Why Xbox Live is Worth the Price

[rover]

Just to keep it real: no one pays $50/year unless they want to or are functionally internet-shopping illiterate.

Anyone can *easily* find 12 months for ~$40, no tax, free shipping, which equates to 78 cents a week: ...three quarters and three pennies per week. (I don't know about you, but I tip more at Fatburger each week.)

A service like LIVE uses hundreds of servers scattered around the world; these cost money, so *someone* has to pay for them.

I would agree that we need more Gold-only features like 1v100, facebook and twitter (which are coming soon), but the biggest benefit XBox Live allows for online play (IMO) is:

reduced cheating.

Of course, there are going to be a-holes toggling their routers, but those things are known and devs are getting better at flagging this stuff.

Oh, how disappointing it was back in the day when I realized why Counter Strike wasn't fun any more: cheating.

XBox Live allows the ban hammer. G'bye cheater, g'bye modded box.

Please keep in mind, my comments aren't a slam on PSN, they are a comment on why I feel XBL is worth the money.

If the online play, 1v100, facebook/twitter aren't worth it, if you don't want to have access to the (excellent) Netflix streaming service, keep a silver account and do essentialy everything you want except those. Have friends, download demos, play your games and get achievements.