Microsoft has released the Halo: Reach – Noble Map Pack, a new download available through Xbox Live. Priced at 800 Microsoft Points, the map pack includes three new environments – Breakpoint, Tempest and Anchor 9 – that work with the popular shooter.
Video demos after the cut
“The fight for humanity rages on a galactic scale. From a frozen xeno-archaeology site harboring secrets millennia old to an orbital anchor defending the stars high above planet Reach – and to mysterious places far, far beyond – Bungie’s Noble Map Pack injects three new explosive environments into the multiplayer battlefield, each designed to reinforce all of Halo: Reach’s vital warfronts, from small scale engagements to massive Invasion battlegrounds.”
You’ll obviously need a copy of Halo: Reach if you want to do anything with the map pack. More information at Xbox.com here.
Right about this time is when I received the HTC HD7, unboxed it, and started playing with the Windows Phone 7-based device. I thought it was only fitting that I timed the final article in our week long look at the device around the same time I first got my hands on it. We started with the hardware, and then we took a look at the software. Lastly, we took a quick glance at the applications available for the device, both natively, carried-based, and third party. All in all, while there have been a few hiccups along the way, the HD7 has managed to not suck after a week of usage. But now, as we wrap it all up, we’re looking at arguably the biggest feature of the device: Xbox LIVE integration. So, is it everything I thought it would be? Or is it just another feature that has a lot of potential, but isn’t worth the time right now? Find out after the cut.
Xbox LIVE
Aside from the Zune Pass on my phone, there wasn’t a single feature that I was looking forward to more than Xbox LIVE on my Windows Phone 7 device. While Apple is making significant headway into the mobile gaming market, I felt like Microsoft already had the base, and that they could easily succeed where Apple and company were still trying to make ground. So you probably won’t be at all surprised to find out that Xbox LIVE was the first Hub that I accessed, after the device turned on. I played around with the interface for awhile, noting that, just like every other aspect of Windows Phone 7 (as I would find out over the next few days), it’s just too beautiful to look away. Swipe left and right to find what you want. Easy, simple, and aesthetically pleasing.
Simply put, Xbox LIVE on Windows Phone 7 is awesome, and it’s only going to get better. With the development community where it’s at right now, and seeing that mobile games are a huge hit, I find it almost impossible to believe that game developers out there won’t want to focus on the Xbox LIVE functionality within Windows Phone 7, and make the best games that they can. Simply put, the hardware, with its minimum specifications and standard Operating System, much like what you see on Apple’s side of the street, means that developers have a wide open opportunity to make some great games, and include standard integration with Xbox LIVE.
What does that mean, exactly? Well, you get to tie your Xbox LIVE GamerTag to your handset. You get to change your Avatar’s clothes. You get to see, and message, your friends on Xbox LIVE, to see what they’re up to, what games they’re playing, and keep up with their Achievements. And yes, you get your own Achievements, too. So, if you happen to be playing Bejeweled Live, you earn Achievements as you play, and those go right along with your total Gamer score. It makes for an engrossing experience, and one that I find perfectly emulates the experience of Xbox LIVE on the Xbox 360, but on a smaller form factor.
As far as games go, there’s plenty to choose from. However, my favorites happen to be Bejeweled Live and Max and the Magic Marker. If you’ve never played Bejeweled, it’s a simple enough idea: drag colored gems so that they match other colored gems on the board. Connect more than three at a time, and you get special, more powerful gems. It’s simple, but addictive.
It’s after I played Max and the Magic Marker for awhile, that I realized that I’m going to fall in love with the games here, and having Achievements just makes it so much better. In this title, you’re a kid with a magical marker (as if you couldn’t tell from the title of the game, right?), and you have to use that marker to interact with the levels. That means getting across large gaps, catapulting yourself over ledges, and making colored boulders to help you along your journey. I was surprised at how enjoyable the game was, in the end.
But, there is room for improvement. There are a few games out there, but the truth is, there’s not a lot of games. And, there’s even less that I, in my honest opinion, actually looked interesting to me. I’m sure there’s a few titles out there that are just as fun as the two games I just mentioned, and I may be judging them too hastily, but I’ve only got a week! If you’ve got yourself a Windows Phone 7 device, I highly recommend jumping into the Xbox LIVE Hub, and having way too much fun.
