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Xbox Live

demo

Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit Demo Online

Looking to get your hand on the first Dragon Balls on the PS3 and Xbox 360? Atari has a demo up on Xbox Live right now for Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit, the series' first foray onto the current crop of cutting-edge consoles. The demo weighs in at under 500 megs and features two battles from the game's story mode, Goku versus long-haired guy and other long-haired guy versus those little green things. Yep, I am definitely up on my DBZ terminology. The demo is currently available on Xbox Live and should be up on PSN later today, Sony willing. While you wait, a metric ass-ton of screenshots.


tough issues

"theGAYERGamer" Gets Xbox Live Ban, Microsoft Explains

The Consumerist printed a letter from a reader, Grant, who claims his Xbox Live gamertag, "theGAYERgamer," was banned from Xbox Live. When he called Microsoft customer support, a rep reportedly told him that while she wasn't offended by his gamertag, "the greater Xbox community" had found his it offensive, thereby warranting a ban.

Hit the jump for Grant's full letter to The Consumerist and for comment from Microsoft reps.

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microsoft

Rumored Xbox 360 Spring Update Touts "Motion Sensor" Features, Game Installs

If Microsoft follows the same schedule it did last year, the Spring system update for the Xbox 360 should be right around the corner. Today, an alleged and wholly unconfirmed list of changes included in the "Q2 2008" update was sent to us, supposedly forwarded from an internal source. The full list—which is after the jump—features about 80 new feature additions, tweaks and changes but was purported to be incomplete and subject to change.

Some are simply interesting as curiosities, such as an option to purchase Xbox Live memberships for charities and the addition of a Media section for audio delivered through feeds, such as podcasts. Others sound more feature robust, such as Windows Live Mail integration and an expanded "Inside Xbox" with news, weather, entertainment, help and community features.

Perhaps the most interesting additions are "Calibration options for motion sensor devices" for the Dashboard and "Support for titles to store installation data on Storage Device for faster loading" for Games. If true, the former would lend further credibility to frequent rumors that Microsoft is planning to introduce a motion controller for the Xbox 360. The ability to store installation data on a hard drive—as is done with some PlayStation 3 games—would certainly be a welcome option, if that's how the wording should be interpreted. Continue on for the full list of rumored updates.

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live arcade

Reiteration - Assault Heroes 2 This Wednesday

In case you weren't paying attention around the end of April, Sierra Online's Assault Heroes 2 is this week's Xbox Live Arcade release. The game picks up where the first left off, with our heroes realizing that the enemy the vanquished in their last adventure was merely a pawn of something much more sinister. The new game features enhanced foot combat complete with a dodge roll maneuver, the ability to hijack enemy vehicles (perhaps to ease you away from GTA for five minutes), and combat that takes you over land, sea, and eventually into the depths of space. Assault Heroes 2 hits the 800 MS point sweet spot and will be available early Wednesday morning.

xbox 360

Impress Your Friends With These Xbox 360 Grand Theft Auto IV Statistics

Hot numbers! We got hot numbers, folks, fresh from the Microsoft sales and marketing team! The company's Gamerscore Blog is stuffed with statistics, revealing that Xbox 360 console sales were up 54% during the week of Grand Theft Auto IV's release. Of the millions of copies of GTA IV sold, MS says that 60% of those were of the 360 persuasion. Take that, friendly competition!

In addition to sexy percentages, Microsoft has whipped out big, big numbers, including 1 million concurrent Xbox Live users, 12 million GTA IV Achievements and 2.3 million total players going online last week with Rockstar's latest. All those zeros! *pant pant* I need a cigarette, a Vitamin Water and a shower. For even more digits, hit up the official boast post or visit your local library.

Grand Theft Auto IV Statistics [Gamerscore Blog]


gta iv

How Many GTA IV Achievements Did You Unlock In A Single Day?

