Microsoft Increases Limit on XBLA Downloads

1up reports that XBLA's 50MB size limit is no more. Microsoft has upped that to a whopping 250 MB, just a week after it was revealed that the upcoming Symphony of the Night would be almost double that in size. While this is great for the possibilities of the service, games, and gamers, it does mean that 'Core Pack' owners are now even more 'out in the cold' when it comes to downloadable content. Unless a HDD is purchased for the system, Core Packers are reduced to using the 64MB memory cards, which are clearly not large enough for even one 'expanded' game title. From the article: "However, how many folks are out there downloading Live Arcade games without an HDD? It probably works out to a small percentage. We asked Microsoft about those users and the memory card issues that the console will face with this new expanded size for Live Arcade titles. Microsoft said 'There is already one possible solution in the works for this category of gamer should we decide to increase the Xbox Live Arcade game file size from its current 50 MB limit. As announced at E3 last May, a larger Memory Unit is being developed which will allow gamers who do not own a hard drive to store and easily transport several Xbox Live Arcade games at a time. We have no further details to announce at this time.'"

Comments

SURPRISE

[powerlord]

So ... the XBox360 starts launching new services that need a hard-drive, leaving the "core" system, without a Hard-Drive out in the cold, and even leaving the "Premium" system players hurting.

The PS3 with a 20GB or 60GB HD (and a User Replaceable one at that), certainly seems like a better choice.

Heck, even XBLA upping the limit to 250GB seems like a response to the PlayStationNetwork unleashing 500-600MB demos. and 150MB download games.

I know lots of people on Slashdot seem to love bashing Sony (and the PS3), but it certainly seems like MicroSoft's XBox360 is reacting a heck of a lot to what the PS3 [can do/is doing].