Sale: Amazon drops Xbox Live price to $30

Make what you will of Sony's embryonic PlayStation Home, the PS3's online matchmaking service ultimately costs nothing, while Microsoft's Xbox Live equivalent reaches into your wallet and extracts $50 annually.

Sale: Amazon drops Xbox Live price to $30

Shouldn't online multiplayer be free?

It's all a bit strange, really, considering the Xbox's Windows-based sibling, Games For Windows Live, made the transition to "on the house" this summer.

Now Amazon's thrown a $20 curveball at the issue by discounting their Xbox 360 Live 12 Month Gold Card plus 1 Month Bonus card, making the new price just $29.97 -- a 40% markdown.

Temporary one-off vendor sale? Or harbinger of an official Microsoft price drop?

I've asked Microsoft why they won't zero out Xbox Live and personally argued for fee (or at least matchmaking fee) abandonment. The company's response is predictably elusive and generalist. "We're going to continue to deliver even more value to Xbox Live gold subscribers," said Microsoft Senior Global Director of Games For Windows Kevin Ungangst when I spoke with him this summer. "Frankly, Xbox Live members are going to get more people to play with as a result of the GFW Live announcement, and I think that community will get exponentially larger as a result of what we're doing on Windows. They're different services designed for difference audiences that happens to be connected and share a Gamertag."

Cut through the PR flak and the only notable difference is online matchmaking and multiplayer (sorry Netflix, you're a for-money service regardless of Live's cost). The rest, as they say, is noise.

$50 a year is a pittance to some, an unjustified expense to others. The arguments for or against line up accordingly.

Of course PCs offer the same online services and thousands more besides, just not tied up with a neat bow in a simplified format.

That said, is Amazon's $30 a deal? Sure. It's 40 points less than you had to pay 48 hours ago, and for online multiplayer aficionados, Xbox Live isn't optional.

But should online multiplayer cost so much as a dollar? I don't think so. And if Sony drops the price of the PS3 by $100 in April, as some are suggesting they might, don't be surprised if Microsoft's rejoinder involves finally goose-egging Xbox Live...or at least migrating the "online multiplayer" component into its freebie Xbox Live Silver membership column.

Source: PC World

Comments [20]

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codizzle587

ohh that would be nice free xbox live awesome and if sony does drop the price of the ps3 i will go out that day and pick it up :] i want one but they're too much money

eday_2010

mstrmrdr82 wrote:

can somebody tell me what the ftw means

Nothing important. It's a term man children with the maturity and brain capacity of 12-year-olds say.

Segaho182ed

mstrmrdr82 wrote:

can somebody tell me what the ftw means

F-word the world

307191
The12P

mstrmrdr82 wrote:

can somebody tell me what the ftw means

It means either: "f*ck the world" or "for the win", depending on who says it.

Back to the story, this is a great deal that I wish they would have started LAST month because I just renewed my subscription last week with a prepaid card

ddiddy415

HEY!!! This is great news for everyone. I'm a PS3 owner so of course I want more people to own a PS3....and like if the article says....if sony does do a price cut....than that might make microsoft zero out there "xbox Live" membership. Thats great news.....especially with the economy.

Bottomline....with the price cut....sony will have a monsterous year

htown4life

ddiddy415 wrote:

HEY!!! This is great news for everyone. I'm a PS3 owner so of course I want more people to own a PS3....and like if the article says....if sony does do a price cut....than that might make microsoft zero out there "xbox Live" membership. Thats great news.....especially with the economy.
Bottomline....with the price cut....sony will have a monsterous year

Sony been supposedly havin one of these for 3 years now
Good luck waitin

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