Xbox Live GOD line-up revealed

By Robert Purchese Published 5 August, 2009

MS offering 21 games next Tuesday.

Microsoft has announced the Xbox Live games-on-demand launch line-up, which rolls out this coming Tuesday, 11th August.

Of the 21 titles, a handful are synonymous with the new service: Assassin's Creed, Mass Effect and Oblivion, for example.

Others, however, are fresh, such as Rockstar Games presents Table Tennis, Fight Night Round 3, SEGA Rally, Burnout Paradise and Viva Piñata 2.

Similarly, some we had expected for launch, like Crackdown and BioShock, are now nowhere to be seen.

The Xbox Live games-on-demand channel allows full games to be bought direct using credit cards, with no real-money-to-Microsoft-Points faffing in-between. Exactly how much those games will cost, mind you, is still under wraps - "comparable" to retail is all we know so far.

Here's the launch line-up in full:

  • Assassin's Creed
  • Need for Speed: Most Wanted
  • Burnout Paradise
  • Perfect Dark Zero
  • Call of Duty 2
  • Prey
  • Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
  • Rockstar Games Presents Table Tennis
  • Fight Night Round 3
  • SEGA Rally
  • Kameo: Elements of Power
  • Test Drive: Unlimited
  • LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga
  • Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Vegas
  • Mass Effect
  • Tomb Raider: Legend
  • Meet The Robinsons
  • Viva Piñata
  • MX vs. ATV Untamed
  • Viva Piñata 2: Trouble in Paradise
  • Need for Speed Carbon
Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (66) Latest comment 3 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • miiiguel #1 3 years ago

    But, is it possible to use points as well?

  • cyacomini #2 3 years ago

    "comparable" to retail..

    I hope that means at retailers prices and not RRP. You can get SEGA Rally for £5 in some shops so don't think for a second I might drop £20 on it!

  • Heitzu #3 3 years ago

    Still no mention of the price then...

  • siro #4 3 years ago

    Viva Piñata 2: Trouble in Paradise went online for €29.99 yesterday. Much more than getting it on Amazon or so. :(

  • BillyBrush #5 3 years ago

    Not sure miiiguel

    I know everything else is still points, but it seems like these won't be....which is a shame, i have resisted the lure of credit for the last 29 yrs, and i'm not about to start now

    (they'll be cheaper to pick up from a shop/online anyway tbh)

  • DFawkes #6 3 years ago

    Indeed, can I chose to use points? doesn't matter, as long as they're even vaguely close to retail I'll have a couple of them at least. Some are newer than others, so I'm guessing £10 for the older ones. That's just a guess though.

  • Peew971 #7 3 years ago

    When it was revealed at E3 they confirmed you could use points or money... If it's RRP though it's a bit pointless.

  • ParanoidZombie #8 3 years ago

    Too bad they forgot to tell about the price, it's the most important point, I bought Prey 8 months ago for 10€, and most of those games can be found in the preowned bargain bin for about 10 to 20€... Just like with the xbox originals, the price will make or break this feature.

  • alimokrane #9 3 years ago

    so pretty much 2 years old games and above.

  • miiiguel #10 3 years ago

    Yes Billy, while it seems that some (lots?) of ppl aren't fond of the points thing, I kinda like the system. I go into a retailer buy the code, or use PayPal and buy a few points online and use them in a "controlled environment".

  • mrpon #11 3 years ago

    I picked up Kameo brand new for £3.85, beat THAT Microsoft!

  • NewbieZilla #12 3 years ago

    They'll have to bring down the Xbox Original prices, and put the 360 ones at that price point. Some even cheaper.

  • videogangs #13 3 years ago

    All of these games go for 10-20 quid in the second hand bin, if MS don't reflect this then this service will deservedly flop.

  • seasidebaz #14 3 years ago

    TD:U for a tenner could make me buy it...

  • udat #15 3 years ago

    For this to tempt me they have to offer these games at the typical high street price (so say 40-45 quid) minus whatever I could get, on average, for trading it in 2 months later.

  • Peew971 #16 3 years ago

    I see this just as a test anyway, the objective is probably Steam on console but they will need all games to be available from day one and even at retail price it will be successful... These old games probably won't do much for the service.

