Just get xbox live silver and you'l be fine with stuff like leaderboards as seen on Ninja Gaiden 2.
Personally i would use the 360 for online gaming first but you obviosly don't want to pay for gold which is fair enough, but you do get a free months subscription so you will get a chance to check it out.
So basically, you will be fine without online gaming on the 360 as there are lots of single player games such as Mass Effect, Ninja Gaiden 2, Bioshock, Viva Pinata and so on. But you will definately be missing out if your friends have xbox live too.