The Wrap-Up
I knew before I took on this project that, at the end, I would have to sit here and tell you, honestly, if I think that Windows Phone 7 can compete in the mobile market. Does it stand a chance against Apple’s iOS, or Google’s Android? Where does it stand against HP’s webOS, or Research In Motion’s BlackBerry OS? Well, I can tell you this: it’s a fighter. And, it has more than a fighting chance to make itself known in this ridiculously cramped, complex market. But, you know what? I think Windows Phone 7 has enough flash, speed, elegance, and everything else that someone could want in a mobile Operating System, that it could, indeed, usurp Android and iOS for the throne.
But, it won’t be easy. But, that actually has nothing to do with the OS itself. It has everything to do with the fact that Microsoft came out of the gate swinging, but unfortunately, the general populace believes that they are already behind. There’s not enough applications in the Marketplace. There’s no Copy & Paste. You get the idea. And, unfortunately, that’s a real dampening force on Microsoft, because they’ve got a great mobile Operating System here. It’s light years better than Windows Mobile, and yes, I’m saying that completely from a consumer standpoint. I’m not a business person, so I can’t sit here and tell you that it’s better in that department than anything else. But, if I had to make a guess, I would tell you right now that Android and iOS work just as well as Windows Phone 7 would in a business setting.
Yes, Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 has a few sections where it can improve, and there’s obviously some bugs that need to be worked out. But, their hard-headedness towards mandatory hardware requirements, along with a mobile Operating System that is so gorgeous, sleek, and easy to use, may mean that, sooner than later, Windows Phone 7 pops out heading for first place.
Just today, corporate vice president and chief operating and financial officer of Microsoft’s Interactive Entertainment Business mister Dennis Durkin addressed attendees of BMO Capital Markets Digital Entertainment Conference in New York. He said unto them: 40 percent of the members of XBox live are using their time on the console for activities other than gaming. In that number are people using Netflix, listening to music using Zune and Last.fm apps, and clicking around and updating their Twitter and Facebook. NOTE: for your edification, I note that Durkin was only speaking about humans.
Durkin noted that these members who are, for whatever reason, not using their XBox 360 to play games, are still using their console an average of three hours online a day. It’s as if, I think, they’re using them like, stay with me here: a computer! “What we found is the core gamer might be the person who brought the console into the house, but as you widen the choices of content, it broadens what people can do with the system,” noted Durkin.
He also had a bit of a note on the Kinect: “Everything we’ve been shipping has been selling,” citing GameStop and Toys”R”Us reports telling of sellouts. He also mentioned the always frightening (to me) prospect of advertising on the console, speaking specifically on figuring out their audience: “It’s hard to track though with a controller-based system,” Durkin said, “Kinect brings a really interesting opportunity as it relates to that. Obviously with Kinect, it has facial recognition, so we can cater what content we present based on who you are.” Severely creepy.
Indie developer fury at their marketplace being shifted into a less-trafficked part of the Xbox 360 dashboard seems to have paid off, as Microsoft has relented and moved the download store back. Frustrations began in the aftermath of the new dashboard roll-out, with the Xbox Live Indie Games section put into the “Speciality Shops” area; now, however, it’s been moved back to the main marketplace.
Microsoft initially issued a statement saying that developers would in fact benefit from the move, but this did little to detract from suspicions that the company was trying to remove competition from the more lucrative Xbox Live Arcade titles. Now the developers are taking on the Indie Game icon, which they feel doesn’t quite match up to the rest of the 360 dashboard design.
The Xbox 360 Dashboard update earlier this week has split opinion among gamers, many of whom would like to be able to roll back to the previous version, but some game developers are also upset by Microsoft’s changes. Xbox Live Indie Games have been shifted to the “Speciality Shops” section of the dashboard, behind the Avatar Marketplace, in a move that developers are saying will have a negative impact on sales and gamer awareness.
Meanwhile the update has also removed much of the information about Indie Games titles when downloaded, reducing their pages to mere play/delete options. Previously there could be custom icons and box art, along with the description of the title from the Marketplace, depending on what the developers had provided.
The general consensus on Microsoft’s justification for the changes is that the company was seeing little return on the Indie Games section, and so decided to shift it so as to reduce competition with Xbox Live Arcade titles.