  • bad09 #17 3 years ago

    I quite fancy a couple of those. Sadly I only have 20gb so won't be using the service (unless HDD's come down to a reasonable price). Besides we all know these games will cost more than on the high street anyway, the selection will rarely get games added....

    ....and we'll have Xbox Originals - part 2

  • Anthony_UK #18 3 years ago

    As everyone has said, price will be the thing that decides whether this feature is a hit or falls on its face.

    It'll be interesting, at 800msp they'll cost the same as most of the acrade lineup, which I can't imagine them doing. But any more and you might as well pick up a second hand copy from somewhere!

  • hiddenranbir #19 3 years ago

    If it is same as retail, might as well go looking for second hand or retail discount deals.

  • ZuluHero #20 3 years ago

    Hmmm…

    It will be interesting to see how competitive they can be with the continuously fluctuating prices, sales and ‘manager’s specials’ of a brick-and-mortar or online retailer.

    I know it’s not on the list, but I just picked up Too Human over lunch for £4.98 (brand new). Call me skeptical, but are they going to be able to offer me a more competitive price than that? Not to mention I have a physical disk of a game in my hand that isn’t sitting on my HDD taking up a third of it.

  • lambtron #21 3 years ago

    Excellent. I will pick up FN3 if the price is right.

  • miiiguel #22 3 years ago

    While physical media has the tangible benefit of being... physical, digital ditribution also has a big one which is acessibility. We can all talk about bargains we found, but I'm sure we don't find all of them all the time, everywhere.

  • Toothball #23 3 years ago

    Yeah, I'm keen to see if the prices change at all. Many people prefer to wait until games become cheaper before buying them at all, so it will be a struggle to break that habit if they have no plans to depreciate prices over time. I'm also quite partial to sales too. The weekend deals that Steam offers often get me buying things I wouldn't have done otherwise in the same way as I pick up things I find secondhand and in bargain bins. I'm sure countless others do the same. If they want everyone to move to digital purchases this could end up being something of a sticking point.

  • Monkey_Puncher #24 3 years ago

    I could do with playing Assassin's Creed again, though anything more than £10 and it's not really worth it.

    I imagine most games will be £20.
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/09 @ 16:15

  • groovychainsaw #25 3 years ago

    i reckon half those games are £10 from online retailers. So they should not be more than 1200 pts. But then they directly compete with arcade games, a good number of which come out at 1200 points now. Given the choice, I'd rather play a full, 10-20 hour game than an arcade title. So they got a problem here. I reckon they will be 2400 points (about £20).
    Couple this expected price with the fact that the majority of people have at best a 20GB drive (which, in my case, only ever has 5GB left, even after significant cleaning up) I reckon they won't sell more than about 5 copies of each. They will deem it a failure and not use it. Which will be a shame, because there's a perfect gap for impulse purchase digital downloads, as steam keeps getting me to buy every weekend (I now have a huge library of games I haven't started on steam yet!)
    Edited by 2 at 05/08/09 @ 16:19

  • phantom516 #26 3 years ago

    All old games available for £5 - £10 at your local game store. When they release new games on this service it will be great.

  • TopKatt #27 3 years ago

    @BillyBrush

    Will you have to use credit if you can't use points then? Surely you can use a debit card so the cash comes out of your bank account.

  • hiddenranbir #28 3 years ago

    I don't think MS accept debit cards...

    If they did, I could have bought MS points from them!

  • GamesProgrammer Verified Games Team Programmer, Eutechnyx Ltd. #29 3 years ago

    So disapointed in this i thought this was going to be a store like the PSP is getting when the PSP Go Launches, I.E. almost every title available, i understand for the PSP this is going to be a necesity with the absence of a UMD drive, but this half baked solution offering 21 extremley old titles just seems like a waste of time.

    Lets face it if i-tunes only offered music over a year old it wouldnt be anywhere near as popular as it is.

  • Peew971 #30 3 years ago

    @hiddenranbir: I've just purchased 1000pts with my debit card and have used 2 other debit cards without any issue.

  • cianchristopher #31 3 years ago

    Nice to see Burnout Paradise there as it's been out on PSN for almost a year now. But why don't Microsoft release a 360gb hard drive. Oh, now i remember - cos it would cost £360 or thereabouts...

  • Hypercube #32 3 years ago

    I've only ever used my Visa debit card to buy MS points. I think that, as long as it has the Visa symbol, it's OK to use for that purpose.

