New Xbox 360 dashboard "an advertiser's dream"

By Wesley Yin-Poole Published 9 December, 2011

XBLIG devs have their say on Metro UI. MS responds.

Indie developers have had their say on the new Xbox 360 dashboard, with some complaining that it buries Xbox Live Indie Games.

While indie games do appear in Bing search results - that is, if a gamer knows the name of the game they're looking for Bing will find it - the new Metro user interface has replaced the dedicated XBLIG channel with an Indie Games tile some are concerned will disappear as Microsoft rotates its promotions.

Mommy's Best Games (Weapon of Choice, Explosionade) boss Nathan Fouts told Eurogamer he was happy with the new search functionality and "Related" tab, but said the dedicated Indie Games portal is "now more hidden and confusing than ever".

Indie Games are not listed in the New Arrivals section of the Marketplace, nor the Genre listings. Instead, they are found through a tile labelled Game Type.

"The image for that (of course) is a woman doing a karate kick dressed in a hoodie in front a brick wall with graffiti," Fouts said. "There's a revolving tile that currently also links you to Indie Games but it's sort of random if someone will see that or even if IG will be listed there next week.

"For me the truly disheartening news is that the 'games' tab on our game console is now several pages away from the start," he continued.

"'Videos' is now before 'games'. For better or worse, the new Metro layout is an advertiser's dream. Every single page main page now has an advertisement on it (you can't scroll away any more), there are dozens of secret little places to feature things, and it's easy to get lost. But simply getting to the main portal for Arcade, Games on Demand or Indie Games, or for that matter my own game library is a chore. I like the 'quick list' but if it would have a simple connection to my complete library, it would be a huge help."

Avatar Battle Bees developer Brett Eveleigh told Eurogamer many developers were losing faith in XBLIG - and the new UI only accelerated the problem.

"Microsoft take a back-seat approach and only really gets involved to take a cut of your sales and make the games slightly harder to find with each new dashboard update," he said.

"Not that anyone wants to go through the pain of retail/arcade style certification but it feels like Microsoft has abandoned the platform in favour of Windows Phone 7. But instead of admitting it they're brushing it under the carpet and hoping it'll go away.

"It's easy to lose faith when you see a dating game that looks like it took 10 minutes to make and uses some stock images of women in low-cut tops sell better than lovingly crafted, quality games that have been made by talented developers."

XBLIG pricing is, according to Eveleigh, another point of concern.

"Indie games can be sold for either 80, 240 or 400 MSP. The problem is that 80 MSP might as well be the only price point, since people just don't buy games that cost more, so developers are forced to under-value their games to get people to even consider them.

"This is of course a trend with indie/downloadable games at the moment as it was recently highlighted about the devaluation of Indie games on PC and we all know about the situation on the App Store but those platforms are at least easy to find/access and have huge amounts of users which goes some way to offsetting the devaluation, this just isn't the case on XBLIG."

A number of XBLIG developers Eurogamer spoke to, including Cthulhu Saves the World developer Robert Boyd, said the new dashboard will probably result in reduced sales.

"It feels to me that Microsoft is trying to promote individual games more but hide the [XBLIG] channel as a whole," he said. "I think this will result in less sales overall but only time will tell."

But what does Microsoft have to say about the new Xbox 360 dashboard and how it affects XBLIG?

A spokesperson pointed out that the firm provides a marketplace, free development tools and a peer-review system for developers to create XBLIG titles and launch them affordable on Xbox Live, but stressed that indie developers must put marketing effort into their games in order for them to be successful.

"Indie developers have told us they are looking for an easy route to market, which is the biggest hurdle to overcome, and we've provided that for them with Xbox Live Indie Games," the spokesperson told Eurogamer.

"But they've got to take that next step and do marketing after the launch. We encourage indie developers to work together and support each other in marketing efforts, like the Indie Games Winter and Summer Uprising promotions."

"The new Xbox 360 Dashboard update provides improved ways for consumers to find great indie titles, including the ability to search with voice," the spokesperson continued. "We've been experimenting with Xbox 360 Dashboard promotions for indies, such as our Halloween 'Shocktober' campaign. And we've been helping the community support their own amazing promotions, including the recent Summer Uprising.

"Indie games on Xbox 360 are generating a growing revenue stream for developers. In fact, the average revenue for the top 50 indie games is now well over $100,000 per title. When you consider the increasing install base of Xbox 360 consoles (over 960,000 consoles were sold in the US during the week of Black Friday 2011), it's clear that Xbox Live Indie Games is a great opportunity for developers."

Still, Microsoft said it was listening to feedback from developers and is "taking it into consideration for future programs".

Picture of Wesley.

