Xbox Live Performance Thread (1 Viewer)

[Joe Szott]

If you are one of the lucky bast'rds to get Xbox Live in Beta, what are you're impressions of the performance and features? Don't know if you guys are under an NDA or not, just want to know how good the lag and communicator systems are in your experience.

 

[Dave Falasco]

I just got started two days ago, but so far so great. I have played mostly NFL2K3, and the only thing I have noticed is that every so often the screen will freeze for a second or two when selecting plays. Other than that, it was very smooth. Voice doesn't lag either. The early impressions I had read indicated that voice would lag a bit once in a while, but I have yet to experience that.

The biggest problem I have is getting the wire from the communicator tangled up with the controller cord. Oh, that and my wife saying "Time Life, how can I help you?" every time she sees me wearing the headset. :b

 

[Scott "E"]

I've had nothing but good experiences so far. I've played every game available and some are better than others as far as features go. Moto GP is by far the most impressive, but that doesn't mean the others are bad. The biggest plus about Moto GP is the fact that you can join a race that has already started. It turns out the way that the stats are tracked is by lap time, not what place you finish in. This is great for the Optimatch setting, as you can be matched up with others in your experience level and not get thrown to the veterans right away, very nice touch IMO.
As far as the communicator goes, it really depends on the game. The only game I've had a problem with it is Moto GP and it's not really a problem as much as it is hard to understand 15 people talking at one time. This is only in the lobby (waiting area), once the race starts you are only able to talk to the riders closest to you. I'd like an option to pick who you are able to talk to during the race, but it's not that big of a deal since Moto GP does require a lot of concentration.

 

[hwshi]

with moto gp, xbox live just turned into crack,finished a very busy work week to come home to the new games and a new insta geek t-shirt.
let me tell you moto gp has aimed for the wall and gotten damn close.excellent graphics,16 racers(no lag!!!),and intuitive controls once you set them up properly,and i was worried about having 16 people blabbering in your ears stepping over each other, however once the game starts you are only able to talk to the person in front and behind you,excellent feature in my opinion!
i had a 7 hour marathon last night and i'm ready to go again this morning,have not had this much fun since halo.except now you can share the experience with your fellow racers.got to meet a lot of great people last night and added and joined a few freind lists.that is something i was surprised about with live, i was expecting a bunch of kids and instead have mostly found older hard core gamers you can talk with.although all that may change nov.15.
all i can say to people sitting on the fence about live,jump on down and join us.at first i was not to impressed (revolt/whatever,fever/football yawnball). but now with moto gp i can not wait to play again,bring on an excellent shooter and i'm set for winter.

 

[Dave Falasco]

After a 3 hours Moto Madness session last night, I fear my life will never be the same. I finally went to bed, couldn't fall asleep because I was still jazzed about playing, and when I did drop off I dreamt about Moto (I knew it was a dream because I finally finished first...). I'd say that was a memorable experience...
Hwshi, I looked for you in Moto last night but when I went to join your games I always got "session closed". Oh well, with the amount of time I am logging in this game, I'm sure we'll hook up soon.

 

[hwshi]

hey dave, i saw that you were on-line also last night.i was in rooms that were really fun and no-one was really dropping out as we were ranked in the room and getting along well.
i am also fully hooked and glad that it's miserable outside today so i won't feel guilty about playing.hoping the girlfriend doesn't want to veg in front of tv today.in any case i will be on late at night if not this afternoon.

 

[hwshi]

hey dave, sorry to have dropped out of your room last night but while you were still racing a bunch of guys got on with masks activated and drunk,couldn't deal.found another room and went to send you an invite but you were aff line at that point.

p.s. buck NICE driving!i'll be putting in some hours this week so that i can bring it.

 

[Scott "E"]

buck NICE driving!

Thanks, I noticed you're moving up in the rankings. I got your invite last night, but for some reason every time I tried to join it said the session was full, oh well I'm sure we'll have other opportunities. See ya online.

