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Shadowrun public beta: testers wanted
FASA has begun registering participants for a public beta testing of its eventual cross-platform ('Live Anywhere') FPS Shadowrun. The beta is scheduled to begin by mid-December and will run through March 2007. Testing applies to the Xbox 360 version only (sorry, no early access to Vista for you). You have to be a US-based Xbox Live Gold member to participate. Anyone still interested, read on for registration details...[Via Press Release]
Sign up for the Shadowrun beta
Microsoft and FASA Studio have officially announced the Shadowrun beta program. Shadowrun, you may recall, is the launch vehicle for Microsoft's Live Anywhere service, allowing gamers on both PC and Xbox 360 to compete with each other. An FPS that combines both technology and magic, Shadowrun looks to bring something different to the shooter genre -- and answer the age old keyboard and mouse/gamepad question once and for all. Find instructions on how to participate in the beta after the break.
More evidence Live Anywhere reaching Zune?
Digging through the source code of Zune.net a curious mole stumbled upon an intriguing line of code that referenced the production domain: "gamercard.zune.net."Perhaps it's just lazy (copy/paste) coding, as a Generation Zune commenter points out -- Xbox.com's source has the same line of code, with "xbox" instead of "zune" -- but why wouldn't Zune feature Gamercard compatibility? That Zune will be part of the Live Anywhere network has been rumored before, and there's no good reason to believe it won't.We already know (see 2old2play) that MS Passport-associated Gamertag's will become your Zunetag. In fact, Microsoft has already reserved said Gamertags so that if you ever decide to go Zune, you're proper handle will be waiting. We're not convinced that Live Anywhere is a critical selling point for Zune, but tossing the feature in for Xbox Livies is a no-brainer.[Via Gamertag Radio]
XBL downtime scheduled for Oct. 17th [update 1]
Major Nelson has sent us word that there will be a day scheduled downtime for Xbox Live and Xbox.com on October 17th. October 17th ... hmmm. Why does that sound familiar. Wait a minute! That's when we get Double Agent. What the hell, man! And not only that, October 17th is the second to last day of the PSU beta -- which is already delayed to begin with. So what the hell do we do now Microsoft? What the hell do we do now?!Ah well, guess we all gotta deal right? The boys at Xbox.com even suggest 10 things you can do without Live. And Major Nelson reminds us all that this is not the Fall dashboard update, though apparently "cool stuff" is being added. What that means is anyone's guess. Now we just figure out what to do. Anybody want to go bowling or something?[Thanks, Larry, AKA Major Nelson]Update: It's Xbox.com, not Box.com. Give me a break. I'm jet-lagged here.
Win a Zune from Engadget [update 1]
Our heavily connected blog cousin Engadget is celebrating their relaunch by giving away five "vertically integrated portable media players" -- aka Zunes -- courteously provided by Microsoft for hype purposes. All you have to do is leave a comment on this thread naming your favorite song (and the artist that sings it) and pray that the gadget gods smile on your entry. We're still not sure exactly when this device ships (Holiday Season), how much it costs ($300?), or exacty how it will incorporate Mr. Allard's mysterious Live Anywhere service (not much at first) but we do know the Zune Marketplace will accept the same MS points we 360 fanboys use to buy over-priced horse armour.Update: To clarify, posting a comment here on 360 Fanboy will win you a lot of nothing. Click over to Engadget if you'd like to win a Zune.
Magic, science, and fun, Shadowrun preview
Evil Avatar scored a sneak preview of FASA's upcoming Shadowrun, the debut game of Microsoft's new Live Anywhere platform which will allow both 360 and PC players to hash it out online. Some of you may remember that FASA was involved with the debut title for Xbox Live -- MechAssault -- way back in 2002. The preview pretty much covers everything you need to know about Microsoft's would be multiplayer king. The game plays out like Counter-Strike. Each match is divided into six rounds. At the beginning of each round, players purchase magic, technology, and, of course, weapons. The interesting factor here is that magic and technology remain with players even if they are killed during a round -- weapons must be purchased again, however. Essentially this causes the match to intensify with each new round. Adding another layer of strategy to the game is the ability to resurrect dead players. As the author notes, there's nothing quite like resurrecting your entire team and fighting your way back to victory. The preview is full of other details about the game. For instance, PC and 360 players may not be able to answer the age old mouse vs. controller question after all. See, you won't be able to tell if your playing against 360 or PC players. As far as the game is concerned, they're one and the same. The game also has another way of leveling the playing field. The faster you move the targeting reticle, the less accurate your shots. The idea is to moderate the massive speed advantage that mouse players have over console players. According to the author the experience on both the PC and 360 versions is nearly identical. We're always excited by fresh multiplayer so, here's hoping Shadowrun really shapes up. Anyone looking forward to this cross-platform frag fest?