About Wesley Yin-Poole

Wesley is Eurogamer's news editor. He likes news, interviews, and more news. He also likes Street Fighter more than anyone can get him to shut up about it.

Read more articles from Wesley by visiting the Wesley Yin-Poole archive page.

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Comments (90) Latest comment 6 months ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Biker_Bob_1971 #1 6 months ago

    Post deleted at 16:59:10 06-02-2012

  • Markitron #2 6 months ago

    Them adds are driving me crazy, the current game has a tiny little panel over on the left with a gigantic fifa add front and centre. FFS

  • GamesProgrammer Verified Games Team Programmer, Eutechnyx Ltd. #3 6 months ago

    Seems a shame that if they've gone down this tiles route, then why is it not fully customisable, or at least a few different set-ups for different user preferences

  • Peew971 #4 6 months ago

    It's not just a concern for indie games, even xbla games are somewhat burried and they used to be a big deal. The issue is Microsoft wants people to rely on Bing but to use Bing you need to know already what you're looking for. Hopefully there will be enough backlash for them to do something about it.
    Edited by Peew971 at 09/12/11 @ 10:32

  • braydee89 #5 6 months ago

    So much is being made of the "games" tab being three clicks away from the main page. I don't see why this is a big issue. If I'm there to game, I'll jump straight to it. If I'm there to do something else, it doesn't matter. Besides, everyone knows that it's now easier than ever to play the disc in the console.

  • CaptainQuint #6 6 months ago

    It's a fucking mess.

    I never thought I'd see the day where I actually prefer the free PSN dash over the premium Live one.
    Edited by CaptainQuint at 09/12/11 @ 10:34

  • mastablasta #7 6 months ago

    I pay a premium to watch a film in the cinema and then have to sit through various adverts. Why? I paid for the film. Thank the lord for torrents.

  • braydee89 #8 6 months ago

    "Xbox, bing 'Indie Games'"

  • Subdominator #9 6 months ago

    You know ... farmers generally come across as crybabies. If it's warm it is too warm, if it is wet it is too wet, if it's just right it is basically too just right. Indie game developers on XBLIG are like farmers. All they do is complain and cry and whine and stuff. Having bought 92 indie games to date I am ashamed of this bunch of idiots. Not once have they talked about how nice it is to have an indie marketplace at all, that they are now on par with XBLA and the other stores, that they were the first to use Avatars in games without going through a ridiculous certification, that the top rated list is now not limited to the top 50 but instead shows all the games, same for top downloaded. And user ratings on the dashboard are back. Sure, there are some massive faults with the new dashboard, it's probably done on purpose because the navigation is only worse when using the gamepad. With Kinect it is just as comfortable as it once was with a gamepad, so this is just a way to enforce Kinect. It is strange that they got rid of the genres search, because with 2100 games every method to limit the results is great. But overall the dash is great and great for indies as well. You don't have to wait two minutes for your library to appear like it was ebfore with 100+ games. Takes around 15 seconds now, no matter how many games you own. So while navigation became worse (it takes five seconds to get to indie games instead of three) the rest is vastly improved. So quit fucking crying.

  • Biker_Bob_1971 #10 6 months ago

    Post deleted at 16:59:10 06-02-2012

  • choddo #11 6 months ago

    Why have they got the Metro interface back to front (apart from to provide more ad space as soon as you turn it on of course)? The main page should be a set of tile widgets for music / video / games / whatever with some sort of news (indie could feature on the game tile once in a while for example) for each displayed in each box so all are one click away.

    I don't buy those Microsoft comments. On iOS every game that develops a bit of a viral following (or buys 5star ratings but that's a different debate) has a chance of being easily found in "Top 25" by casual browsing and making it very big. They don't need to spend loads of money and time on marketing, quality games can speak for themselves. Indie being buried under that ridiculous "Game Type" tile is a nightmare for those xbox devs.

  • Subdominator #12 6 months ago

    It's time for Xbox Live Diamond. Pay 15 bucks a month but without ads. People need to realize they don't pay what the service costs, they pay less. And with every addition of something like Sky, BBC, Twitter, Facebook, Youtube the need to show ads rises, because while XBL Gold subs stay the same, Microsoft has to pay those content providers.

  • CaptainQuint #13 6 months ago

    @Subdominator

    Funny that you should use the farmers analogy, because you sound like a fucking sheep in your post.

    BbbbbaaaaAAAAA

  • braydee89 #14 6 months ago

    @Biker_Bob_1971 that's a bit ridiculous. The major issue with the kinect voice use in the dashboard is that I feel like a knob when I'm sat on my own talking to my xbox within earshot of others.

  • Po1ymorph #15 6 months ago

    @CaptainQuint I agree.

