Would be pretty sweet to DL games to your HDD from XBL...

I agree. Digital distribution would be sweet. I'm guessing brick and mortar retailers would object, though.

Gah. Can you imagine the server load of millions of gamers trying to download Halo 3 at release? Oh well. Deal with it Microsoft. Millions of people are paying you $50 a year. You ought to be able to meet the demand.

Steam's great for this. I like game? I just buy it and play it from Steam. No pre-orders or trips to the store. And the price is sometimes a lot of cheaper than the offline price.

$50 a year I doubt would cover the bandwidth for millions of H3 downloads. Even if it did, it certainly wouldn't cover the ill will caused when people's downloads failed.

I don't think "game store" there should be interpreted as direct downloads of full titles, but rather a way of browsing the marketplace. Although it would be nice.

I do have to say, though... that I find the whole thing terrible. That one avatar in the first screenshot says it all. I know it says "Lucklaster" but I keep reading it as "Lackluster" and that's what this interface looks like to me.

If I want a Wii, I'll buy one. And I probably will, at some point. MS doesn't need to start aping the interface-- they just need to perfect the one they have, which isn't the worst thing ever. This thing looks like the bastard child of Front Row and Family Circus.

Rampant for over seven years.

Online distribution seems inevitable any way you look at it. Steam has shown this distribution method to work effectively.

The bandwidth costs, in my estimation, aren't a huge factor here. Of the top of my head, a company like Microsoft is looking at around $0.10 per gigabyte or less.

Plus, Microsoft Research has been working on P2P technology for years; which could significantly lower their per gig cost.

http://research.microsoft.com/camsys/avalanche/

Yeah, I know the "Games" menu isn't for downloading the actual game, but it'd be sweet if you could click CoD4 and "Download Full Game" was listed right above "Trailers" and "Gamerpics/Themes".

If you don't like the new interface, didn't MS say they'll still have the blades interface? I don't know how that would even work out.

You can keep using the blade UI if you like after the update.

I wish the 3D UI didn't look so "G" rated. But, that's what I'll use. The lack of advertising is one selling point for me; although I bet MS intentionally left out advertising on these screens.

I don't mind the advertising. They've helped me find new demos/videos that I didn't know about otherwise.

I also wish it looked a little more adult. I think one of the largest challenges the video game industry faces is the consistent non-spoken assumption that all video games are made for and ultimately will be played by children. That's why there's a double standard between gory/sexual movies and their video game counterparts. Whether it's M-rated or not people think it's made for a kid because it's a video game. This is not a step towards defeating that perception.

That's a mature outlook on the situation, Midnight. We also have the Wii to thank for continuing that false subconscious perception.

I think if the default view was the blade interface, it might help, thanks to the power of defaults. It would still be fun to tool around the new one, though.

Looks like you'll also be able to use themes in the 3D UI.

Looking a little better.

More pics from Major Nelson: http://www.flickr.com/photos/majornelson/sets/72157606205914939/

That is looking pretty snazzy! I can't wait for these updates!
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"Don't blow this, Gene!"

This does look pretty cool. i cant wait to be honest!

i agree on that it does look a little young, but i am glad about a change of dashboard. somethin new.

I agree w/ Narcogen. I'll stick w/ the Blade UI. The simpler, the better. To quote a pretty smart redneck: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." (OK, well perhaps not smart, but well-spoken, at least)

So why the change?

I could do without the Mii knockoffs, but I think the dashboard itself looks nice. In fact, it looks very simple, neat and clean to me.
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"Don't blow this, Gene!"

0N3 W0RD...lumberjackish

Am I the only one here who thinks the new dashboard looks extremely awful?

No you are not. I've run into a lot of people that think the UI looks bad.

Microsoft has said that the blade system is not going away. However, I have a feeling that you'll have to use the new dashboard UI to get to the blade system.

I don't like the blade system. It looks like something straight from the year 2000.

I don't like how the avatars in the example screenshots look so cartoonish. I think it would be cool if an avatar could look more real or look more like in game characters (like a Brute or a Locust or MC, etc.).

I think if you take away that cartoony looking avatar from the screenshots you'll have a nice looking UI.

In fact, I believe Microsoft is trying to sync the XBOX 360 UI to resemble the UI for Windows Media Center and the Zune. Both WMC and the Zune have scrolling text-based menus that lead you deeper into the UI. And that's not so bad. Several major publications have said that the Zune UI is better than the iPod UI. I agree.

How cool would it be to use something like Tony Hawk's character creator to make an avatar for your 360? That way it'd be a lot more mature-looking, and game devs would be able to release clothes for a small fee to allow you dress up your character with more cool clothes.

have we got a date on this new GI yet?

XBL ads promise the Netflix integration in "late fall." If we assume they're all coming at the same time (which may be incorrect) then I'd guess sometime in November. I think they'll push this before Holiday 08 to help 360 sales.

Fall 06 update was October 21
Fall 07 update was December 4

Also, we didn't get a Spring update this year.

Hrmm.

"Avatars will be restricted for use only in titles rated E10+ and lower by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board, Microsoft has revealed" to Shacknews: http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/54032

I'm still skeptical of this whole new dashboard. What was wrong with the blades? I like the blades.

I think rap's idea of having in-game characters as your avatar would sway my opinion completely, and probably many others' opinions. What if I could use a Bioshock Big Daddy or little sister as my avatar? What about SgtMaj Johnson from Halo? Games could include a handful of avatars relevant to the game along with your purchase of the software, and you could purchase avatars ala carte through XBLM.

At the risk of being repetitive, the cartoony avatars look too much like Nintendo Miis and don't fit well with the 20-30 something age of many gamers.

I feel Microsoft's just trying to hit the market where the money is, not necessarily where their audience is.

If anything they are targeting women and children with these stupid avatars. I know that my woman loves to play games where you can change "outfits" like the ssx series, one of the only games I can get her to play with me and she is quite good at it.

I think this is a bold move by Microsoft, but then again it's not going to hurt the sales at all. It will just cause massive trolling and nothing more. The in-game characters would have been a better approach.

Just as long as I have the option to stick w/ the current Blade UI, and avoid these Mii avatars altogether, I'll be happy.

Agreed, Josh. Well said.

Video of the new dasboard working with GTAIV being installed to hdd.

Cool, looks slick.