Live Anywhere on a cell phone: First pics
Mobility Today scored the first photos of the Live Anywhere platform in action on a mobile phone. Xboxic does a good job deciphering the blurry pics:The first picture is pretty blurry, but it shows Major Nelson's gamertag and three selections, two of which are "Games" and "View Gamercard". The middle is too blurry to make out, may have something to do with his online status. In the second picture, Live Anywhere has the same game comparison function as Xbox Live, just in case you needed to see if your buddy just beat your Small Arms score while, say, in the supermarket.What do you expect Live Anywhere to grace your cell phone with beyond this basic stuff?
MS talks Live Anywhere achievments
Are you and your Xbox 360 itching frag your obnoxious PC-loving cousin and his competition weighted mouse? Microsoft UK Third-Party Account Manager Steven Blackburn told a Leipzig crowd that MS will lure you to the blood feud with special online-only achievements designed to hype the Live Anywhere service. Start talking smack now because the the first truly cross-platform title, Shadowrun, hits early next year with plenty more to follow.[Via Xboxic]
But wait, there's more... Zune deets
For a product that Microsoft hasn't even officially confirmed, there sure is a whole lot of Zune info to be getting on with. The latest leaks are from Digital Music News, who has been reviewing some of the presentation material that Microsoft shared with top-level execs of partner companies. The biggest detail that they've unveiled is that the Zune will indeed be basing its social networking capabilities on Microsoft's Live Anywhere platform. Not an incredibly huge surprise, given the functions we've already heard described and the Xbox roots of the device, but it should give the Zune a good boost in the direction of its 18-28 year old demographic, which Microsoft claims will skew a bet younger than that of the iPod. The social aspects, including that trusty friends list from Xbox Live, is purportedly taking some cues from MySpace, which seems to go beyond the functions we spied at our E3 demo of Live Anywhere. DMN also reveals that the 30GB Zune will have the "same pricing, look and feel as the 60GB iPod," which was $399 the last time we checked. That, of course, is the same price as an Xbox 360 Platinum, which might put the hurt on the cashflow of their younger target demographic. As rumored, the Zune should come in three colors, and that round button is indeed a scroll wheel to work the menus. WiFi functionality will be able to share music with up to 10 friends in a close-range peer to peer fashion, but to share a protected track your friend will have to "bookmark" the song for purchasing later. The player will be incompatible with other PlaysForSure services, focusing, we suppose, exclusively on their URGE store. There's still no word on non-DRMed MP3 sharing, but the outlook isn't good. Microsoft is aiming for a November release in the US, to be followed by a global launch next year. We would promise you more info as the release looms nearer, but we're not sure what else we could say.
Xbox Live numbers just keep rising
At the Develop Conference in Brighton, England, Microsoft's Jeff Sullivan dropped the news that 60% of 360 users are connected to Xbox Live. The long and short of it: things look good for Live."'Every time I do this presentation I have to check what the new figures are,' Sullivan said, before rattling off up-to-date stats such as Xbox Live has hosted over two billion hours of gaming, including over 500 million games of Halo 2. It also handles over 900,000 voice and text messages per day. But there's plenty more where that came from, with Microsoft on-track to hit its target of six million Xbox Live accounts in 2007.On Xbox Live Arcade:". . .on Arcade (which is used by 65 percent of connected users), over five million games have been downloaded. Conversion rates between free content and paid for downloads currently averages around 21 percent, with top games such as Geometry Wars and Uno up at 50 percent, while the lowest conversion rate is around 10 percent."It should be noted that even %10 percent is a substantial improvement over casual PC games, which average 2%. Sullivan also covered many other topics including Live Anywhere, in-game ads, and XLSP -- a tool that allows third party developers to integrate their own servers with Xbox Live. I think this Xbox Live thing might be going somewhere.[Via Xbox-Scene]
Allard's iPod killer to use Live Anywhere?