  • DanWhitehead #16 6 months ago

    @braydee89 From a functionality point of view, the location of the games tab isn't an issue. What it's placement says about the role of gaming in the Xbox brand is, perhaps, an issue. The main problem is how muddled the games marketplace has become. The fact that a lot of people can't even find Xbox Live Arcade is a real problem, and one that can only impact Microsoft's digital revenue.

  • Subdominator #17 6 months ago

    @choddo Every game is buried under "game type", that is not a problem exclusive to indie devs. The fact that everybody has this problem means that it's basically not a problem at all. And last time I checked the top rated lists show the best games there are. In fact they are working so good that games that once were total failures now slowly rise to the top - and get nice sales boosts. Perfect example of this is Weapon of Choice. Three years old and only now it is starting to sell. There's not a single massage app or something in the top rated games anymore. granted, there are four Minecraft clones, but at least those are games and people like Minecraft. So nothing wrong with that.

    Two years ago something like RC Airsim sold like mad and people were wondering why (because production value was abysmal). Not it's down there in the top rated list with less than two stars and doesn't sell at all while the good games (and games, not apps) rise to the top.

  • choddo #18 6 months ago

    @lollage Are you sure? I mean, I agree that there's no market for an ad-free option, but I don't think I've seen more than one or two ads on the xbox dash ever that I'm interested in.

  • The-Bodybuilder #19 6 months ago

    I haven't got the new update yet (can't be arsed to switch on my 360), but I do have a WP7 and rare owner of a ZuneHD.

    In all those softwares, the key to Metro UI is it's semi-ability to customize and "Pin" most-used apps/shortcuts to a start-screen

    Is that possible on the new update? If not, then call me synical as to why MS would "forget" to do that.

  • jampar #20 6 months ago

    any recommendations for Indie games? Broken my ankle, so finally have some time to try some. Also have a few spare points to throw away.

  • CaptainQuint #21 6 months ago

    It's time for Xbox Live Diamond. Pay 15 bucks a month but without ads. People need to realize they don't pay what the service costs, they pay less. And with every addition of something like Sky, BBC, Twitter, Facebook, Youtube the need to show ads rises, because while XBL Gold subs stay the same, Microsoft has to pay those content providers.


    *FACEPALM*

    What planet are you living on? Poor MS have to pay the content providers, huh?

    Here's a cutting-edge idea for you - why not just bin all the needless tinsel and give us back our games machine? How about it!

    Seriously, STFU with your barmy suggestions, please.

  • Otis_Inf #22 6 months ago

    Ads are apparently served from http://rad.msn.com If you block that in your router, the ads should be gone. See: http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/n5831/how_to_block_xbox_dashboard_ads/

  • Subdominator #23 6 months ago

    @DanWhitehead I wouldn't be so sure. Microsoft really doesn't care if they sell games, videos or music on Xbox. Even if they should make less with games due to their placement (I doubt it, if you want to go to the store you will go there, no matter how difficult it is to browse) that same placement allows for other stuff like movies to be more visible. And so will make more money.

    They did make it more important to be featured in ads, so those that can afford to walk away with only 51 % of the revenue instead of the standard 70 % will choose that option and be just as visible as before. The problem with indie games has never been the navigation but the huge backlog of crappy games and apps. Out of 2100 games only 400 have three or more stars.

    And while it's true that all price points above 80 points don't sell it is also true that most games simply don't have enough content to justify anything above 80 points. You play those games for twenty minutes and then it is over. Look at something like TIC. Sells for 240 points and offers one level, repeated three times. As long as games offer no content people will prefer the 80 points price tag.

  • MrMarbles #24 6 months ago

    @lollage

    But that's the side of the list that the PS3 defaults to when you turn it on. You don't have to scroll past TV, Video and Social tabs to access your games library or store, so you're pretty much shooting yourself in the foot with that comparison.

  • Sodding_Gamer #25 6 months ago

    I know this may sound like a completely ridiculous question.. I like the bing feature, however I am not shelling out for a Kinect! Do you have to have a Kinect for voice controls or can you just use a headset?! If they don't they should implement it because my room is too small for Kinect and fuck all good games for it too.

  • Subdominator #26 6 months ago

    @jampar

    LaserCat
    DLC Quest
    Techno Kitten Adventure
    Escape Goat
    Platformance (both are quite nice)
    Toy Stunt Bike
    Flotilla

  • cheeky-sod #27 6 months ago

    I love it... best dashboard yet.

  • Subdominator #28 6 months ago

    @Sodding_Gamer Can't use the headset. Technically it would be possible since it's not hardware, all software. But they want to push Kinect. BTW, for menu navigation and voice recognition you don't need those six foot Kinect empty spaces. But 100 bucks for the sensor is still quite expensive if you just want to have nicer menu navigation.

