Dead to Rights, flat online pricing, and a message to Sony and Nintendo.
Under a flurry of green lights and dry-ice induced smoke, Microsoft Corp. held its pre-E3 Expo press conference earlier today. Free popcorn and alcohol topped off the evening.
This year’s Microsoft Pre-show focused specifically on two areas of the Xbox: developer support and online gaming.
Robbie Bach, the Xbox’s chief evangelist, kicked things off by noting that five Xbox titles have sold over half a million copies, while another 20 games have moved over 100,000 units. Bach went on to add that Microsoft expects there to be over 200 Xbox games on the shelves by the holiday season.
Ed Fries took the stage next and unveiled a quite impressive list of games headed towards the Xbox, including notables such as: Blinx: The Time Sweeper, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Panzer Dragoon Orta, Ninja-Gaiden, Shenmue II, Dead to Rights, Crazy Taxi 3 and Project Ego. All in all, Fries estimated that there are currently 300 games in development for the Xbox. The trailer video stunned the crowd, it was visuall pleasing and very entertaining to watch.
Next, Microsoft's J Allard, sporting dyed blonde hair, introduced the online component for the Xbox, dubbed Xbox Live. The service will support broadband users only, and will charge a subscriber fee. Microsoft will introduce a handy bundle for those who want to play online, the Xbox Live Starter Kit. The kit will contain the system’s voice headset, as well as a year’s subscription to Xbox online gaming and will retail for $49.95. That includes 12 free months of serevice, and all that you need to play online games.
Xbox Live will kick off beta testing next week and is scheduled for a joint launch in America, Japan and Europe this fall. Titles announced as in development for Xbox Live include: a new Halo game, Unreal Championship, Phantasy Star Online, Midtown Madness 3 and a Counter-Strike game from Valve Software.