  • septimus #33 3 years ago

    If the price is right there are a couple I wouldn't mind owning again. Mass Effect being one. Wouldn't pay more than £10 for it though. Seen it for £3.99 on the PC in HMV recently.

    Now get rid of points altogether please MS.

  • Xerx3s #34 3 years ago

    They will have to do a lot better in pricing. It's digital only so barely any cost and the unused hardcopies can be found for a fraction of the price. Picked assassins creed up for 5 euro this week i.e.

  • matrim83 #35 3 years ago

    I'd pay 1200 MSP for most of them. 1600 for maybe one or two of them. Thats my limit.

  • techknight #36 3 years ago

    These are terrible... The whole point of GoD is that you don't ever have to use a disc - but paying for that only makes sense when you sell games that people will actually play over and over again. Where's Rock Band 2? Street Fighter 4? Call of Duty 4?

    When the only games available are crap you'd only play through once and can buy used for $5 on disc anyway, what the hell is the point?

    I'm astounded at how angry this makes me. :)
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/09 @ 16:57

  • hiddenranbir #37 3 years ago

    @Peew971

    Ahh, guess I'm just stuck with my Maestro card.

  • gandhimaster #38 3 years ago

    they will obviously be too expensive!

    on psn gt5 prologue was £8 more expensive than at retail on launch day!

    itll never be cheaper to buy via live/psn than online retail stores.

  • Kosumo #39 3 years ago

    On Inside Xbox today there is a New Features video and it shows Mass Effect costing 1600 MSP so does this mean its def points or is it an old video? Although now I can buy Burnout without leaving my room then I may have to purchase it if its at a decent price. Just a pity 20GB (13GB really) Hard Drive isn't going to hold anything.

  • muscleblade #40 3 years ago

    @techknight

    I agree. I have no interest in these old titles. If i wanted them i would have bought them long time ago. Some of them i bought ages ago of course.

  • macmurphy #41 3 years ago

    Does seem a bit pointless unless they're charging a tenner. Picked up Sega Rally new for that. It is a little slice of gaming pleasure though, romping round herds of animals under a sega-blue sky. Burnout paradise is also great.

    If they do this for the right price they'll get loads of business, I'd happily pay a tenner on a rainy day to impulse buy a game if it meant saving a walk up the shops. If they charge any more than fifteen they can wedge it though.

  • dnky666 #42 3 years ago

    Assasin's Creed is currently available for £8.99 online. That's a new, sealed copy and that includes postage. If I order it now sure I have to wait 36 hours but I will have a hard copy that I can flog as like new for about £5 or £6 down the line.

    GOD seemed like a good idea at the time (ie E3) but now the pricing is revealed......

  • miiiguel #43 3 years ago

    " but even then, should you ever decide to sell the console, you're going to lose all that potential value in software because its tied to your gamertag."

    Why do you say this? I re-download software with my gamertag on multiple 360s, by having my GT on a mem card. Even if I didn't have on mem card (which is a great thing, I mifht add) swaping HDD would do the trick.
    Regarding selling consoles, that must be the worst deal ever.

  • Anthony_UK #44 3 years ago

    There's a video on xbox live showing the new features, they go into the games on demand part, and it shows Mass Effect for 1600 points.....My feeling is, a touch to expensive for the sake of flicking throught the preowned section in your nearest Game/Gamestation!

  • techknight #45 3 years ago

    @Mappman

    I see what you're saying, because there definitely is a loss of value when you can't resell a game.. But a title like Street Fighter IV is one I would never want to sell in the first place, even though I could get more money for it than Kameo. Similarly, I wouldn't want to be stuck with Perfect Dark Zero for life, unable to get even one dollar for it.

  • jonsaan #46 3 years ago

    The convenience of having something on the drive cannot be underestimated. How many 360s are you licensed for use on? Because this is what makes PSN psp games massively good value. If you have more than one psp obviously.

  • jonsaan #47 3 years ago

    @Games programmer. If the pspGO store launches with every game available I will eat my hat. There are already a boatload of titles up there. How many did they say would be available at launch?
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/09 @ 19:33

  • waggy79 #48 3 years ago

    I keep reading of people with the 20gb hdd saying they dont want to upgrade because of the price. Just to let you know 120gb hdds are going for just over 40 quid on ebay, i recently purchased one for my gfs 360.

