For the last several hours Microsoft has been holding my hand and walking me through a series of demos, the first of which was their entirely redesigned dashboard. The dash is barely recognizable, retaining just a few references to the initial design. I've described the biggest new features below.
-The Netflix integration looks fairly slick. As long as the movies you want to watch are in your instant watch queue (which you need to set on Netflix), you can instantly stream them at decent quality (Netflix adapts the quality of the stream depending on your connection speed). Friends in your “party” can also watch what you’re watching, assuming they also have Netflix.
-You will get an avatar, regardless of whether or not you want one, but you can choose to still be represented by your gamerpic (they aren’t just going to delete all the custom ones you have).
-Eight players are able to join together in a party. The idea of the party system roughly spawned as a result of the question, “Why should I ever lose connection with my friends?” So regardless of what you and your party friends are doing, you’ll be able to talk and join each other’s activities. Of course, everything is in your control, so if you’re tired of hearing your friends blabber over the movie you’re watching, you can shut them up.
-The “Primetime” section will include games like 1 vs. 100, which was announced at the press conference. In the case of 1 vs. 100, players will have to join at a certain time, and somehow one of them will become the “1” and 100 others will become “the 100.” Those who are not a part of these groups will be in the audience, and will still be able to participate and win prizes in some way. No word on what the prizes will be or any other details on how it will work.
-No search functionality is being announced at this time.
-The entire package launches this Fall.
Jul 16, 2008