And by "you", I don't mean "you". I mean you, the collective owners of the game. According to Microsoft's Larry Hryb, the answer was a lot, as he claims (and really, I've no reason to doubt this) that during the first 24 hours of GTA IV being on sale, over two million achievements were unlocked. That's over 15 million Gamerpoints. I know, the first 2-3 achievements are picked up pretty quickly, and the game sold fairly well, but if anything, it shows that a frighteningly high proportion of you failed to turn up to work/school last Tuesday.
Show #277 GTA IV and umm...more GTA IV [Microsoft, via Eurogamer]

grand theft auto iv

GTA IV Claims Top Spot On Xbox Live

From the Obvious Files comes news that Grand Theft Auto IV has unseated Xbox Live chart topper Call of Duty 4 as the title with the most unique users on the service. That's a lot of dead pedestrians! Liberty City has never heard this many racial slurs and synonyms for "homosexual" in such a short timeframe, we guarantee it. Former Live activity darling Halo 3 settles for third place from April 28 to May 5—and we predict for months to come—as the GTA IV masses flood the service in its debut week.

Taking the number one spot in the Xbox Live Arcade top ten? Brain Challenge! Who didn't see that one coming? Probably someone who was unaware that Brain Challenge was released, just like me.

LIVE Activity for week of 4/28 (GTA is #1) [Microsoft]


demo

Bourne Demo On Xbox Live

This morning Xbox 360 owners get their first shot at truly being Bourne. Robert Ludlum's The Bourne Conspiracy gets the demo treatment this morning on Microsoft's platform, bringing the fast-paced, close quarters combat of the movie trilogy to the smaller, more interactive screen. Be sure to check out Flynn's eyes-on impressions from last month to help you decide whether or not you want to commit 1.24GB of your precious hard drive space to High Moon's take on the spy game, 100% Matt Damon free. More »

harmonix

Next Week's Rock Band DLC Makes The Scene

Next week's batch of Rock Band downloadable tracks arrive just in time for the new, officially licensed Rock Band Lip Ring controller, adding extra authenticity to what Harmonix is calling the Scene Pack. Individual hipster tracks will hit you in the wallet for $1.99 (160 Microsoft Points) each or $5.49 (440 Microsoft Points) as a bundle. They're all master tracks, fortunately, and should show up on the service of your choice starting next Tuesday.

  • "This Ain't A Scene, It's An Arms Race" by Fallout Boy
  • "Date With The Night" by Yeah Yeah Yeahs
  • "It Hurts" by Angels & Airwaves

DLC Week of May 6th [Rock Band Forums]


xbox live

British 360 Vid Marketplace Gets...Michael Jackson Videos

Poor Britain. Your 360 Video Marketplace, it was so late! And is still woefully understocked! What could possibly make amends for this? How about...uh, five Michael Jackson videos? Bad, Billie Jean, Thriller, Beat It and Black or White are all available, all for 200 points, and all - sadly for the legions of Macaulay Culkin fans in Ireland and the United Kingdom - all in standard definition. No, before you ask, I don't know why the hell they're there either.
Marketplace Roundup for May 1, 2008 [Microsoft]

xbox live

Microsoft Expects Big Xbox Live Surge From GTA IV

Microsoft's Aaron Greenberg expects GTA IV's launch to drive a big boost in Xbox Live memberships, he told Reuters today:

"The multiplayer in this game is so well implemented that I can't imagine anyone owning a copy without trying to play it on Xbox Live," said Aaron Greenberg, the director of product management for Xbox 360 and Xbox Live.

"GTA is unique because it appeals to such a large audience. It will likely be the best-selling game launched all year and we expect it will drive a lot of new members to Xbox Live."


Greenberg also told Reuters that GTA IV might even take the top Live spot. Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter estimates, though, that only about 40 percent of users play online — if you're one of those who routinely doesn't, will GTA IV be the game that finally sends you forth into that strange and wild country?

