to simply looking pretty and providing an avenue for user expression, avatars will also be usable in upcoming games. Microsoft indicated that many third-party developers are excited at the prospect and are eagerly adopting the new feature. Future game achievements may also unlock upgrades such as new outfits for your avatar.

Games and Spotlight

The Games channel will let users easily find games to purchase and explore. You'll be able to find demos, full downloads, and game previews.
The Spotlight channel serves as a simple way to access what is essentially the most popular or important stuff on Xbox Live. The channel will have links to the hottest games, events, videos, and whatever else Microsoft wants to put in front of you. The system will be updated frequently to help users discover new and interesting content.
One of the not-so-cosmetic changes in the fall update will be the ability to let you play your games directly from the hard disk. The new feature will let users install all of the game content directly onto the hard drive to improve game load times. Microsoft reports that it has seen a 30 percent improvement in load times in internal testing. As an interesting data point, Microsoft went out of its way to tell a group of reporters that the full Devil May Cry 4 hard disk installation took roughly 10 minutes on the Xbox 360. The installation took twice as long when we conducted our own installation tests on the PlayStation 3. Another side benefit of having games installed on the hard disk is reduced noise, since the optical disc no longer needs to spin up. However, you will still need to have the game disc in your optical drive while you're playing it, presumably as a piracy check.
The new Xbox experience is certainly turning out to be a colossal achievement. The update could easily qualify as a new software product with the number of features and improvements it brings to the Xbox 360. We look forward to testing out all the new upgrades when Microsoft rolls out the update this fall.

Source: GameSpot.

Gears of War 2 será cooperativo.

During our recent visit to Microsoft to try out the competitive multiplayer in Gears of War 2, we got a sneak peek at one other mode in the upcoming game, horde. Once Epic's Cliff Bleszinksi ran through the competitive modes we covered previously, he gave us a sneak peek at some other multiplayer elements and talked co-op. We're finally able to spill the details on the new mode and other choice bits on the Gears 2 multiplayer experience.
Horde is essentially a cooperative survival mode that lets you and four friends work together to deal with increasingly difficult mobs of enemies that come in waves. In addition to the new mode we had a chance to check out two new maps, avalanche and day one, which added a new wrinkle to the multiplayer experience.
So, first off, horde mode. The new mode lets you and four friends test your skills against waves of enemies. Basically every wave will be made up of a set amount of enemies. Once you clear the wave you'll have a few seconds to prep and collect ammo and whatever pickups have been left by your foes or gear that respawns. The first waves are totally manageable and are made up of familiar enemies. However, as the levels progress things get crazy as new enemies such as the mauler boomer, butcher boomer, grinder boomer, and the flamer boomer. Each variation comes packing new weapons and gear that bumps up their threat and irritation levels to new heights.
However, you might look back fondly on the new boomers when you hear about what else is coming. The bloodmounts are new and exciting enemies which find locust riding mounts that bring a world of pain. If you're fast you can take out their riders, but these new foes are something else. At the moment the mode is being tweaked for balancing so specifics on the number of waves, right now Epic is thinking 50 or so, and exactly how things will play out are still being determined. We got pretty far in our play time, but things got pretty brutal. The biggest challenge is keeping your ammo stocked by collecting what's handy before enemies spawn in. The best way to survive is teamwork as your group can revive each other if everyone's attentive and fast on their feet. If you can't be revived before something horrible happens you'll respawn in time for the next wave if one of your team members survives.
One of the cool new twists to the mode is the stage interactivity on the two new maps we saw, day one and avalanche. Day one is set in a city center and paints a disturbing picture of how things went down on emergence day. Basically the stage is made up of a downtown city street, complete with movie theater. At its center is an emergence hole that offers an unpleasant surprise every so often: a rampaging worm that reaches out and chomps on anything that's unlucky enough to be close by.
However the avalanche level featured an even crazier interactive element, an actual avalanche that changed the layout of the level. Before the mighty rush of snow hits the level is a simple mountainside town. The boxy level is bordered by structures you can go in and explore with a center area that has a gazebo like structure with weapons to collect. The problem with the center area is, when the snow hits, you don't want to be there as you'll instantly die. While the snow is dangerous, there are some nice perks to it. The biggest perk is that the level layout is changed by the snow and you'll be able to access different weapons, including some from the new weapon class being introduced in the game, the heavy weapon class. We got to see two, the mulcher and the mortar, from the new class which is essentially an incredibly powerful but challenging to aim firearm. The mulcher is a chaingun like weapon that is a powerful close quarters weapon with so much kick it's tough to be too accurate with. The secondary fire to it lets you actually plant it in the ground and create a mobile turret with a limited range of fire. The challenge is that the weapon uses a heat system which will lock up the gun if you use it too often. To help you balance usage you can manually cool it by flushing heat. The new mechanic is called active cooling and works like the active reload system.
The mortar follows the same logic and lets you fire a cluster of powerful explosives that present a danger to anything around, including you. However, if you plant it in the ground you'll get a range finder and be able to take out foes at a far range which is incredibly handy. The downside to both weapons is that you'll move slowly with them and using them on the fly isn't super effective.
The visuals in horde mode and the new maps are obviously along the same quality lines as what we've reported. We would like to call out the visuals for the avalanche which are very cool. The heavy weapons are a little nutty but feature some impressive effects that sell their raw power.
Based on what we played, horde mode is a slick new addition to the Gears experience. The five player support is cool, although we do still wish for some two plus player co-op, and a lot of fun. Another cool tidbit we didn't get to see too much of was bot support in the game which sounds like another cool touch that Epic's adding into the game. Look for more on Gears of War 2 this week when Microsoft demos it live on our stage show Tuesday afternoon. The game is slated to ship this November.

