XBOX DECLARES AN ONLINE REVOLUTION

By Nick Valentino

GameZone Reporter

Microsoft makes a number of announcements concerning the future of Xbox Live, it’s online gaming service, during an Xbox media briefing.

Los Angeles - May 12, 2003 - Last year, the Xbox Team opened up the media briefing with the exciting news that Xbox gamers everywhere will get the chance to challenge each another using it’s online service known as Live.  Monday, in the Grand Olympic Auditorium in Downtown, Los Angeles, the briefing not only mentions the success of the online gaming service but also made some announcements to introduce new features to Live.

J. Allard took the stage to explain that Live not only did better than expected but also delivered on the promise that downloadable content would be available as well as identity protection as well as challenging online tournaments. 

“At its launch,” Allard said.  “The Xbox Live service has opened up new doors for game developers everywhere and they are just now seeing what this service is capable of providing online gamers.  We’ve seen gamers download new team rosters for games like NBA 2K3 or extra levels for games like Splinter Cell.  These things are great, but we can do more.”

One of the major attractions of online on the Xbox, Allard mentioned, is playing against other gamers.  The principle game genre for this, he revealed, was sports titles.  As his first announcement, Allard mentioned that all of the sports games Microsoft Studios will release, like NFL Fever 2004, would be online.

Allard also unveiled XSN Sports, an online feature that keeps track of your sport’s gaming skills to match you with gamers worthy of your skill level.  XSN also allows gamers to set up tournaments, create competitions and create their own teams.  A gamer can access an opponent’s stats, averages and, depending on the sport, see how well he or she stacked up against others.  NFL Fever 2004 will be the first game to kick off the XSN Sports feature.

A number of new additions to the Live service have also been announced, such as a Live web page that offers news about new tournaments.  The new Live Alert feature will announce when new downloadable content is available for gamers to download.  And, surprisingly enough, a Live chat room where you can basically just chat with online friends via the headset Communicator.

The coming releases that are Live enabled go beyond sports titles like Project Gotham Racing 2, among them are a lineup of massively multiplayer online games such as Star Wars: Galaxies, True Fantasy Live Online and Star Wars: Republic Commando to name just a few.  And one of the most anticipated sequels, Halo 2, will feature Live support so gamers can play online.

The future of online Xbox gaming seems to continue to go through a number of changes and Allard put it best.  “If you have the right tools, there is no limit to the things we can do and, with the right ideas, all we can do is add to the online revolution.”

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