Quote: Originally Posted by Bit-Tech During the festive period, many Xbox Live members discovered that they were unable to use much of the online service’s functionality and it looks like Microsoft is going to compensate Xbox Live Gold members who were affected by the downtime. While the service was still up, many members were unable to play multiplayer games over Xbox Live, while others were unable to sign in to the service at all. I happened to be affected by a different problem, where I couldn’t recover my gamertag – apparently this was also a known problem. Sadly, it’s been over a week since the problems started and the company says that it still hasn’t completely resolved the issues, but Microsoft’s Larry Hryb assured customers that engineers are working day and night to fix the issues as quickly as possible. “The entire LIVE team has been working day and night to ensure that you can have a great LIVE experience. While we’re not done yet, I wanted to let you know that things are getting better each hour and that no one on the team is going anywhere until the job is done. Thanks for your patience,” said Hryb on his blog. The Bitbag managed to get an answer from Microsoft when asked whether there will be any compensation for those affected by the downtime. The representative said that “we will definitely be doing something for our Gold members that weren’t able to get online over the last week.” Microsoft hasn’t issued details on exactly what it will be doing for its Xbox Live Gold members that were unable to get online during the period, so I guess we’re going to have to wait for an official statement from the company.

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you know...I didn't get to play online a bit this past week...but I wasn't upset about it. I'm more excited of the fact that the 360 sold so well that it drug MS' servers to a crawl. That's a GOOD thing for MS. Sure, it stunk that they didn't get the system up and running at a moments notice, but they fixed it and it runs great now.

I don't need a check for $1 signed by Bill Gates...because that's how much money I missed out on from paying for XBL...

I think the xbox360 is a pretty great system but I don't sleep better at night knowing that Microsoft is getting more money...

Good news mates it's a little more than a dollar...

Quote: Originally Posted by Bit-Tech If you’re a Silver member and suffered from the problems, don’t fret because Microsoft hasn’t forgotten about you either -- Marc Whitten, General Manager of Xbox Live issued an official statement via Larry Hryb’s blog in the early hours of this morning, which should please all Xbox Live members. “Dear Xbox LIVE Members: During this past holiday season you helped us break a number of Xbox LIVE records. This included our largest sign-up of new members to Xbox LIVE in our 5 year history and just yesterday you broke the record for the single biggest day of concurrent members ever on the service. As a result of this massive increase in usage we know that some of you experienced intermittent Xbox LIVE issues over the holiday break. While the service was not completely offline at any given time, we are disappointed in our performance. I would like to take this moment to thank you each and every one of you for your patience and understanding as our team has worked around the clock to return the service to a stable state. At the same time we would like to offer a token of our appreciation to all of you in celebration of record success for the service. And as a thank you for your loyalty during this holiday period, we will be offering all of our Xbox LIVE members around the world access to a full Xbox LIVE Arcade game that will be available to download free of charge. In the coming weeks we will be sharing the specific details of this offer with you.”

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This is cool news but I was hoping for more of a message like this:

Dear Valued Xbox customer,

We have started to realize that we are robbing our customers on a daily basis. And we also started feeling bad about having our customers buy a console, buy all sorts of accessories to use the console, buy a game, then buy LIVE just so you can play the game like its meant to be played, and then GET THE RROD. We have decided to be like our competition and allow you to play your investments in games online for FREE!!! We are starting to learn that our competition has happier customers at this time and we would like all of you to be happy as well!

Sincerely
BILL GATES

PS...Please send money!

Well jeez with service like that why wouldn't you just use a PC?

Quote: Originally Posted by eascarface Well jeez with service like that why wouldn't you just use a PC?

MS likes to make something that is free in most games, cost money.

Take GoW for pc. It has a really fun multiplayer, but is crippled if you don't pay for a "Gold" membership.

Yah, that's right. You have to pay $50 a year to play simple mutliplayer and co-op online. That's essentially $100 for the game.

You don't need to pay for XBL Gold to play online on the PC...

Quote: Originally Posted by NCXCStud You don't need to pay for XBL Gold to play online on the PC...

You can play list play, which is a good idea, because so many people use that...

You shouldn't have to pay for a Gold account just to essentially be able to play.

At least they're doing something about it, unlike EA did when the Battlefield 2 stats system went haywire last summer...

I don't really care either way, though - I just got a 360 and it's great and all but online play has just been blah for me. I love Gears of War in sp and co-op but I hate the multiplayer. The other games I have are Bioshock and Assassin's Creed so I have had zero good experiences with live other than GoW co-op for a few hours.

Vertical_Zer0 - You need to pick up Call of Duty 4 if you want a really good multiplayer experience.

A lot of the XBLArcade games have good multiplayer as well. Uno is a blast to play online with others, though I haven't played Uno for sometime though.

GoW was great last year, but with the influx of new users last Christmas and this Christmas seasons... lots of preteen and teenage idiots are playing it now...Plus, as some have said...GoW has turned into how quickly you can run up to someone and shoot them with your shotgun.

When played 'right' GoW multiplayer is very fun

BTW - whats your gamertag on Xbox Live? I'm always up to playing with new friends

So like for the arcade game... you can pick anything?

Including Worms/TMNT arcade?

No, they haven't disclosed the information pertaining to the free XBL arcade game...could be a list...could be one they choose...we'll see..

And your freebie is....Undertow.


Any good?

Not sure, but it'll probably be more enjoyable (if it's not that good) because it's free

Played it at my buddy's... Like Battlefield underwater. Pretty damn cool