Source: GameSpot

Trailer de Final Fantasy XIII

El Trailer que se presentó en la conferencia de Microsoft.

It's Official Final Fantasy XIII to Xbox 360 too!!!

Square Enix's formerly PS3-only RPG epic will launch day and date on Microsoft's console in North America and Europe; timed 360 exclusive hitting US Sept. 2, EU Sept. 5. By Tor Thorsen, GameSpot Posted Jul 14, 2008 2:04 pm CT LOS ANGELES--At the 2005 Electronic Entertainment Expo, Microsoft presented what it thought was a major announcement from a top Japanese developer, Square Enix. Unfortunately, the "news" proved a tad anticlimactic, considering that the game in question was Final Fantasy XI, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game previously released on the PC in 2003 and the PlayStation 2 in 2004. Despite a sizeable PR push, the 360 edition of the game was lukewarmly received by critics and consumers, who barely bought 213,000 copies of it in the US. Over the next three years, Microsoft would announce several more Square Enix games for the Xbox 360, including the exclusive Star Ocean: The Last Hope and the timed exclusive The Last Remnant. However, in many gamers' minds these projects were dwarfed in importance by the stature of two other Square Enix games: Final Fantasy XIII and Final Fantasy XIII Versus, both PlayStation 3 exclusives... ...until today. This morning at its press briefing at the E3 Media & Business Summit, Microsoft stunned many in the audience by announcing that Final Fantasy XIII is now in development for the Xbox 360. Not only is the game coming to the console, but it will arrive on the same day and date as the PlayStation 3 edition of the game, with no timed exclusivity of any kind. However, when exactly that is remains a mystery, given that the graphics-intensive role-playing game still has no firm release date. "We believe that releasing an Xbox 360 version of Final Fantasy XIII will allow us to provide the game to even more fans in the two regions of North America and Europe," Square Enix boss Yoichi Wada told a stunned audience. No mentioned was made of Japan, where the 360 is far less popular than the PS3. Wada also used today's event to date the 360 release of The Last Remnant in all regions. The game will ship in North America on September 2, Europe and the UK on September 5, and Japan and Asia on September 11.

Source: GameSpot

Rock Band 2... Rocks too!!

While the original Rock Band is still going strong, Harmonix is already looking towards the next bit of kit that it hopes will be cluttering your place, with it now getting official with Rock Band 2 for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. This time around, it seems the Xbox 360 will be getting a jump on things with a launch in September, with the PS3 version set to follow "later in the year." Both of those will, naturally, be coming with all new instruments, including the tasty Fender Stratocaster pictured above, but you will be able to use your current gear if you want to spare the extra clutter and save a few bucks. What's more, you'll also be able to carry over all your current downloaded content and, as IGN reports, you'll even be able to download and play new tracks on Rock Band 1 once Rock Band 2 is out. Of course, Harmonix is saving most of the details for E3 next month Here is more detail information: June 30, 2008 - Rock Band is ready for a comeback tour. Today, Harmonix announced Rock Band 2 is set to ship for Xbox 360 this September and PS3 later in the year. However, the official announcement of Rock Band 2 is sparse on details, so we went straight to Harmonix to learn more. We spoke with Lead Designer Dan Teasdale to get the full scoop on the mega-sequel. Teasdale gave us his thoughts on user-created content, improving accessibility, upgrading last year's model and more. Source: IGN.COM