  • choddo #29 6 months ago

    @Subdominator Nothing else is ONLY available via Game Type. And I just went to Games/MarketPlace/Most Popular and most of what I saw was disk based games!! One Arcade game in the first 5 screens. And why does the scrolling work like that? Horrible.

  • Subdominator #30 6 months ago

    @lollage Yeah, that's what people are forgetting. The Guide menu was the fastest way to browse everything in NXE and it hasn't changed at all.

  • levitate #31 6 months ago

    I'm glad I got the Wii instead. No UI updates, no ads, no games and nothing too upsetting popping up on my screen while I'm staring at it with a blank expression.

  • jampar #32 6 months ago

    @Subdominator many thanks, i'll give a couple of those a bash.

  • Sodding_Gamer #33 6 months ago

    @Subdominator

    Cheers dude. Yeah I thought as much. It's a shame really because I have my headset on most of the time. Plus the kinect voice is so poor as well. One of my mates has it and uses it as a mic. All you can hear is the bleeding game! I really hope they stop pushing Kinect. By all means whack it into the PC market and make it to fabulous things, But the implementation is so poor for xbox at the moment.

  • saxlal #34 6 months ago

    @Subdominator the price of the gold subscription have raised at november 2010 in the States, UK, Canada and Mexico.

  • arcam #35 6 months ago

    Advertisers will be wetting themselves over things like this.



    It's obvious MS are only just getting started. I am 95% sure we will regularly be getting ads in games loading screens in the next 2-3 years.

  • asphaltcowboy #36 6 months ago

    I don't actually think Indie Games are any more buried than they were before, I think the rest of the marketplace has now been buried equally as deep as XBLIG was/is.

    I do like the new dash, but the Marketplace is a real mess!

  • Subdominator #37 6 months ago

    @saxlal I know. And the reason for that is that a) those currencies lost value due to the economy (that's why Euro prices stayed the same) and b) Microsoft started paying Activision for Call of Duty because most of the gold subs come from CoD players. Which just proves my point, Microsoft has to pay content providers. Either by ads or by raising the price of subscriptions. Of course I don't want an Xbox Live Diamond, it's sad that people don't realize the irony. It's just that you have to either accept more ads or higher prices. And I think people will almost always choose ads over price.

  • UkHardcore23 #38 6 months ago

    LOVING the new dash, when i go back to XMB i feel i have gone back to the 80's.

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #39 6 months ago

    On the NXE dashboard, many of the views presented were nothing but adverts, especially the one which loaded by default.

    Now, though, the adverts are at least always accompanied by something actually useful, which is back to how it was with the original blades system.

    Still, Indy Games does need some sorting out. In fact their three-tier download games store (with demos and DLC besides!) has turned into a bit of a legacy mess in general. I am sure that Microsoft know they must sort it out eventually, but since they haven't chosen to do it now, I think they're probably waiting for the next hardware revision. Or at an outside chance, following the release of Windows 8 and its marketplace, in next year's Fall Dash Update.

  • Subdominator #40 6 months ago

    @arcam Ingame advertisement has been done before and it failed. Like five years ago. Companies like EA have long closed their ingame ad departments. Ubisoft pretty much started it with a Splinter Cell game (Pandora?) and it ended soon afterwards.

  • IronGiant #41 6 months ago

    Lollage is the biggest xbot fanboi on here so it's pointless arguing with him. He's obviously very upset at EG for slating the dashboard update, maybe getting a life will help.

  • arcam #42 6 months ago

    @Subdominator

    Actually in-game advertising is growing rapidly and spending on it is expected to reach £1bn by 2014: http://www.brandrepublic.com/News/908125/Screen-Digest-forecasts-1bn-boom-in-game-advertising/

    And there are ads in the loading screens of Deus Ex HR on PC, which is obviously a new game.

  • Okamiwolf #43 6 months ago

    All this garbage just makes me love my clean Windows desktop even more. Just a couple of necessary utilitarian icons followed by a hundred or more shortcuts to all my games. And no stupid ads in sight - not even on the internet thanks to Adblock. Sorry, Eurogamer. Did I mention I also cancelled my cable TV subscription a couple of years ago? I'm an advertiser's worst nightmare.

  • LeSpank #44 6 months ago

    I'll admit that I have never bought an XBLIG but that's more to do with the fact that I never see any reviews, promotion of them rather than the fact that they are hard to find. I have to know about it before I go looking

  • Jay-ITFC #45 6 months ago

    Crazy that a seperate section for highstreet retail games has been removed from 'Games Library'. Now I haven't a clue what's installed to my HDD without scouring my storage device.

