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Microsoft prepares ban hammer for Halo: Reach pirates
Posted by John Kilhefner Categories: Bungie, First Person Shooters, Microsoft, Xbox 360, Xbox Live,
Though the temptation may be great to jump online early, perpetrators of downloading early copies of Halo: Reach better think twice before firing up their illegally attained games online. Microsoft is no stranger to banning as many users as they see fit suspected of playing pirated copies of their games. A representative for Microsoft had this to say:
“We are aware that an unauthorized copy of “Halo: Reach” has leaked. We are aggressively investigating the matter. We have no further details to share at this time.”
Sounds like Microsoft is pretty pissed at the whole situation, and we all know what happens when Microsoft feels slighted. Last fall, gamers playing pirated copies of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 prompted Microsoft to ban up to a million players to get their message across. And that message is that pirating will not be tolerated.
“We are aggressively pursuing the violators. Microsoft’s commitment to combat piracy and support safer and more secure gameplay for the 25 million members of the Xbox LIVE community remains a top priority. All consumers should know that piracy is illegal and modifying their Xbox 360 console violates the Xbox LIVE terms of use, will void their warranty and result in a ban from Xbox LIVE.”
Read More 
| Kotaku
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Halo: Reach leaks out…via Xbox Live
Posted by John Kilhefner Categories: Bungie, Corporate News, First Person Shooters, Xbox 360, Xbox Live,
Keeping in tradition with Halo 3 and Halo 2 before it, the Halo series has managed to fall into unsavory pirate hands yet again with Halo: Reach. How did the leak occur, you ask? Directly from Microsoft’s own servers on Xbox Live. This is because Bungie provided authorized reviewers with the codes to download the game which is currently on display in the Xbox Live Marketplace. However, having Reach hiding in plain site wasn’t clever enough to keep the modders from getting their greedy little hands on Reach a full month early.
With Reach already floating around on some torrents out there and in the hard drives of a climbing number of peoples computers, you can expect details from the games story to begin surfacing online. Futhermore, I can safely predict that there will be another epidemic of eager gamers playing Reach online and subsequently being caught and banned from Xbox Live. Microsoft claims that they are “aggressively investigating” the leak, as I’m sure they are furious, but expecting, of the incident. While Halo has been plagued with early downloads, video games don’t suffer from the same stigma of illegal Internet downloads as music, and the sales don’t seem to decline any. Anticipate Halo: Reach to do big numbers on its release date regardless of the incident.
Halo: Reach introduces Forge World
Posted by John Kilhefner Categories: Bungie, First Person Shooters, Microsoft, Xbox 360, Xbox Live,
It’s no shocker that Bungie’s Halo: Reach finale is going to be epic, to say the least. But no one was prepared for just how ambitious the last Halo world would be. That is, until ‘Forge World’ was shown for the first time. In fact, epic is an understatement referring to Forge World. To envision the vastness only a word such as ‘Brobdingnagian’ is befitting. To put it simply - you are not ready.
By now you’re scratching your head wondering “what the heck is Forge World?!” Basically, Forge World is five multi-player maps rolled into one - Canyon, Island, “The Rock,” Quarry, and Coliseum. Each of these maps is set in a different location of the colossal map. In Forge World the player is god, able to customize these areas as they see fit, à la the forge editor from Halo 3. However, unlike Halo 3’s forge editor you are given more options to create developer worthy maps. In fact, Bungie had so much fun in forging these new maps that they even added six of their own Forge World creations to be put into regular game rotation in Halo: Reach’s online multi-player. One of which is a remake of the classic ‘Blood Gulch”, now called ‘Hemorrhage’. To get an idea of the scope of Forge World, Hemorrhage is like a mere sandbox in the middle of the desert.
Bungie is aiming to have gamers create their own multi-player maps with newer forge tools that allow greater creativity. In this new Forge World you will have access to about 150 transferable objects. Thankfully, the physics of objects can be altered accordingly to make mid-air and other placements easier. Also, you now have the ability to “phase” objects into other parts of the map, creating whole new structures and consequently different ways to engage in combat. Created maps can then be “tagged”, allowing other gamers to download them. Think of Forge World as your own personal Inception - “it’s pure creation”. With even more objects to place, a much larger scale world, and the player’s own creativity driving them, we can expect to see some insane multi-player maps start to surface immediately after D-day (September 14th).
Read More | Bungie.net
Microsoft pulls plug on 1 vs 100 for Xbox Live
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Internet, Xbox 360, Xbox Live,
Well, it was definitely fun while it lasted, but Microsoft has decided that their 1 vs 100 Live game show was not worth continuing, and we won’t be seeing a season three. The whole 1 vs 100 Live experience was completely new and different from anything else ever tried on a game console, bringing thousands together at the same time to take part in a game show with a live host (Chris Cashman.) Our take? Sure, Chris Cashman may have been overbearing, but we aren’t gonna pin this on him. We think Microsoft has realized that the 1 vs 100 concept has run its course—we’re guessing we see something new (and better) step in and take its place soon enough. For now, the Sprint Theater is closing up shop.
