makingmusic476 said:
MonstaMack said:
Um... you can play FF11 Online with just a silver membership. Not seeing with the issue is here unless MS all of a sudden wants gold membership to play the new FF online. Either way could care less since It's a MMORPG, and right now the new KOTOR MMORPG is the only game that has a chance against WOW.
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All games now require XBL Gold for online play, MMOs are not. FFXI remains the only exception to this rule. On top of the Live fees, I believe Microsoft also wants portion of the MMO subscription fee as well, but I'm not 100% sure on that.
Thus far Capcom are the only company that have been willing to agree to their terms. They've even gone so far as to create a special bundle for the 360 version of Monster Hunter Freedom Online, one that includes a year subscription for both the game and XBL for one fee. Aside from that, every other MMO that has been announced for the 360 has never actually managed to be released. Age of Conan silently disappeared, while Champions Online was straight up canceled, depsite the fact that the game was up and running just fine on 360 hardware. Even Final Fantasy XIV was anounced for 360 initially. It was actually PC/360 only.
Microsoft also imposes limitations on the number and size of patches and other free content, something that affects MMOs moreso than most other genres. The effect of this policy has been thus far been most apparent in Valve's titles. The 360 version of Team Fortress 2 hasn't been updated since release, despite the PC version having recieved patchs and updates on a near monthly basis, and "The Passing" downloadable content for Left 4 Dead 2 was released for free on Steam while Valve were forced to charge for it on XBL.
In contrast, Sony is allowing Valve to integrate Steamworks into the ps3 version of Portal 2, allowing it to be updated day and date with the PC version, keeping the two on par with each other at all times. This will even allow for cross platform play between the two versions, while the 360 version will be excluded.
The strict policies of Live do have their benefits, but on the whole I think they can be too limiting when it comes to fostering the availability of content compared to PC/PSN.
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