  • SpaceMidget75 Verified Senior Software Developer, Minerva Computer Services #46 6 months ago

    Well my suggestion on the Beta Connect site to move XBLA, XBLIG, GoD & Demos to tabs (or at least tiles) within the first Games Marketplace menu has been closed by MS as "By Design" so I think they're being pretty stubborn on this at the moment.

    As Dan said this isn't just an XBLIG issue, they've buried what was one of XBL's largest revenue streams, XBLA, behind the same mess! I have some experience in UI design and it took me ten fucking minutes to realise I need to click the Type tile. It's wrong, plain and simple. To make matters worse and even more laughable when you do get to the list of XBLA games it also shows games that aren't even out yet with no way of filtering them out so I can't look to buy something NOW! (Not to mention 'New Releases' is currently broke).

    I really like Metro but this particular iteration needs some pretty serious tweaking - not just in the Games side either. As MENTAL1ST said, NXE was pretty much worse IMO for adverts even if only due to the fact that you had to scroll through them to get to other tiles because of the X/Y axis nature or NXE.

    Anyway, sort it the fuck out MS. Ta
    Edited by SpaceMidget75 at 09/12/11 @ 11:46

  • Beano #47 6 months ago

    New Xbox 360 dashboard "an advertiser's dream"
    ...and a user's nightmare.

    It's seems to me MS have deliberately made it hard to find downloaded games on the HDD and trying to forcing users to use the search function which requires Kinect to be practical - not even headset support which would work just as fine. It's not user friendly and forcing ads on the dashboard is an insult.
    Edited by Beano at 09/12/11 @ 11:51

  • bliprunner #48 6 months ago

    Call me old fashioned but I'd like an interface that flagged up interesting games.

    Just games really, not ads, not movies, not apps, not zune-whatever...
    Edited by bliprunner at 09/12/11 @ 12:44

  • Darklightside #49 6 months ago

    I must admit to having a hard time finding the market place at first I agree with what some of the others have said about if this new update will effect revenue for dlc and arcade games in the long term? On the plus side you can now access dlc from the game menu when you insert the disc.

    One issue I have always had with indie games is the fact that they require a constant connection to xbox live to play them. Yet this is rarely mention by anyone. If I buy an indie game why am I unable to download it to my hard drive for offline play?

  • Bander #50 6 months ago

    I resorted to checking out new XBLIG titles via the xbox.com website a while ago, and adding them to my download queue from there, since the old dashboard wasn't ideal either. I just hope the website doesn't end up becoming more 'Metro' as well.

  • TheVoice #51 6 months ago

    @gotyourmoney No, it means ads for other products too. Currently I've seen ads for Intel and BT, and in the past they've advertised Infiniti, Ford, Hollyoaks and Lynx.

  • [TR] #52 6 months ago

    Player: "Xbox, bing awesome indie game"
    Xbox: "..."
    Player: "Xbox, bing new indie game"
    Xbox; "..."
    Player: "Xbox... are you there?"
    Xbox: "Have you tried the new Yell of Honor? What about Caveman Halo: Combat Devolved?"
    Player: "No! Xbox, bing indie"
    Xbox: "Are you sure you didn't mean 'bing first party titles'? Here, have a list of Batman titles for no reason"

  • Widge #53 6 months ago

    @lollage it defaults to game

  • vert1go #54 6 months ago

    "It's easy to lose faith when you see a dating game that looks like it took 10 minutes to make and uses some stock images of women in low-cut tops sell better than lovingly crafted, quality games that have been made by talented developers."

    Doesn't that mean that people are able to find those to buy them then..?
    And that in fact they are making a choice between your equally promoted "quality game" and those titles..? In large enough numbers to be outselling them? Meaning people can find them and are choosing to do so..?

    Doesn't quite track when you stop and think about it really. They *are* buried away but still... clearly people are finding those games alongside the "quality" ones and making a choice that results in those selling better.

  • butler` #55 6 months ago

    They're playing with fire. Now they're charging for XBL subscriptions and monitising the platform through display advertising.

  • andromeda #56 6 months ago

    "xbox, blow me"

  • temmy #57 6 months ago

    I like Metro UI, but on Xbox 360 it's far too ad-driven. There should be more quick links to content and less ads (especially on 'Home' & 'Games' sections).

  • barneyboo #58 6 months ago

    There's a few issues. One is that XBLIG developers don't generally get much of a voice, so if the likes of EG poke a few for their opinions, it's unlikely to be an opportunity to say "everything's peachy!"

