The Xbox Live Arcade - One Year Later

Via Joystiq, an article at GamePro asking is Live Arcade worth it? One year after its launch, the service has been transformed by lots of retro classics, some brand new games, and the addition of the (now working) movie and television download service. What parts are good, what parts are bad, and ultimately, is it worth it? From the article: "Many of XBLA's original games draw their inspirations from classic video games, and the poster child for XBLA originals is Bizarre Creations' Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved. Released with the launch of Xbox 360, Geometry Wars showed a skeptical world just how cool original yet classically styled downloadable games could be. It plays like a crazed combination of all-time classics Asteroids and Robotron: 2084, with your lone, triangular spaceship pitted against literally endless hordes of nasty geometric shapes. The level of onscreen carnage is legendary; never has a game had more spectacular or over-the-top particle effects, showing that even simple games can be flashy."

Comments

Re:360 Still Needs A Web Browser

[Creepy Crawler]

---I imagine there are people on this very website who would love to be able to exploit a browser bug and attack a Microsoft console.

BLINKS..

A Microsoft Console? What? Do they retain ownership when I BOUGHT it, bought the software, buy the electricity to keep it on, have the space in my apartment to keep it in, and buy the bandwidth to keep it on the internet??

It is MY CONSOLE, not anybody elses property. If I want to crack it open, solder wires to the busses and interconnects, I'm damned if anybody will stop me. Its a different issue if they dont want me playing on their private network, but thats fine. I dont want on their god-damned network. I bought a computer that mainly plays games, and Ill have the right to do whatever I want with it.