  • SAMF2000 #49 3 years ago

    I Can tell you now that unless the prices of these games on demand are equal to or less than those on amazon...people are not going to buy anything if they have common sense . for instance PREY Can be purchased new for under $15 on amazon.we will soon see what M$ Is going to do as far as pricing, but fear their pricing will start at 1600 MS Points ($20.00) :-(

  • RegorTtenneb #50 3 years ago

    Okay heres the price you can get these titles right now on Amazon.co.uk albeit through their marketplace;

    Assassin's Creed £8.10
    Need for Speed: Most Wanted £17.99 (eek!)
    Burnout Paradise £7.60
    Perfect Dark Zero £2.99
    Call of Duty 2 £11.99
    Prey £4.48
    Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion £8.99
    Rockstar Games Presents Table Tennis £2.40
    Fight Night Round 3 £6.94
    SEGA Rally £5.45
    Kameo: Elements of Power £2.99
    Test Drive: Unlimited £17.00 (!)
    LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga £11.35
    Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Vegas £4.50
    Mass Effect £9.50
    Tomb Raider: Legend £3.59
    Meet The Robinsons £7.50
    Viva Piñata £5.49
    MX vs. ATV Untamed £21.00
    Viva Piñata 2: Trouble in Paradise £10.14
    Need for Speed Carbon £4.09

    I doubt GOD will come close to this. If pricing is fair ill probably pick up Table Tennis and Meet the Robinsons (easy gp).

  • miiiguel #51 3 years ago

    Good luck on those "easy gp" in Table Tennins, lol!

    And I say it again, one can have the same game installed in multiple 360s, the diference being that in the others (which are not the 1st) only the GT which bought the game can play it, while in the "original" one any logged in account can.

  • RegorTtenneb #52 3 years ago

    @ miiiguel
    yeah I know table tennis isnt easy its just a game ive never got around to play.
    Meet the Robinsons is what I was talking about it. Under 5 hours apparently :-)

  • RegorTtenneb #53 3 years ago

    U.S. “Games on Demand” Launch Titles:

    1.Assassin’s Creed (Ubisoft)
    2.BioShock (2K Games)
    3.Burnout Paradise (EA)
    4.Call of Duty 2 (Activision)
    5.Dance Dance Revolution Universe (Konami)
    6.Fight Night Round 3 (EA)
    7.Kameo: Elements of Power (Microsoft Game Studios)
    8.Karaoke Revolution American Idol Encore (Konami)
    9.LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga (LucasArts)
    10.Mass Effect (Microsoft Game Studios)
    11.Meet The Robinsons (Disney)
    12.MX vs. ATV Untamed (THQ)
    13.Need for Speed Carbon (EA)
    14.Need for Speed: Most Wanted (EA)
    15.Perfect Dark Zero (Microsoft Game Studios)
    16.Prey (2K Games)
    17.Rainbow Six Vegas (Ubisoft)
    18.ridge racer 6 (Namco)
    19.Rockstar Games Presents Table Tennis (Rockstar Games)
    20.SONIC THE HEDGEHOG (SEGA)
    21.TEST DRIVE: UNLIMITED (Atari)
    22.The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (2K Games/Bethesda Softworks)
    23.Viva Pinata (Microsoft Game Studios)
    24.Viva Pinata 2: Trouble in Paradise (Microsoft Game Studios)

  • KDR_11k #54 3 years ago

    Considering most of these are fairly old I'm surprised they're not going with the 1200 point pricing they used on the XB1 games.

    If they don't allow the use of points I won't be able to buy any of the games.

  • SlackMaster #55 3 years ago

    I reckon they'll all be £19.99. All their XBox originals are 1200mp so 360 games will be a lot more, possibly 1600 to 2400mp. TBH tho these games will never be comparable to retail discounting and online buying. I can see Mass Effect (standard) going for £19.99 when you can get the classics version with the extra disc of content for the same if not less at retail.