    One is that Microsoft almost need to artificially create a value distinction between indie developers and XBLA to maintain the attraction of the latter - that happens to an extent through the inherent limitations of the XNA API, but also through marketing. This argument would be stronger if MS did actually pro-actively market XBLA games, and there's been numerous great write-ups (right here actually) about how that hasn't happened. It pains me to say this as a developer (almost as much as it pains me to say 'as a developer') but I do side with MS on the idea that indies need to be responsible for their own marketing, and I don't really see it as MS's responsibility to bubble up indie games. It's a weird market because anecdotally it does seem like it's the developers who want XBLIG more than the userbase.

    Another issue is that I think MS feed off the credibility they gain from having an indie platform way more than the revenue they scrape from those sales. I get the sense they're a little embarrassed by it, and it does now sit somewhat awkwardly beside their WP7 effort. Sure, XBLA has good and bad games, but there is still some sort of quality baseline that a lot of XBLIG titles do not even aspire to reach. A cursory scroll through the new indie releases does not reflect well on the marketplace, even though buried within there are great developers pushing out lovingly-made games. It's that sort of signal:noise ratio that consumers are used to in the 'app store' world but not so much in what at first glance looks like a curated market of equal standing to XBLA.

    Also, this is a slight tangent but on the dashboard more generally, I think there's a distinction between advertising and advertising. I do find it a bit poor that a 'premium' service has ads for any old nonsense, but the vast majority of these tiles don't strike me so much as advertising but ways of surfacing content within. It's like calling Eurogamer's front page a giant advert because it links to a load of its own articles.

  • Shinetop #59 6 months ago

    "It's easy to lose faith when you see a dating game that looks like it took 10 minutes to make and uses some stock images of women in low-cut tops sell better than lovingly crafted, quality games that have been made by talented developers."
    Then make one of those games. As you said, it only takes 10 minutes. Then spend the money you make from that game and the rest of your time on creating lovingly crafted quality games. Wait, maybe it's not that simple?

    Seriously, it's easy and cheap to dismiss the efforts of others. When will indie game developers finally become mature?
    Edited by Shinetop at 09/12/11 @ 12:44

  • Bander #60 6 months ago

    @butler` Indeed. As there are adverts, couldn't we get free online gaming paid for by the advertisers? Gold subscribers shouldn't have to see any ads at all.

  • ubergine #61 6 months ago

    Horrible update which will result in lower sales of EVERY downloadable title on the service, let alone Indie games. Presumably the broken tabs will be fixed at some point - "new" currently links to a random assortment of old games - but the thing is arranged so badly you can only find a title you are specifically looking for and even doing that is tedious as fuck now.

    Nintendo's online service is starting to look good.

  • SpaceMidget75 Verified Senior Software Developer, Minerva Computer Services #62 6 months ago

    @barneyboo It's a good point(s). Regarding XBLIG, I've been thinking about what it is with the phone marketplaces that seem to work for indies, as I don't even try many XBLIG games (compared to XBLA and phone games). I think the main reason, for me, is that on the phone marketplace all the games are bundled together with filters for things like Top, Paid, Free etc, but they're NOT filtered on type of distribution framework...

    Maybe this is part of what MS are trying to do here and it could help XBLIG more than the old system!

    Quite frankly I just didn't visit the XBLIG section much because most of it looked like tosh. Some issues to do with placement, mixing stuff you can buy now with stuff you can't etc still needs sorting, but I'm wondering now if the specific issue of making the 'Type' filter (XBLA, XBLIG, GoD) more accessible would be a bad thing. Maybe XBLIG should just naturally appear in 'New Releases' along with other games.

    I think that's what politicians would call a partial u-turn. :(
    Edited by SpaceMidget75 at 09/12/11 @ 13:01

  • LegzMackenzie #63 6 months ago

    Teething problems. Hopefully Microsoft will refine the design based on user feedback. As it is, it's pretty fucking cumbersome.

  • StooMonster #64 6 months ago

    @lollage Perhaps it's paying for something and then getting ads ... movies in the cinema

    I'm often puzzled as to why in the UK we accept 20 to 30 minutes of adverts in the cinema before the trailers, and yet in the USA they don't have adverts at the movies in the cinema.

    The land of the commercial is advert free at the cinema, and we have to put up with adverts for booze, Lynx, insurance, cars ... like some kind of super extended tv break.

  • Bonkers_Billy #65 6 months ago

    I presume with the new dash advertising the Xbox Gold subscription will dramatically drop in price?

  • lucky_jim #66 6 months ago

    I've got loads of XBLIG games- around 200, probably- and I've never written a line of code in my life unless youthful dabblings with Spectrum BASIC and 3d Construction Kit count (which they clearly don't). So, I'm coming at this not as a developer, but as an end user with a particular interest in indie titles.

    You know what? Mr-Brett and the others quoted in this article are spot-on. How many people, hand on hearts, would be aware of things like Cthulhu Saves the World if EG hadn't reviewed it?