Earlier this week, Microsoft finally revealed the not-so-secret project that kept J Allard and Robbie Bach away from E3: A wi-fi enabled portable music player (see horribly blurred image above) designed to take a chunk out of Apple's iMonopoly in the PMP business. While not the portable 360 of our dreams, the device, due this Christmas, will presumably feature some sort of limited gaming capability -- and it's own version of Xbox Live. From Engadget:Microsoft's new portable audio and video player will have a screen that's "bigger than that of the iPod video" (which isn't really saying much) and built-in WiFi so you can not only download content directly to the player (sort of like with the MusicGremlin), but actually participate in an Xbox Live-like social network that will help you connect with other people with similar taste and interests. Whether that's going to be the Live Anywhere service they introduced at E3 we don't yet know. But we do know the tag line they're pitching for the device combined with this new network is "Connected Entertainment."Since this is an Xbox 360 blog, naturally we're most concerned with how this new product relates to our favorite console. If the device is indeed apart of Allard's Live Anywhere concept, will it offer some special benefit for 360 owners? Will it allow you to communicate with your XBL friends list? Will Marketplace media content be available for download? Since we don't know much, the climate is ripe for rampant speculation. What kind of Xbox Live integration would you like to see in a Microsoft PMP, and would such features convince you to toss your iPod?
The Engadget & Joystiq Interview: Microsoft's Shane Kim [update 1]
If you haven't already watched the video, now you can read the transcription of our interview with Shane Kim, General Manager of Microsoft Game Studios. On Wednesday (in the middle of E3), Vlad Cole and I got some time to sit down and ask him about some of the biggest questions facing Microsoft's early entrant into the next-gen console wars, like whether there are any more developer acquisitions lined up, which Xbox Live Arcade titles will show up on Vista with Live Anywhere, what are the plans for ad-supported gaming, and just how many paid subscribers does Xbox Live has. We're corroborating with several sources: is Peter Moore's [Grand Theft Auto 4] tattoo real? You know, I wasn't there when it was put on there, it's a very personal thing so I can neither confirm nor deny. Okay... so it's real. Prior to E3, people were really looking forward to actual demonstrations of the Wii controller. That was the big buzz coming into the show and, after they unveiled it, I think people were more or less satisfied with it. So how do you think you fared versus that intense excitement towards that controller? I think we fared extremely well. One of the big things we talked about yesterday was all the momentum we're going to have this next generation. We're going to have 10 million units in consumers' hands before the competitor even ships unit one. We're well on our way to 6 million connected members on Xbox Live and we're going to have 160 games in the market by the end of the year. We've got great momentum. We had Bill Gates attend E3 for the first time ever to announce the vision of Live anywhere. Again, demonstrating leadership in the online space isn't just about what we've achieved to date, but also about how we're going to take that forward across multiple platforms and devices. And finally, first and foremost, it's about the games and the content. Yesterday we started with Gears of War and ended with Halo 3, and we sprinkled in a little bit of Fable 2, Forza 2, Alan Wake, and, oh by the way, the Grand Theft Auto 4 announcement as well. So I think from the content standpoint we're definitely doing great there. So, better online, better content, and better pricing than some of the competition; we feel good about where we're at. Do you think it's important to win E3? I think most people say you have, at least in terms of the keynotes. I think it's always great to be recognized for what you're doing, whether it's at E3 or any other point. Sometimes I worry there's too much importance placed on that but since people are saying we won this year, I'll say it's a great thing we won E3.
