360 games to be installable to HDD News

"Xbox Live boss Marc Whitten revealed the feature on the Major Nelson blog, and boasted about it improving load times and stopping the need for the drive to make lots of spinning noise."

Perhaps its time for them to stop selling the Xbox without the hard disk if its that much of a benefit to the users ;)

In game DSB

game installs = neat, if it makes mass effect have less pop in I'll be using it, honestly can't think of any other game that I would want to use it for (GTA maybe, but it didn't bother me that much)

it would be nice to have Clan / steam style group support though, anything to make organising friend lists a bit easier

Install the entire game or just the partial installs like PS3? Either way, those with 20GB drives (which had about 13GB available for use if memory serves) aren't going to be able to do much of this so I presume it will have to be optional? (Not to mention the relatively small number of users who don't have HDDs at all.) And if it's optional surely this could lead to relative performance problems with online games if some users have it installed and others don't. I guess all this will get cleared up in the coming days.

Starting content downloads from work so they are ready when you get home = Fucking Awesome, I was wishing for this feature only this morning when I heard that the Too Human demo was up on live, and I was stuck at work.

Finally - 1440x900 over VGA.

Why did it take so long? No matter, what with the FFXIII announcement and the ripping to HDD I'm going to allow myself a little smile tonight.

Just stop delaying demos to Silver Live members and all will be well ...

The dashboard is one area that microsoft got right from day 1. Because of the way the dashboard works i.e. it has it's own exclusive thread that is NEVER used by games (or at least is never supposed to be). This means that accessing it doesn't require the game to do anything other than pause. It even has it's own memory space that games are not aware of and never use so it doesn't require a game to unload resources to accomodate it. As a result of this the whole dashboard can be changed without any game ever knowing the difference or needing a patch etc. etc.

Sony please take note for any future consoles you develope.

This makes me so happy

Wipes tear

"Play from hard drive. ***Copy*** your games from the game disc and play directly from the hard drive. Not only will the drive not spin, but load times are quicker, as well. Of course, you will still need the disc in the tray to prove you own the game."

EUROGAMER STAFF - CAN you spot DIFFERENCE between COPY and INSTALL ?

It Is NOT INSTALL of any kind - not full instal - nor partial install

Completly OPTIONAL - you will be able to:
***COPY WHOLE GAME TO HDD - LIKE Playin from ISO on PC***

And it will copy whole DVD in 4-5 minutes TOP on 12x drive in X360 unlike 20 minutes PS3 installs

Anybody who even once played from ISOs on PC will tell you how usefull it is.

And making it ISO copy will make it completly backward COMPATIBLE with ALL X360 games.

We will be getting support for new display modes too, such as 16:10 over VGA or HDMI, plus 1440x900 and 1680x1050.


YES! Nice one fellas! Thing is, I just sold my swanky monitor to a mate because I couldnt stand the slight stretching effect to match 16:10 monitor. He got a bargain.

Bugger.

Makes sense. Might drive up demand for overpriced HDD add-ons and, through piracy, might make the 360 more attractive. Worked wonders for Windows...

That is a killer feature in my opinion.

From reading the post on MN it looks like you can install ther entire game to HDD with only the disk being in the tray for authentication as proof that you own it or have physical access to it.

"It will copy in 4-5 minurtes TOP unlike 20 minutes PS3 installs "

@anonim1979 ...Dont know where your getting your info from, but ive never had a 20 minute install.

@makeamazing
(quote)
"It will copy in 4-5 minurtes TOP unlike 20 minutes PS3 installs "

@anonim1979 ...Dont know where your getting your info from, but ive never had a 20 minute install.
(quote)


Devil May Cry 4: Startup comparison
http://www.gamesradar.com/video/v-200802...

22 minutes 41 seconds

This is a really pleasant surprise. While the drive noise doesn't bother me much, it is noticeable, so it will be nice to remove it. Also, this could really improve some games that had slow texture load-times or suffered from scenery pop-in.

Now a really awesome use for my Elite's HDD!!! Woo hoo!

edit: Bat writing.

It will effectively silence the 360 to the noise levels it has when you play a live arcade title or downloaded movie i.e a quiet low while of the fans. Good to do if you have the new lower priced 120gb drive or the new 60gb drive. Given most of us play only one or two games at a time (full retail titles I mean) it shouldn't be too intrusive to do once or twice every few weeks.