    If I was an XBLIG developer, I'd be pretty pissed off with Microsoft, not just because of this awful update (which is horrible in far too many ways for me to list here) but because of their whole attitude to the service. People invested in XNA and learned to develop some pretty damn fine games with it, with the entirely reasonable expectation that they'd have some sort of visible presence on Xbox Live. For Microsoft to pull the rug from under their feet like this is disingenuous at best, and downright shifty at worst.

  • Daddy-Doom-Bar #67 6 months ago

    Well I loved Battle Bees, it's just a shame it's been so hidden by MS that I can't play online with anyone. I think MS are saying 'pay us to advertise it on the dash or fuck off' - Which is typical MS.
    MS' slogan should be - 'How can we monetise this?'

  • mossychops001 #68 6 months ago

    Post deleted at 11:49:27 04-05-2012

  • Zerobob #69 6 months ago

    "For me the truly disheartening news is that the 'games' tab on our game console is now several pages away from the start,"

    "I like the 'quick list' but if it would have a simple connection to my complete library, it would be a huge help."

    Both the exact same points I made on the forum thread for this. Huge UI mistakes IMO.

  • uzivatel #70 6 months ago

    Microsoft already changed the Marketplace once after the last NXE update to make the Indie Games much more visible, chances are they can iron some of the current issues as well.

  • Darren #71 6 months ago

    Microsoft should rename the Xbox 360 to Adbox 360 really because that seems to have been the main focus of this lacklustre update.

  • Xardan #72 6 months ago

    A lot of negativity here on EG regarding Microsoft now. But when has there not been?

    Personally i don't see what all the fuss is about. If there is a title i want to buy i know about it prior to browsing the marketplace.

  • rudedudejude #73 6 months ago

    Fair point and I am guilty of overlooking the Indie market.

    Do Eg have an Indie games best of or something, would be good to see what's out there - esp. at those lower price points.


    These ads will be coming to Windows 8 soon just you wait, pasted over your desktop wallpaper with no option to remove them.

    This is a bit bad, Apple, Sony, none of them are as bad as this with ads on their systems, MS are taking the piss a bit tbh.
    Edited by rudedudejude at 09/12/11 @ 14:26

  • cowell #74 6 months ago

    Perhaps they can just go totally new media and have a series of QR codes on screen

  • Daeltaja #75 6 months ago

    What are Microsoft playing at? There is a huge, growing market for indie games and soon MS will find devs shying away from the platform.

  • fabiosooner #76 6 months ago

    "The image for that (of course) is a woman doing a karate kick dressed in a hoodie in front a brick wall with graffiti," Fouts said.

    Which is a pretty accurate description of the overall vibe of most XBLIG games available :D (save for dating sims of course, otherwise it would be a tank top instead of a hoodie)

    I've noticed this about the XBLIG the first day I downloaded the beta for the dash weeks ago. But frankly, it doesn't surprise me. The Xbox 360 isn't really the natural platform for most of the games developed for XBLIG. It's like trying to sell bicycles on a car dealer. No matter how much goodwill the dealer owner has towards bicycles, they'll eventually be moved to the corner to make room for the main business. And one can't really blame the dealer owner.

  • fabiosooner #77 6 months ago

    @barneyboo Just to say I'm astonished to see someone being so level about this issue. Thank you. You've said a lot of things people should take heed and be aware of, instead of just blind attacking everything deemed 'bid bad corporate'.

  • RumpyStumpy #78 6 months ago

    Pressing the guide button solves the problem for me.

    Im sorry if this makes me sound like a prick but if you can't find what you want in just a few seconds how do you ever finish a game anyway?

    Yeah I sounded like a prick but you know what I mean.

  • Chazmeister #79 6 months ago

    Glad I didn't bother resubbing to gold last month. It feels like XBL has been slowly but steadily going down hill for quite sometime now, with it's in your face monetizing, and this new dashboard is the last straw for me.

    Sorry but I don't want ads for Sky TV shoved in my face every time I switch on my console. It's not like the ads are relegated to the sides, they are front and center and take prominence over all your game related stuff. It's like "SKY TV! SKY TV! BUY! BUY BUY! Oh and suppose you may also want to play your games."

    As for the functionality, well browsing for games in the store is now very crappy; you can no longer search the list alphabetically by individual letter, you just get the whole A-Z in one long continuous line now. It's a step backwards as far as basic usability goes. It's all very well blabbing on about voice command via Kinect, but I don't have Kinect and I'm not getting it any time soon, if ever, either.

    To be honest this whole update just feels like a cynical move to heavily coerce people into buying Kinect by reducing the dashboard's basic functionality without it. The whole thing stinks of unfettered coporate greed, and I'm sick of it.

