Xbox 360 Metro Dashboard
Last generation ask a gamer what the term firmware meant and you would probably get a blank stare. The way pretty much everything connects to the internet means the people behind things can send updates to their things over the internet.
Games consoles are no exception and in this generation in particular we are flooded with updates for games and the consoles themselves. The Xbox 360 in particular has had two big changes to its dashboard, the hub the controls access to every part of your system.
The most recent change has been made to match the tile system of the new windows phone. It’s a bit like the PS3’s XMB system but with big square tiles giving access to various different things for each category.
In one world it is Terrible. God awful, messy, horrible, and a complete disaster all go some way in describing Microsoft’s latest monster.
It has clearly been designed by the 360’s biggest mistake, Kinect, in mind. The only positive besides speed is that Kinect is integrated rather well. Voice commands generally work and even something like Halo Waypoint is easily recognised.
But that’s where the praise ends. Let’s start with the first new “blade”, Home. This is where your system starts. First off this should be in the middle of the “blades” for reasons which I’ll explain later, instead it is far too Left. You are greeted with a huge advert that takes most of your screen. What 9 times out of 10 you will actually want, play disc, is left at the side in a much smaller tile.
Having the quickplay option, where you can pick from the last ten games/apps you’ve used is a nice touch, but again completely overshadowed by the giant ad in the middle. This dashboard is basically an advertiser’s wet dream. There is a least one ad on every blade, it’s not surprising that people have gone out of their way to block the ads, they are far too intrusive.
Going back I mentioned that the home blade was far too left. The actual problem lies with where the games blade is. I feel a bit like Woody shouting at Buzz here, the Xbox 360 is a Games Console. First and foremost its priority should be games. Yet to get to the games blade you have to skip past Social, Video/TV and even Music.
I wouldn’t criticise this so much if it didn’t have such a simple solution. Move the home blade into the middle. Then to access games go left, video/TV and other media go right (or vice versa). But it seems Microsoft want the Xbox 360 to be a media hub, which is not going to happen. If I want to watch Sky I’ll watch it the proper way, through my Sky HD box.
The Games Marketplace is even worse. Once you’ve passed four blades to the games blade and select the option each individual category now has its own blade. When the NXE came out it had a wonderful new arrivals category. This listed all new arrivals regardless of category.
They then changed it slightly in the last update by categorising them but still having a little preview. This was so the vast number of new music game tracks (i.e. Rock Band) didn’t dominate one category. It would’ve been better to separate music game stuff from the rest, but this was still OK.
Now well let me go through the buttons you need to press in order to check all new Games, Demos, Add-ons and Trailers (what I check for everyday).
Old way (2nd Dash)
Up > Select Games Marketplace > New Arrivals
(3rd Dash)
Up > Select Games Marketplace > Select Arcade games* > Back* > Right > Select Games in Demand* > Back* > Right > Right > Select Demos* > Back* > Up > Select Add ons* > Back* > Right > Select Videos*
*Only if the three in the preview tile were all new.
(4th Dash – This one)
RB > RB > RB (to games blade) > Down > Select Games Marketplace > RB (to games) > Select New Arrivals > Back > RB (to add ons) > Select New Arrivals > Back > RB (to extras) > Right > Right > Right> Select Videos > Back > RB (to Demos) > Select New Arrivals.
Way too many button presses and not a preview in sight.
Another thing they pointlessly messed up is the new Social blade. This replaces My Friends and some of My Xbox. You get three options, Friends, Social apps and I forget the third. Then your avatar and a nice summary of your last twelve achievements. Then a preview of THREE of your friends.
To access your friends list you need to go into an additional option. In the last dashboard you only needed to go to My Friends. Since 90% of the time I have more than three friends online this preview is pointless.
Also in the old Friend list system parties were displayed first and then individuals. If something was going on it was the first thing you saw when you went to My Friends. Now to see if there are any parties you have to go into another option.
So it’s Friday night, after 9pm and in the past you have got into a party with your mates and played something online, probably Call of duty. Check out your friends list, see a party is going, you join and in the next game they invite you in. Simple.
Now you have to select the social blade, select friends, and then select parties to see if anything is going on. Needless additional steps that add nothing and take away so much. Considering the Xbox’s strength is Online and Party chat this is a step backwards.
I said in my prediction for the next generation that we would see apps becoming a big part of console gaming. I didn’t realise how soon as Microsoft have a new apps section. So far though they have all been centred on streaming video. You can now use Youtube (only if you’re gold though apparently, so paying for something which is free on PC), and Lovefilm.
Lovefilm isn’t anywhere near as good as it should be. Even though you can sign in to your account you can’t access your rental list, add titles to your rental list or select titles from the list to watch online. There’s no reason for this. You’ve signed into your account you should have access to your rental list and chose films to watch online from there.
So while there is a nice selection of movies you can watch, and you’ve already picked out your favourites, you can’t then use your list of favourites to choose what to watch. This is pointless and hopefully just an early teething problem with the new app.
So overall the dashboard brings with it very few benefits in exchange for making all the things that make the Xbox so good, Games, Friend List, Party chat and Marketplace all that little more awkward for no good reason. It’s a case of one step forward but five steps back.
Mind you I have yet to try the new Bing Search and Cloud save feature but I doubt I’ll use them that much.