Hopefully they make an easy way to replace existing installed games. It should be as simply as selecting an install slot and having the system automatically overwrite whatever was installed in that slot. The dashboard menu should then show whatever I have installed at the time as if it were an arcade title.

?Did I say how great this is?

my 120gig hd is getting so filled, the noise of the drive bugs me at night, now I can game with the sound down!!!

Wow! Well colour me fucking blown away! At last, i'll...

1) Be rid of the noisy ass DVD drive and

2) Have a reason to get my 120gb drive filled up with faster loading games!

Absolutely impressed, by this announcement alone. Well done MS.

And I just bought the 120 gb on ebay! Good timing :)

so if i set a download off at work, does that mean my 360 at home will turn on all by itself? that surely is some mysterious black magic! burn the witches!

Another Yay for 1440x900!

Complete games? Who confirmed that? That'd be surprising, for multiple reasons.

Ohnoes I need a bigger hard drive

1680*1050 support will probably single handedly sell me a 360.

I currently run my PS3 through a Dell monitor via HDMI (720p) and it looks rather nice.

But, uh, native resolution? Yes please. More reliable motherboard this Autumn and job done.

"so if i set a download off at work, does that mean my 360 at home will turn on all by itself? that surely is some mysterious black magic! burn the witches!"

PS3's been doing that for months now, so for a change it's 360 that's doing the catching up. Though to be frank it sounds more convenient with PC than it is with PSP.

Now if only both manufacturers would support Macs.

Still no clan & friend group support you muppets. Fucking fail.

anonim1979: Is that so? If that is true then that would make it an awesome feature unlike installs which would not solve the problems. That would persuade me to get a 120gb version tbh.

"Now if only both manufacturers would support Macs. "

What do you mean? As in streaming content? Don't they both do that? And if not: macdicaplol.

I wish you didn't have to have the disc in the drive to run a "copied" game from the HDD. Faster load times, although nice, doesn't really impress me enough. Being able to run any game from the HDD without having to get off my arse and switch discs, now that would be sweet. I know having the disc in is a preventative measure to stop people copying games from friends and rentals, etc, but it'd be nice if you could register them in some way so you didn't have to have the disc in.

80gb hdd + installable games + final fantasy 13

This is weird... as a PS3 owner I despise mandatory HDD installs because they're the reason I bought a 320 GB HDD. On my 360 though I'd welcome them because they will be OPTIONAL. LOL

I would feel slightly happier about this announcement if microsft had announced at the same time that they would start letting you use standard hard drives on the xbox 360 rather than the stupidly overpriced ones we have at the moment.

Something which EG having added is that the disk still needs to be in the drive, it just won't spin, meaning it will be quieter.
Of course, the disk needs to be in the drive for piracy reasons!

They'd better start selling HDs at 2008 prices then...

"1680*1050 support will probably single handedly sell me a 360.

I currently run my PS3 through a Dell monitor via HDMI (720p) and it looks rather nice. "

Will running it at the much higher resolution lower the framerate like it would on a PC game if you went from 180 * 720 to 1680 * 1050?

+1 on all comments about reducing hd price, it has too be done.

This is brilliant. Means I can use cheaper media :D

Will running it at the much higher resolution lower the framerate like it would on a PC game if you went from 180 * 720 to 1680 * 1050?

No because individual games are programmed to render in a set resolution (usually 720p but some games like CoD4, Halo 3 etc use a slightly lower rendering res) and everything above (or below if you're playing on an old TV) is done by the machine's upscaler hardware. The only real advantage in outputting a higher res is for compatibility with your monitor / HDTV.

How many PS3 versus 360 comparisons have shown there's little gain from having the game start from HDD?

In the case of the 360, the gain is obvious: it works as a jet engine silencer ;)

I'm assuming this will also help multi-disc games like Lost Odyssey, as each disc boots separately anyway.

This is such a useful feature, I'm surprised it wasn't in the main press conference.

Edit: isn't it amazing how hings occur to you just as you hit 'submit'.

The disc still needs to be in the drive for verification. So swapping will still be needed, unless it allows verification of all 'ISO'S' from physical Disc 1.

