poppabk said:

"8) GFWL offers unparalleled online interaction. No matter what day of the week, you will find thousands of users from around the world in our support forums. Add people with the same problem as you to your friends list and then head over to www.xbox360isthebest.com where you can chat with your friends and get help with all your Microsoft Xbox 360 related questions, purchase 360 accessories and find out all the latest 360 news"

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Stumpokapow said:

Girlfriend bought Where's Waldo. I can't play it on the same computer she bought it on. I have no idea if this is by design or by defect.

Girlfriend boots up 360 while I'm playing RE5 on GFWL. Oops, signed out, because my tag was set to auto sign-in on 360. The reasoning behind this (prevent account sharers or frauds or whatever) is truly irrelevant to me. It negatively impacts me, so I don't like it.

Patching system is horrendous. With Steam, it auto-detects game patches and downloads them for me. With GFWL, I start the game, login with my gamertag. At this point it's probably been 30-45+ seconds. Oh, wait, game has a patch. Okay, let's patch it. Boom, game boots me out, and downloads and installs the patch. Okay, time to launch the game again. Oh wait, I have to sign in again.

But also, even if GFWL was exactly on par with Steam, why would I use it? I'm already running Steam 24/7. It has the same social functionality. It has achievements. If I wanted to "prevent Steam from gaining a monopoly", wouldn't I be rooting for the little guys, not Redmond, Washington?

And it's not on par. The selection is terrible, they don't have the truly epic sales the other guys have, they don't have any developer outreach in the indie community (with their only indie support being games that are on every other platforms). Efforts to improve the selection would mostly boil down to offering to sell me copies of games that I've already bought on other platforms, and efforts to secure better selection for the future will basically be the same.

Which is another thing. MS needs to stop being so schizophrenic with everything they do. Windows Phone 6.5. No, wait, Windows 7 but we'll still do 6.5. Here's the Kin! The Kin is cancelled! The Zune isn't cancelled but it's clearly not being supported. PC gaming is old, let's fire most of the GFW team, ignore the system for a year or more, and stop porting our games. Wait, now we like PC gaming, how come we don't have a foothold. The browser war is over, time to dismantle IE's team. Oh, no, now people don't use our outrageously shitty browser and developers hate us, I guess we'll set up the IE team again. Outside of MS's most very core products, their reliability for continued support is 0. I would trust some third-tier service like Greenhouse Games over GFW. The problem isn't that I doubt the sincerity of this change in direction, the problem is that I doubt there won't be another change in direction 12-18 months from now.

You say you want arguments for why GFW sucks besides "MS sucks, GFW sucks", but half the arguments for using GFW boil down to "It's Microsoft! And you can talk to your Microsoft friends! And use Microsoft achievements! How are those things better than anyone else's implementation? They're from Microsoft!"

When you say "Mindless rabble when get us nowhere", I disagree. Mindless rabble has worked spectacularly so far. I'm very happy with PC gaming. I'm very happy with Steam. I'm very happy that developers are increasingly abandoning GFWL. Mindless rabble has created an absolutely excellent situation right now. Ignoring the mindless rabble has gotten MS nowhere. Tough break, guys.

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1-D_FTW said:

That's actually kind of funny.

Wait. You didn't link, but that's a serious list? Almost reads like it is, but it's funny for all the wrong reasons. Sound like it should be #8 on a sarcastic list.

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Update: Epic Games has confirmed to Big Download that the PC port of Bulletstorm is indeed a Games For Windows Live title.

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Ogs said:

Only place i could think of to post this -

Bulletstorm PC to use GFWL

http://www.gamestop.com/common/images/lbox/640157b.jpg

Trailer on Gametrailers also shows the GFWL logo on it, and BigDownload are saying Epic confirmed its used for the PC version.

http://news.bigdownload.com/2010/12...-edition-revealed-games-for-windows-live-sup/

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azentium said:

Why not make a new thread?

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Vaporak said:

Brainstew, something I'd bring up as a problem that I didn't see in your list is the locking of save files, connected to just general log in stability. When I was playing Dawn of War 2, every now and then GFWL would have sign in errors that no one in the community or developers could figure out. Not only was this locking me out from using the GFWL powered online system in Dow2, which was actually up and running, it also prevented me from playing the single player as well because of the locked savegames. The online portion is understandable, but preventing single player? Simply unacceptable, and makes me glad Relic is ditching GFWL for the next Dow2 expansion. Even just in principle, locking saves to online accounts just reeks of the exact control issues that makes people wary of Digital Distribution / DRM in the first place. At the very least they could offer Cloud Saving if they must keep the savegame locks.

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brain_stew said:

Why would I finally have that attitude now when there's been more progress made in the last few months than the last few years?

I'm not denying the base product was horrendous, but exclusive IP, a much improved store, new login credentials, better DRM than Steam and improved voice chat are all steps in the right direction.

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mrpeabody said:

4) On the right-hand side, write everything that MS can do better than Valve. PC-to-360 friends chat and voice chat. A rich mobile client (for iPhone and Android as well as WP7). Avatar support. An Indie Games Channel. Game Room. Buy it on either platform, play it on both for every game that supports it. Support to help XBLA devs port their games to PC. Design the Xbox 3 SDK and the hardware itself around cross-platform development.

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mrpeabody said:

They won both of those battles, and they can have this if they choose to. They have the PC background, the gaming background, and the deep pockets to make it work. But they have to want it.

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The Kin project was first known by the codename 'Project Pink', and began under direction of Microsoft executive J Allard. In order to gain a head start, Microsoft acquired Danger Incorporated in 2008 for a purchase price rumored to be around $500 million (USD). In September 2009, a ZDNet source reported that Project Pink would bring an entirely new software stack and services. Some reports predicted that the new mobile phone platform would be based on the Zune media device.

Kin was developed inside Microsoft's Premium Mobile Experiences (PMX) division by a group that included employees from Danger Inc.. Handset manufacturers and network carriers were said to be initially enthusiastic about Kin, and vying with each other to be involved with the project.

According to the Engadget publication, there was jealousy and rivalry in Microsoft's executive ranks, and Windows Phone Senior Vice President Andy Lees managed to wrestle control of the Kin project away from J Allard, and move it under his Windows Phone division. Danger Incorporated's 'Sidekick' phone, which was the predecessor of Kin, was based on the Java programming language, but Engadget says that Andy Lees wanted Kin to run on an in-house Microsoft operating system. Microsoft planned to base Kin on Windows Phone 7. Due to delays with Windows Phone 7, however, Kin instead had to be based directly upon Windows CE.

Engadget claims that Andy Lees lacked enthusiasm for the Kin project. Nonetheless, Microsoft spent a further two years developing the Kin until its release in 2010.

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brotkasten said:

People should stop with the 'Microsoft hates PC gaming' and 'Microsoft doesn't want this and that and they're too stupid'. There's no one big evil Microsoft, just like there's no one big GAF hive mind.

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