If this wasn’t a mandatory update I’ll tell you all to avoid it like the plague but alas we’re all stuck with this mess.
Games consoles are no exception and in this generation in particular we are flooded with updates for games and the consoles themselves. The Xbox 360 in particular has had two big changes to its dashboard, the hub the controls access to every part of your system.
The most recent change has been made to match the tile system of the new windows phone. It’s a bit like the PS3’s XMB system but with big square tiles giving access to various different things for each category.
In one world it is Terrible. God awful, messy, horrible, and a complete disaster all go some way in describing Microsoft’s latest monster.
It has clearly been designed by the 360’s biggest mistake, Kinect, in mind. The only positive besides speed is that Kinect is integrated rather well. Voice commands generally work and even something like Halo Waypoint is easily recognised.
But that’s where the praise ends. Let’s start with the first new “blade”, Home. This is where your system starts. First off this should be in the middle of the “blades” for reasons which I’ll explain later, instead it is far too Left. You are greeted with a huge advert that takes most of your screen. What 9 times out of 10 you will actually want, play disc, is left at the side in a much smaller tile.
Having the quickplay option, where you can pick from the last ten games/apps you’ve used is a nice touch, but again completely overshadowed by the giant ad in the middle. This dashboard is basically an advertiser’s wet dream. There is a least one ad on every blade, it’s not surprising that people have gone out of their way to block the ads, they are far too intrusive.
Going back I mentioned that the home blade was far too left. The actual problem lies with where the games blade is. I feel a bit like Woody shouting at Buzz here, the Xbox 360 is a Games Console. First and foremost its priority should be games. Yet to get to the games blade you have to skip past Social, Video/TV and even Music.
I wouldn’t criticise this so much if it didn’t have such a simple solution. Move the home blade into the middle. Then to access games go left, video/TV and other media go right (or vice versa). But it seems Microsoft want the Xbox 360 to be a media hub, which is not going to happen. If I want to watch Sky I’ll watch it the proper way, through my Sky HD box.
The Games Marketplace is even worse. Once you’ve passed four blades to the games blade and select the option each individual category now has its own blade. When the NXE came out it had a wonderful new arrivals category. This listed all new arrivals regardless of category.
They then changed it slightly in the last update by categorising them but still having a little preview. This was so the vast number of new music game tracks (i.e. Rock Band) didn’t dominate one category. It would’ve been better to separate music game stuff from the rest, but this was still OK.
Now well let me go through the buttons you need to press in order to check all new Games, Demos, Add-ons and Trailers (what I check for everyday).
Old way (2nd Dash)
Up > Select Games Marketplace > New Arrivals
(3rd Dash)
Up > Select Games Marketplace > Select Arcade games* > Back* > Right > Select Games in Demand* > Back* > Right > Right > Select Demos* > Back* > Up > Select Add ons* > Back* > Right > Select Videos*
*Only if the three in the preview tile were all new.
(4th Dash – This one)
RB > RB > RB (to games blade) > Down > Select Games Marketplace > RB (to games) > Select New Arrivals > Back > RB (to add ons) > Select New Arrivals > Back > RB (to extras) > Right > Right > Right> Select Videos > Back > RB (to Demos) > Select New Arrivals.
Way too many button presses and not a preview in sight.
Another thing they pointlessly messed up is the new Social blade. This replaces My Friends and some of My Xbox. You get three options, Friends, Social apps and I forget the third. Then your avatar and a nice summary of your last twelve achievements. Then a preview of THREE of your friends.
To access your friends list you need to go into an additional option. In the last dashboard you only needed to go to My Friends. Since 90% of the time I have more than three friends online this preview is pointless.
Also in the old Friend list system parties were displayed first and then individuals. If something was going on it was the first thing you saw when you went to My Friends. Now to see if there are any parties you have to go into another option.
So it’s Friday night, after 9pm and in the past you have got into a party with your mates and played something online, probably Call of duty. Check out your friends list, see a party is going, you join and in the next game they invite you in. Simple.
Now you have to select the social blade, select friends, and then select parties to see if anything is going on. Needless additional steps that add nothing and take away so much. Considering the Xbox’s strength is Online and Party chat this is a step backwards.
I said in my prediction for the next generation that we would see apps becoming a big part of console gaming. I didn’t realise how soon as Microsoft have a new apps section. So far though they have all been centred on streaming video. You can now use Youtube (only if you’re gold though apparently, so paying for something which is free on PC), and Lovefilm.
Lovefilm isn’t anywhere near as good as it should be. Even though you can sign in to your account you can’t access your rental list, add titles to your rental list or select titles from the list to watch online. There’s no reason for this. You’ve signed into your account you should have access to your rental list and chose films to watch online from there.
So while there is a nice selection of movies you can watch, and you’ve already picked out your favourites, you can’t then use your list of favourites to choose what to watch. This is pointless and hopefully just an early teething problem with the new app.
So overall the dashboard brings with it very few benefits in exchange for making all the things that make the Xbox so good, Games, Friend List, Party chat and Marketplace all that little more awkward for no good reason. It’s a case of one step forward but five steps back.
Mind you I have yet to try the new Bing Search and Cloud save feature but I doubt I’ll use them that much.
If this wasn’t a mandatory update I’ll tell you all to avoid it like the plague but alas we’re all stuck with this mess.
posted by Master hunter at 1:08 pm
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home