Read More | Xbox
Xbox Live Gold Family Pack coming in November
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Microsoft, Xbox 360, Xbox Live,
Sounds like Microsoft has finally succumbed to the cries of many an Xbox 360 family, as they are set to launch a new Xbox Live Gold Family Pack subscription. Basically, rather than having a bunch of individual accounts on your console and having to manage them all separately, you get four Xbox Live Gold accounts for $99.99. That’s half price. There will also be a Family Center area where you can manage settings for each account from the primary account. The primary account can even purchase and give Microsoft Points to the other members of the family, and access monitoring reports. Here’s the rundown:
- Up to four individual Xbox LIVE Gold memberships for the price of two – (US) $99.99.
- Family Center – a single, easy to use, destination for Family Settings and account management, accessible on the Xbox dashboard and on Xbox.com.
- The primary account member has the ability to purchase and dispense Microsoft Points to other Xbox LIVE Gold Family Pack members.
- Activity monitoring reports viewable on Xbox.com to help encourage discussions about safer more balanced gaming and entertainment habits.
- Simplified billing that applies all purchase charges to the primary account holder’s billing account and the ability to authorize purchases, helping to manage the family’s entertainment budget.
- Exclusive family content and discounts.
We’ve gotta give Microsoft some credit for finally releasing the Xbox Live Gold Family Pack. We are guessing it will arrive as part of a dashboard update for the Xbox 360 in conjunction with the release of Kinect.
Read More | Gamerscore Blog
Xbox Live expands to nine new countries this fall
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Corporate News, Microsoft, Xbox Live,
It’s hard to imagine that, with over 20 million members worldwide, that Xbox Live isn’t available in all Xbox 360 territories, but it’s true. However, we just got word that later this fall nine countries will be granted access to Microsoft’s online gaming community. Gamers in Brazil, Russia, Poland, Chile, Columbia, Greece, Hungary, South Africa, and Czech Republic will all be able to jump in. That potentially means there’ll be a lot of new people available to play against, and you just know that we’ll be seeing a marked increase in Zangief usage in Super Street Fighter IV. Better start prepping now.
Original Xbox games lose Xbox Live access on April 15
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Microsoft, Xbox, Xbox 360, Xbox Live,
Check it out, Microsoft just announced that all games made for the original Xbox will no longer be able to access the Xbox Live service as of April 15, 2010, and we couldn’t be happier with the news. No, we don’t hate classics like Halo 2, but the thing is, those titles are many years old, and they’ve been holding back the full potential of Xbox Live for far too long. As an example, it’s no secret that we hate the Xbox Live friend limit, and the major reason it exists is because of Halo 2. With Halo 2, and all the rest of the original Xbox games, being denied access to Live, Microsoft will be able to stop worrying about those original Xbox restrictions - and that means, among other things, that we should finally see that friend limit jacked up, if not removed entirely.
It should be noted that, even if you downloaded original Xbox games on your Xbox 360 using Games on Demand, even those won’t work when you try to connect to Xbox Live. It’s just the nature of the beast, and it’s all in the name of progress.
Read More | Gamerscore Blog
How To Use Your Gaming Headset with Xbox Live
Posted by Alex Lifschitz Categories: Accessories, Features, Xbox 360, Xbox Live,
If you’re anything like me, and I’m making an assumption here (because that’s what irresponsible journalism is all about), you might only have so much money to go towards fancy gadgets and various electronic compensations for a strikingly diminished sense of personal worth. That can lead to some trouble if, for instance, you have a decent gaming headset that you want to use for your Xbox 360 instead of a bona-fide sound sytem, since you can no longer use Xbox Live without Microsoft’s proprietary, flimsy headset.
A few headsets, like those from Turtle Beach, alleviate this problem by offering individual chat volumes and the ability to both listen to your game and communicate with your buddies. It’s a worthy investment, but a bit of a waste if you already have a good gaming headset - dedicated XBL headsets can hover around the $150 range. All you need is a $5 adapter and zero soldering.
Hit the jump to see what you need.
Click to continue reading How To Use Your Gaming Headset with Xbox Live
It’s official: Facebook, Twitter, Last.fm, and Zune hit Xbox 360 on November 17
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Internet, Microsoft, Xbox 360, Xbox Live,
For those of you who weren’t able to get into the Preview Program, you can now rest assured that the latest Xbox 360 features, including Facebook, Twitter, Last.fm, and Zune Marketplace with instant on 1080p streaming, will be arriving on all Xbox 360 consoles on November 17th. Yup, that’s just five days away, which isn’t that bad at all. To celebrate the launch of the new dashboard, all Xbox Live Gold features will be available to Xbox Live Silver members from November 20-23, allowing Silver members to sample Facebook, Twitter, Last.fm, and online multiplayer. Oh, what’s that? You didn’t know that only Xbox Live Gold members were able to use the new social networking aspects of the dashboard? Yeah, major fail, we agree.
We previewed the dashboard in a recent episode of Bleeding Edge TV, which you can check out at the top.
Xbox LIVE Fall Update: We’ll be previewing Facebook, Twitter, Zune 1080p for you on Monday
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Microsoft, Xbox 360, Xbox Live,
We just got word from our friends at Xbox LIVE that we’ll be getting the new Fall 2009 Dashboard Update on Monday, which means we’ll be bringing you a preview and walkthrough of all the upcoming Xbox 360 dashboard features, including Twitter, Facebook, Zune instant-on 1080p movies, Last.fm, and more. For a look at everything we’ll be bringing you on Monday, hit the jump. Now go enjoy your weekend!
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