Was Microsoft's vision for Vanguard Vista exclusive? [Update 1]
Sigil Games, developers of the upcoming MMORPG Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, shocked quite a few people by announcing that they were buying the publishing rights from Microsoft so that they could co-publish the title with Sony Online Entertainment. We've already provided some speculation about what the "varying visions and direction for the title's development" between Microsoft and Sigil were, but a tipster (who asked to remain unnamed) from E3 provides another possible reason for the split. Our tipster claims to have spoken to several developers working at Sigil and at another development company that has Microsoft as a publisher -- we'd say the meat of the tip is on the same level of credibility as someone saying that the Government is tapping your phone (yes, I made a political joke -- the first comment to judge my political affiliation wins my apathy!).According to our tipster, Microsoft intended to make Vanguard a Vista-exclusive title and Sigil didn't like it. The fact that XP users wouldn't have been able to play the game (limiting the user base quite drastically) and Windows Vista's notoriously slippery release date being the obvious disadvantages of such a move on the part of Sigil. If true, the motivation for Microsoft would have been that the title would be the first MMO to take advantage of Live Anywhere, Microsoft's online games platform which blends Xbox 360, PC and mobile phone devices: more Vista sales = profit!It's credible that Microsoft wanted to use Vanguard as the first MMO to work with Live Anywhere but that Sigil didn't want its game to be Microsoft's guinea pig and therefore bought the publishing rights. With Vista around the corner, Microsoft wants to provide as much incentive for gamers to upgrade and by making big name games playable exclusively on Vista it can gain that incentive. At the very least we get a kick out of discussing the vague PR explanations of the reasons behind leaving a game's publisher during the beta stage. It's impossible for us to believe that simple, meaningless "varying visions" caused this massive, late in the game move.Update 1: Brad McQuaid (Sigil CEO, creator of MMORPG Everquest) responds by saying "false rumor", but Joystiq commentator Jack Slater cleverly rebukes: "personally I would just deny everything if I was him, as there is no legal obligation for me to tell the truth on the forums but there is likely a legal obligation to keep the reason for leaving Microsoft undisclosed." Meanwhile, Ctrl+Alt+Del daydreams about how the meeting between McQuiad, Microsoft and Sony went. Funny stuff.
Xbox 360 impressions: Shadowrun
Shadowrun is Microsoft's launch pad for Live Anywhere, the game that the company hopes will unite (in comradery and competition) Xbox 360 and PC gamers. It's an online-based game similar to Counter-Strike, only with magic and tech enhancements (e.g. the ability to glide).Since Shadowrun can't be released until Vista is deployed, developer FASA has clearly had -- and will have -- a lot of time to fine tune this title. The weapons, magic, and tech abilities are well balanced, and players will have to pick and choose wisely.Mechanics aside, the demo map we previewed was extremely bland. It did however, highlight some of the unique tactics that must be employed to win, including teleporting through walls and floors, planting health replenishing trees, and using extra-sensory vision. It was a lot to handle in a 10-minute session, which is a sign that Shadowrun has the depth to support Microsoft's vision.
Live Anywhere bad news for gaming IM
Being able to seamlessly connect with your friends while playing games is becoming increasingly important, both to gamers and to games companies. Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony all emphasised the importance of online as well as offline play, but Microsoft's announcement of Live Anywhere must surely have struck a nerve with a few niche companies.Niche up till now, that is. Companies like Viacom and Verizon who are heavily investing in the gaming IM space -- bringing social networking and gaming closer together -- are now in direct competition with a company that can reach multiple platforms easily. By connecting Xbox Live, Windows Vista, MSN Messenger and mobile phones together, Microsoft will make it hard for others to encroach on their territory.
Microsoft blends platform lines with Live Anywhere
The latest ambitious endeavor by Microsoft might have "monopoly" written all over it, but we have a feeling they wouldn't want it any other way. Microsoft's new Live Anywhere that they announced at today's E3 keynote takes their Xbox Live concept and extends it to the PC, Windows Mobile and even Java-enabled phones. Whether you're at your PC or rocking a mobile, you'll be able to track your gamer tag, message friends, purchase content for that device or set it to download to another device, and of course compare rankings with your buddies on various gaming titles. Halo isn't going to run so well on your RAZR, so for actual cross platform titles, Microsoft is sticking with XBLA-esque games that can translate easily to different platform, such as Bejeweled. There will, however, be major games that can be played on your Vista PC and Xbox 360. Microsoft is banking heavily on third party support for Live Anywhere, in the form of mobile friendly value-adds for 360 games, and just straight up phone-friendly casual titles. In order to get more support, they're claiming to approach this from a "platform agnostic" (hah!) angle, and after supporting the 360, Windows Vista and Windows Mobile, will move on to Java, S60 and possibly even Palm if they deem it worth their while. Microsoft obviously has the muscle to launch a service like this, and the features they demoed look quite entertaining and welcome, but we'll still be (pleasantly) surprised if they actually manage to pull it off. Keep on reading for screenshots and impressions.