  • shotgun44 #80 6 months ago

    I did my dissertation on the effectiveness of in-game advertising and came to the conclusion that in general it's annoying and ineffective, regardless of the size, intrusiveness or relevancy...

  • 43n1m4 #81 6 months ago

    @Beano

    "It's seems to me MS have deliberately made it hard to find downloaded games on the HDD and trying to forcing users to use the search function which requires Kinect to be practical..."

    And, as previously mentioned, voice search doesn't work outside US or UK, which makes the new update rather pointless for a lot of people. That I don't even have the choice to turn on voice control in english, really annoys me.
    Edited by 43n1m4 at 09/12/11 @ 19:54

  • itsfuzzy #82 6 months ago

    Spent 5 mins looking for sentuamessage, then i just gave up. New dash is a joke

  • CloudXIV #83 6 months ago

    @Subdominator What if you dont want or need all that crap? I certainly don't. There should be some kind of option to force xbox into "I'm strictly for games" mode. Why the hell am I forced to watch ads on my game console? I never had to do that on older consoles and I still don't have to do that on ps3 (you only get ads when you enter ps store, but there are no ads in xmb).

  • miiiguel #84 6 months ago

    Realy love the new dash and the Metro style, finally we got rid of the messy icons allover the place.

    Regarding indie games I don't understand this new complain, they first said Arcade titles got all the atention on the dashboard, now they are treated equally, since they are listed alongside XBLA and GoD titles. Maybe the problem is the last time I checked (last night) there were 2148 Indie titles, that's like 4x the number of Arcade titles, and the service is less than one year old ? How do you promote and give equal atention to than amount of titles ? Tbh, this service, if it has a problem, is that it is too prolific, which makes these complains quite interesting, I wonder if it was good.

    About the "ads", or maybe a aestetically well place Metro square anouncing the Sky service, I have no problem with that, tbf it give a more cosmopolitan look to the ecosystem, a out of the nerd box call, but to each its own. Like someone says it bothers me a whole lot more the ads before the movies where I have to sit there waiting for the fil to b ig and forced ot watch some crappy and lousy videos. A square place anouncinf some entertainement feature on my ludic box which I can completly ignore (it doesn't force to buy anything, honestly) doesn't make me angry.
    One aspect though, it should allow more (some!) customization.

    You may now continue to be angry with everything.
    Everything is amazing and no one's happy
    Edited by miiiguel at 09/12/11 @ 22:59

  • DwarfyP #85 6 months ago

    @braydee89 Totally agree

    Also, it is interesting to see that if you like the new Dash or say anything about it you get rated down, if you throw your toys out of the pram and bitch and moan you get rated up. Gotta love the Internet.

  • DwarfyP #86 6 months ago

    @DanWhitehead XBox hasn't been a CONSOLE for a long time. It is a Media Center/Hub that happens to play games. Deal with it or get a Wii U cos the next Xbox and next PlayStation are going to be even more focused on different media like TV, music, social channels etc.

  • jamesi #87 6 months ago

    i think the problem with the new dash is that its built around kinnect and bing and not games.most of us dont care about kinnect we just want an intuitive system to do what we want games friends movies demos etc.i hate the adverts find it obtrusive and it feels like a needless step back of an update. it is more snappy only good point.also why not make it optional or more customizable?

  • Rack #88 6 months ago

    @shotgun44 So your theory is that companies throw money at it without any regard as to whether it does anything? Or did you do that dissertation8 years ago?

  • Ryze #89 6 months ago

    They REALLY NEED to allow these devs to compile and release on WinPhone7 and Win7 simultaneously.

    How about an Indie Games channel in the new Windows App Store?

    The Windows Phone 7 App Marketplace?

  • cloudskipa #90 6 months ago

    I don't like to say this but are some of you actually gamers or not? Because you sure wouldn't think so with how some of you are carrying on about this dashboard. It's NOT a gamers nightmare at all, it's just another means of selecting what you want to play, it's not complicated unless you are already mentally challenged and you can access all of the same content as before. Yes there may be a few more ads here and there but they are easily ignored. Try to enjoy the actual games.

    Also I quite liked MS response to what the Indie Dev was saying as it gives me a little bit of hope they do take Indie games serious, my worse fear is that it turns into another Game Room. No-one wants that, MS were quite good how they listened and worked with Indie Devs during the last Dash update and made the appropriate changes soon after it's launch. I hope this happens again but to be fair, there has actually been some improvements made to the search list as the Xbox rep said, Bing search now allows you to search for keywords including the developer and even game types of Indie games, something you could not do before.

    I also think Indie games are such a niche market and that the kinds of people like me, who enjoy these "quality games that have been made by talented developers." will also be the same types of people who will be have no trouble in finding them.