GTA 4 poised to dominate Xbox Live [Reuters]


xbox live

Kung Fu Panda Demo On Xbox Live

Today marks the 25th 35th (oops) anniversary of me popping out of my mother's uterus, and to celebrate, Activision has released a playable demo of the game of the movie Kung Fu Panda for me to play! The 810MB demo features the Jack Black-voiced panda Po taking on the evil forces of the snow leopard Tai Lung. According to Larry Hryb's website, the demo is only available in the US and Canada currently, with other regions getting it closer to the film's release. Kung Fu Panda is due out in theaters in early June in the states, so either they are supremely confident about the quality of the title or figure kids might need something else to play in between bouts of jacking cars and stabbing hookers. Thanks Activision!

Demo: Kung Fu Panda [Xbox Live's Major Nelson]


gta iv

Buy GTA IV, Get Xbox Live Free For A Month

In my haste to get started on GTA IV this morning, I didn't even look at the manual, let alone take it out and see what was hiding underneath. If I had, I'd have been able to tell you this a lot sooner: the 360 version of GTA IV comes with a free one month subscription to Xbox Live. Most likely useless to the majority of you, but if for whatever reason you abhor the concept of a paid online service and have been gaming unconnected, know you can buy this game and at least squeeze four weeks of free online gaming from the man. Whoever you deem "the man" to be.

msoft prepares for gta iv

Xbox Live Preps for GTA IV Server Riot

If Microsoft has one thing going for them that no fanboy rant can question, it's Xbox LIVE. As long as Nintendo has friend codes and Sony has, uhhh, we'll get back to that, Microsoft stands tall on their untarnished pedestal. Well...untarnished if you ignore the month+ of outages around Christmas 2007. The fact of the matter is, Xbox LIVE has failed the consumer public before. And it could fail us again. More »

video marketplace

More Original Programming For Xbox Live

You know James Gunn? Hollywood writer. Has some hits (Dawn of the Dead remake), and some misses (both Scooby-Doo movies). I bring him up not to torture you with memories of Freddie Prinze Jr in tight pants, but to tell you that he's currently looking for actors to star in some content he's putting together for the Xbox Live Video Marketplace. Maybe he's working with Peter Safran's company, maybe this is all-new content, we don't know. What I do know (I have visions, you see) is that the show will be about the "wacky adventures of a group of friends". And that this will not end well.
Original Xbox Live show after actors [Eurogamer]

ace combat 6

Even More Planes For AC6 Tomorrow

I thought it was over, but you folks just keep on buying them. Namco Bandai is readying yet another batch of downloadable planes for Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation for release tomorrow via Xbox Live, including yet another gaudy, incredibly expensive (400 MS points) IDOLM@STER model and two planes that really do nothing but shoot colored missiles for show purposes. Along with those three, a cheapy Typhoon and a completely free PJ Emblem F-16C, they're also releasing a 400 point pack containing four aircraft from the Razgriz squadron of Ace Combat 5 fame. Hit the jump for more details on the release, or check out the gallery to see the pretty planes that keep fans coming back for more.

More »

Xbox Live Status Watch: Day 125 - Didn't think we'd be running one of these again so soon. We'd gotten a few emails over the past day or two about people being unable to sign into Xbox Live, but things seem to have taken a turn for the worse today, with Xbox.com's support page now displaying the familiar "Users may experience difficulties..." message. I can't sign in, you guys having any luck?

xbox live

Xbox Live On Dial-Up Is No Fun For Anybody

It's unlikely, but some of you out there may use a dial-up connection on a semi-regular basis. Hell, maybe even a regular basis. If so, you're probably used to waiting an age for stuff to download, so why not give your ceaseless read-press F5-wait-repeat cycle a miss and try something a little more laborious. Like connecting to Xbox Live. Instructables have the how-to guide, and all you need is a a PC hooked up to these internets via 56k and an ethernet cable. Oh, and some time on your hands.
How to get on Xbox Live with Dialup [Instructables, via Gizmodo]