 

[RayKk]

I got my email from Xbox live on Oct 11, sent credit card stuff and got ups tracking # hope to be on line Tues 15th, its thanksgiving on Monday in Canada, the live gaming sounds allot of fun, I just hope there isn't much lag as I found it to be on many sites on PC.

 

[Elliott Willschick]

Ray be careful. You get about $40 CND in tax at the door for your Xbox live package. I wasn't home at the time but my bro nearly didn't accept it.

 

[RayKk]

Elliot, where you hit up with a $40.00 delivery charge or it the tax stuff included in that??

 

[Elliott Willschick]

It was $25 brokerage fee and the rest tax. Someone posted on this forum that they got a refund but they never replied when I asked how. Make sure you have lots of change available.

 

[Dave Falasco]

No prob, Hwshi. I actually didn't get to play as much as I had hoped, but the few races we did get to hook up in were fun (except for the drunk idiots). I saw that dvdguru (Steve B) was in on a few races as well...maybe we can get an all-home-theater race going one night.

Joe, we've kind of hijacked your thread here...sorry about that. I'll start a new one so that HTF members can coordinate their online gaming and we can keep yours for performance issues (as you intended).

 

[hwshi]

elliot,
that was me that posted about getting a refund.sorry that i didn't reply about how i got it. i had a mad work week and then finished the week with motogp in the mail, so all my free time has been spent racing.
i had gotten charged 41$ in brokerage fees and tax and was appalled at this surprise charge.i am still in the middle of getting my money back, someone had got in touch with me and i haven't had the chance to call them back(xbox live support).i will be doing that today and will let you know the outcome.
i believe all new live testers will not be charged as they are now aware of this issue with ups.i know my new disc and t-shirt came with no added charges
ray,
no problem with lag,had some with revolt. but i am no longer playing that p.o.s. it's all about moto gp and let me tell you 16players and not a blip.there has been the odd game where one bike is jumping around and that has been extremely rare. in about 20 hrs. of gameplay over the past few days it has happened maybe in 6 races.basically nada,and the host will usually kick off that player to join another room,in a friendly way .i've been in races were people are from all over including hawaii! and no problems,pretty amazing for beta if u ask me.
gentlemen of moto gp, i will also be on tonite as soon as my girlfriend gets to bed.she has to work early tomorrow morning .

 

[Dave Falasco]

I have had some miserable experiences with ReVolt as well. The game itself isn't that bad, but the loading times when starting the game and when joining a race are simply ridiculous. It took over 45 minutes for my friend and I to race three times against one another, and the races take under 3 minutes each. The rest of the time was spent dealing with lockups and waiting for screens to load. My experience with NFL2K3 and the glorious MotoGP have been flawless, but ReVolt is just unplayable. Too bad, because it's kind of a fun game.

 

[Elliott Willschick]

Thanks hwshi. I am looking forward to the outcome. I hate UPS and their brokerage fee. I use Fedex all the time.

 

[Dave E H]

I've only played Fever so far and it's been great. Finally won my first yesterday (I play as the Rams, and ironically they just won their first one too.) Fever's an OK game, but the online side as been really awesome.

 

[JohnE]

Man, I'm really jealous of all you rats that have this already!:wink:
Anyway, does anyone maybe have a list of what games will be available the first six months or so? I can only think of Unreal Championship, but that's because I can't wait for it.
I'm really looking forward to getting mine. I think I'm going to have to start practicing at NFL 2K3 though since I stink pretty bad at it right now.

 

[RayKk]

Ill be looking for you guys on line, will post tag when I get it, can we setup a private hometheater members race?

 

[StevenK]

How does XBox Live deal with people quitting games? This would be especially important in say NFL 2K3 or other 1 on 1 games? Does the dropper get punished like Blizzard's Battle.net?

I used to play Madden 2001 online (for the PC) and people kept on quitting on me (after 1 score by me and then holding the other to a punt usually). That drove me nuts!!!!