Hooray! They’re releasing the ads like wild wombats out of a gunnysack, all of them for the Xbox Kinect which they say will change OUR ENTIRE LIVES. Yes indeed, no doubt that it will, at least the way we look at playing video games at home. Just [yesterday] we shared with you the first video, one that now appears to have been a chopped up version of the following videos which are categorized as Kinect for Xbox 360 (all encompassing), Kinect Sports, Kinect Adventures, and the extremely exciting video about what might be a glimpse into the future of interactive entertainment: Xbox LIVE with Kinect.
This Kinect device will allow users to be their own controller. It seems to me, and I’m sure quite a few other people, to be a dubious claim, but hey! Look at the videos! It looks like it’s working just fine, yes? With a launch date of November 4th in the USA and November 10th in the UK, you’d expect that they’ve got all their ducks in a row, having this thing packaged and ready to ship out the door Willy Wonka style. By the looks of it, it’s going to be both a riot and a revolution in gaming. For those of you who still like to sit back with a nice controller and move your thumbs only: this isn’t for you. If you like to go wild and crazy and have lots of fun, well, then, it appears that you’re about to be having a lot of fun.
Take a peek through this collection of videos and keep your eyes peeled for specific games and movements of the people being filmed. This should give you evidence enough to see what the first wave of interactivity will be. Pay the CLOSEST attention to the Xbox LIVE video, as it not only has people jumping and flipping around, it’s got people interacting with things like video, music, photos, and everything, using things like their hand to move through menues and chat with friends. If this is all that it seems to be, it’s definitely very exciting stuff.
The screen that just keeps on going meets the OS that refuses to fit on a single display. Yes, Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7, like Windows Mobile 6.5 and Android before it, is getting treated with a 4.3-inch display from HTC for its launch party. The aptly titled HD7 is, by virtue of Microsoft’s stringent hardware requirements, mostly just a stretched-out version of its WP7 contemporaries: it offers the standard 800 x 480 res, 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon, 576MB of RAM, and a 5 megapixel autofocus camera with a 720p movie mode. So what sets it apart? HTC will have you believe its Hub enhances the buttery smooth WP7 software, while outside the shell there’s a handy kickstand for landscape lounging and you do of course benefit from an enlarged canvas for your finger inputs. Join us after the break to discover how much that matters in day-to-day use, along with the rest of our thoughts on the HTC HD7.
This review is primarily of the HTC HD7 hardware. Check out our full review of Windows Phone 7 for our thoughts on the OS.
We’ve just received some very exciting words about the future of the Xbox including news on xBox Live, including Avatars, Friends, Achievements, and Messaging, as well as updates on Marketplace and some new games. First of all, right out of the box you’re going to be able to link your existing Xbox LIVE account, or make a new one, and have a boatload of fun with features loaded directly into the Games Hub including your Avatar, Gamerscore, and Gamgertag. For those with a deeper need to plug themselves into the experience, Windows Phone will be offering a free, one-time download called XBox Live Extras!
The Xbox LIVE Extras for Windows Phone are wild. With it, you can grip even harder to your Games Hub with Avatars, Friends, Achievements, and Messaging. Avatars take your 3D character and props with you to the phone with full closet access (kinky!) Your Xbox friends activities and status updates will be available, no matter if they’re on their console, PC, or phone. You can compare achievements instantly, and communicate with anyone on your friends list through Xbox LIVE text messages.
The Marketplace is similar to the one on the Xbox 360 as Windows Phone 7 owners will receive lovely content on a weekly basis post launch. Three new Xbox LIVE titles will be released each week with prices ranging from $2.99 to $9.99, all of them with the full set of Xbox LIVE integrations on such features as Achievements, leaderboards, and more. Many titles will have content exclusive to Windows Phone 7, and there’ll of course be such promotions as “Deals of the Week” and more.
And now what you’ve been waiting for of course, a list of some GAMES that’ll be blowing off their meathooks soon. Many games will be available at both the European launch later this week and the US launch on November 8, and more will be launching each week. There’ll also be the puzzle game “ilomilo” with’ll be available exclusively to all AT&T users through the end of the year absolutely free. At this very moment on the Marketplace there is to be found seven Xbox LIVE games ready to review by you, and on October 21 all of these titles – and more – will be downloadable in European markets, coming then to Windows Phone 7 for the US launch on November 8.