@banfoi

" So rather than fix the noisy DVD Drive, they instead let you install entire games to the HDD>

Two problems:

1. You still need the disk in the drive.
(But I can see them having made cracking ISOs to the 360 considerably esier for hackers now).
2. Hard drives are going to fill up considerably quicker now.
3. How many PS3 versus 360 comparisons have shown there's little gain from having the game start from HDD?

So for all intents and purposes, it only really serves two purposes of any practical use:
1. Larger games that span multiple DVDs are now more feasible.
(FFXIII had somthing to do with this no doubt).
2. Less noise from the console.

But for 99% of games on the 360, there's no benefit. 7.8 gigs + DLC+ Movies = 60gigs full already.
Even the elite will strain with more than 10 games (especially multi-DVD games).

At least with the PS3 its' not every game, and they only install a couple of gigs to 4 or 5 at the most.

What is particularly grating is that MS still force you to use authorised hardware,w hereas the benefit of the Ps3 is the ability to backup the hard drive and install the contents onto an upgraded, standard SATA drive, so ou can upgrade all the way to the 500gb available for less than the cost of a 120gb 360 hard drive.

Pathetic"


You miserable fucker. MS announce a handful of feature updates that we've been crying out for and that's your response?

Disc-tray noise is an issue for some people, myself included, so for this ONE feature alone (HD installs) I'm immensely happy. Also, just because there's been no proven increase in loading on the PS3, for HD installable titles, means jack shit here because the same hasn't been quantified, like-for-like, on the 360 yet. For all you know, the 360 may have 50% increase over regular disc-based game load times.

Yes, HDs will fill up. Thats the nature of the beast when you've got a capped storage system. The PS3 may have the advantage of generic drives as replacements and lower costs to boot, i'll grant you (if you're confident to have a go), but that doesn't detract from these great new MS announcements. Will 360 20g owners have a tough time? Yes, of course they will, and they'll need to juggle games installs. However, i'd put money on MS lowering the cost of 120g drives, at the time these features go live, to go some way towards alleviating the concerns.

Pathetic is what people like you are, for blatant trolling of great, feature-rich, announcements that will do NOTHING except improve the usability and experience of an already great games console.

Wow, now I really didn't need to buy a 360.

Finally - 1440x900 over VGA.

Can someone help me here. I've already been using my 1440x900 monitor through vga for 360...what resolution has it been all this time then? Or is this from games specifically?

Some people are way too easily impressed. Copying games to the HDD isn't really some kind of huge improvement. Partial installs to save on load times and increase performance without eating all your HDD space is the way to go. Then there's queue'ing downloads from the PC...for all the people who leave their 360's on while they're at work?! Average person works 8-10 hours per day while there's maybe about 1-2 hours worth of download per day. That makes a lot of sense. If you don't download much in the first place, this feature is even less remarkable. Try starting a download before you eat dinner and take personal time. Now was that so hard? Come on MS, I'm still waiting.

Fuck me what a fantastic announcement!

There's at least 2 things in there that I badly wanted and 2 more that I didn't know I wanted till now.

I feel kinda dirty saying this but... GO MICROSOFT!!!

@hiddenranbir I am not sure what the default resolution is but it's probably horribly stretched.
Go to the dashbord and setup to find one which looks better.
I have a 1680x1050 and found one which looks quite good, so good that I forgot I was worried about it when I bought my 360.
Obviously 1680x1050 support is welcome.

"There's at least 2 things in there that I badly wanted and 2 more that I didn't know I wanted till now. "

+1 fantastic and surprising news indeed.

wasn't the spinning of the drive used to get some air flow to cool the gpu?
i'm happy, no more hurricaine while gaming :D

@hiddenranbir

360 output resolution is whatever you set in dashboard(system blade),its not game dependent.I have 1440x900 monitor,and 360 is set to 1280x768(its closest to 16:10 ratio).Your monitor is always "in" 1440x900,it has to stretch input res to native(1440x900) res.

Play from hard drive has been my most expected feature. So awesome.

Stupid thing is, of course, that it's I view it as necessary just because my 360 is loud as a jet engine taking off when reading discs, and because it sometimes gives read errors. If this solves both those issues, I can finally love the console.