  • miiiguel #56 3 years ago

    @ Regor, you're absolutly right the game's awsome and you should play it. Lovely graphix, challenging gameplay and very close to real professional table-tennis. As a matter of fact you could send me a FR if you get arround to buy/play it and we could have a few online games, is hard to find games nowdays.
    Edited by 1 at 05/08/09 @ 21:57

  • Ryze #57 3 years ago

    I spent a few months buying copies of TDU from Play.com for £10 brand new, then trading it at Game for £13 for XBLA points and other games.

    Unless these games are £15 or less while they're that old, they've no chance.

    Nice experiment, though - great to have them there - but I wont be paying top dollar for old games. This could be for rich dummys.

    /waits for price announcements

  • RegorTtenneb #58 3 years ago

    @ Miiiguel
    Yeah will do. My GT is Regor Ttenneb

  • bioreit #59 3 years ago

    @ Mappman

    I think you can rest assured that the next Xbox console will be fully backwards compatible with the 360 - the only reason for the problematic BC from 360-to-Xbox was down to licensing issues between Microsoft and Nvidia, due to the fact that the Xbox was a very rushed design job, built with components pretty much off the shelf. The 360, however, was built in much the same way as other consoles, whereby Microsoft to all intent and purposes owns all of the designs and patents.

    On-topic:

    1600 MSP is the maximum I think Microsoft can charge for GOD titles, really - any more and almost all will just buy physical discs. I'm happy to pay £10-15 for a digital version of a game I could pick up for, say, a fiver from a shop because:

    1) Buying a disc version doesn't let me insta-launch from the dash.

    2) Digital versions cannot get scratched, lost or nicked.

    3) If friends want to come over for a 360 session, they just bring their HDDs to plug into my spare 360s - don't even need to bring games any more, yet they have their GT, saved games, DLC and titles available in one (very large) pocket-sized device.

  • BiffTanner #60 3 years ago

    Well it looks like many might be 1600 as a new inside xbox article shows mass effect as 1600 points.

  • mrmonkey1980 #61 3 years ago

    comparable to retail.... not comparable to the cheap secondhand copy I can get by now. It's a ncie idea but its not going to work until the price drops. I don't even know the price but I know it needs to drop.

  • Xerx3s #62 3 years ago

    "Why do you say this? I re-download software with my gamertag on multiple 360s, by having my GT on a mem card. Even if I didn't have on mem card (which is a great thing, I mifht add) swaping HDD would do the trick.
    Regarding selling consoles, that must be the worst deal ever. "

    A) You can't sell the games. 100% loss right there.
    B) If you sell your console, you will probably stop using your gold account. You will in all likelihood also stop using your silver version as well. All inactive silver accounts are purged at regular intervals. Buy something and it will only be valid as long as your account exists.

  • Xerx3s #63 3 years ago

    The problem with DD is that we had all the functionalities back in the days with expansion packs and free addons. In fact, it doesn't add any positive points for the gamers. The only ones who really stand to benefit from it are the publishers.

  • miiiguel #64 3 years ago

    "A) You can't sell the games. 100% loss right there.
    B) If you sell your console, you will probably stop using your gold account. You will in all likelihood also stop using your silver version as well. All inactive silver accounts are purged at regular intervals. Buy something and it will only be valid as long as your account exists. "

    A) True, though I don't sell games. Not being cocky here, is just I like to collect them games, and on top of that, in Portugal selling games is a *realy* bad deal for the weakest link.
    B) Only if I'd sell all my consoles to never use them again which sounds unlikely... though I can't be totally sure.

    That said, it's clearly not the coolest feature ever to spawn on Live, though it is nice to have the option to buy Burnout, even for 1600 if that's the case, if I ever have a sudden urge to play it.
    Edited by 1 at 06/08/09 @ 02:10

  • Darren #65 3 years ago

    I can't see Microsoft selling any of these games for less than £10 and even that is unlikely when you realise that Xbox games are currently being sold for that. When you can get most of those games for less than a £10 online then I can't see this being a good way of getting old games myself. Unless you like playing extra for not having to insert a disc in the tray, that is.

    I've only ever bought one Xbox game from the Marketplace, Psychonauts, and that was only because it's near impossible to buy online. Despite owning a 120 GB HDD I can't see myself buying any of those games but I'm sure lots of people will, assuming Microsoft don't price them stupidly high, like £19.99 or something.

  • smernicki #66 3 years ago

    Viva Pinata 2 would tempt me. but my HD is full and upgrading to a 120gb is such a rip off