“Hexic Rush” is a new version of the classic Hexic game, this time designed to be speed-based and available for Windows Phone 7. “Flowerz” is a gardening based game where you’ll be able to plant a bunch of nice flowerz, plant them in a row, plant them to look nice in bushels, and keep them nice for big scores or just a leisurely escapade. “Twin Blades” is a wild shooter game set in medieval times utilizing manga-like illustrations and graphics. Run with a nun to defeat evil and the greater armies of zombies across multiple environments such as a city market, cemetary, a chapel in ruins, and the cities outskirts – buy new skills and powers, upgrade yourself as you progress toward total obliteration of the living dead.
“Bejeweled LIVE” should almost certainly be a best seller as its other versions are already played by over 500 million people with over 50 million copies sold to date. Swap gems to make sets, match gems to make them disappear – you know the drill. “Star Wars: Battle for Hoth” is one of the most epic battles in the history of the galaxy, snowbound. This is a strategy based game where you place soldiers, ion cannons and other powerful items to defend yourself against the invading Imperial forces. “Rocket Riot” places you in the boots of a bazooka-wielding soldier on the way toward total glory as you blast the strangest adversaries you’ve ever laid eyes on. It’s a highly stylized eight-bit era game in a completely destructible environment with power-ups, burrowing, and a regenerating map. Fun on Xbox LIVE Arcade and Windows Phone 7.
While the Xbox 360 is still an integral part of Microsoft’s business strategy, there’s no doubt that with the upcoming launch of Windows Phone 7, the company is looking to make some of their already utilized features a bit better, offering more integration with what’s to come. Major Nelson of Microsoft has revealed today that Xbox.com is going to go through a “massive facelift,” and when it comes back online tomorrow, early morning, there will be plenty of new features in store for visitors.
As of right now, Xbox.com is a portal for information about the Xbox 360. You can also sign into your Xbox LIVE account, check out what your friends are doing, send messages (as long as you have a Gold account), and even buy Xbox LIVE Arcade titles, as well as other games and items right from the site. But, that’s not good enough for Microsoft, and the upcoming changes are meant to add more integration between Xbox 360, Windows Phone 7, and the site. One of the new features is a way to change your Avatar’s features, and clothes, right from the website, thanks to a new browser-based Avatar editing program.
However, one of the biggest additions is the web-based games you’ll be ale to play on the website. Playing them is one thing, but you’ll also be able to play them with your Xbox LIVE friends, whether you’re on the website, or if you’re using your Windows Phone 7 device. However, Major Nelson doesn’t let us know if you’ll be achieving any Achievements in the process. Other features include a more streamlined way to access your messages, game invites, utilize Family Reports, and check out friend requests. Microsoft will roll out the changes tomorrow morning, beginning at 5:00am ET, when the site will go down for an unknown amount of time (it’s said to be a short time). When it comes back, you’ll be able to enjoy all of the above features. If you want to see what it will look like before then, check out the gallery below.
We see it time, and time again. Some announcements are just too big, or exciting to hold back. That looks to be the situation over at Xbox Germany, who have announced via their Facebook page that the current cap on the Xbox LIVE friend list is about to be tossed out the window, and expanded to an almost ridiculous amount.
This particular feature wasn’t mentioned in the Preview Program that was just announced, and so far it doesn’t look like anyone testing the new Dashboard has actually seen the change that Xbox Germany claims to be coming. Interestingly enough, the post that claimed the 1,000 friend-capable friend list was quickly pulled from the Facebook page. It didn’t happen quickly enough, though, as a screenshot was taken, confirming that someone over there believes the friend list is getting a significant upgrade.
At the moment, the friend’s list on Xbox LIVE allows for players to have 100 friends. Another interesting point to the original Facebook status update, was the mentioning of a “Finder tab.” With this tab, you’ll be able to find new friends, while the details of that search are unknown. There’s no sign of this “Finder tab” in the preview version of the new Dashboard, though, so there are plenty of eyebrows being raised in confusion. Could Xbox Germany be talking about another update, further down the road? It’s possible. Or, the new feature could be a “bonus” for the official roll-out of the new Dashboard by the end of the year.
