The games did work well over the network, and the setup of

how the whole Xbox Live system works is well done.   Xbox Live does have promise, but just seems to be

lacking in games for me.  For now,

I’d stick with MechAssault and look forward to Halo 2. 

But I think that’s all they have in their arsenal for now.

Microsoft were very gracious hosts, and even gave us a tour

of the whole Xbox Live server gig, the network “war room”. 

It was pretty cool seeing how it all would come together. 

I can’t really argue with their plan, at least they have one.

The

War Room

The

Xbox Live server room

When

you gotta go...you gotta go.

To break up some of the gameplay, we got a tour of Bungie

and got to look at some storyboards of Halo 2 and see where all the magic

happens.  Regardless of what system

you make games for, I always find developers fascinating.  Unfortunately, we didn’t get to see any of Halo 2 in

action.  Boo.

Inside Bungie

The sound studio

This makes Baby Mario cry a LOT!

At the end of the day, J Allard, Cameron Ferroni, and some other

people asked us what we thought of the whole thing, what people thought of the

Xbox, and what we would like to see in Xbox 2. 

I couldn’t believe what Xbox editors complained about most with the

system.  Surely you’d think that

system size or the monstrous controller would be the biggest issues. 

They complained that the top of the system wasn’t flat. That’s it. 

I almost threw up.

Cameron Ferroni and J Allard

The non-Xbox people (yes, I spoke up quite a bit) had quite

a few interesting suggestions for Xbox 2, even though Tycho from Penny Arcade

suggested blowjobs immediately (which I still think is a great idea). 

We brought up wireless, and immediately J and Cameron cracked some joke about

the Wave Bird.  I couldn’t believe

they had the audacity to rip on the Wave Bird. 

Outside of a lack of rumble, there’s absolutely not a bad thing about

it.  It works flawlessly! 

Since I had already spent about 20 minutes that day trying to untangle 2

corded controllers with Xbox Live headsets attached to them, I couldn’t

believe they didn’t like the idea.  Seems

like a no-brainer to me.   Finally,

issues of system size came about, and someone even suggested throwing a Tivo

type device in there.  Maybe a crazy

idea, but Microsoft does have Ultimate TV at their disposal, so making an

all-in-one set top box may be the way Xbox 2 is headed.