Great system, not so great support (Xbox Live)

Member Name: LastLine

Product:	Xbox Live
Date:	07/06/09 (8 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Smooth, well accessible online service.

Disadvantages: Costs money, no support for lost ID's.

Xbox Live is the name given to the online services for the Xbox and the Xbox 360.

It comes in two distinct flavours:
Silver - which allows downloads of most marketplace items, most game expansions, and most chat features, whilst also allowing you to hold a gamertag.
Gold - which opens up some premium downloads and allows online play whilst at the same time offering all the features of silver. The other difference is that gold membership costs either £5 a month or £40 for the year.

Silver membership is fairly standard and doesn't really feel like much. It's kind of equivalent to being able to sit on your computer and potter around at the internet. In my mind it doesn't really add much to your Xbox that shouldn't be there without a 'membership' so I won't go on about it, after all, it really is more formality than an actual membership.

The gamertag you create is your online ID, kind of like a forum ID, or your Dooyoo username. It's how you are known, and how people can find you online should they so wish. In addition it also keeps track of your gamerscore. Your gamerscore is a numerical scoring system that keeps track of all your achievements received within game. Y'know, things like turning on the console...inserting the disk...ok I jest, but it does keep track of things like 'Completed Act 1' or 'Killed General X with only 1 bullet' It's a silly scheme, but it's fun if you're into that sort of thing.

Gold membership as I said earlier allows online play. Now as this is a paid membership you have to cough up some of your hard earned cash to Microsoft. You can do this in a few ways, the main two being using prepaid cards bought at your favourite retailers, or by entering credit card information on the console. Either one's equally valid as Microsoft boast secure encryption and all the sort of stuff you'd expect from a normal online retailer so it's all perfectly safe. Once online with a gold membership you can start any game with online features up normally and go into a multiplayer game, or set one up yourself. Rather nicely you can use the friends features to either join a friend in game, in a cyber stalker esque manner, or to invite them to join yourself. I joke but it's a nice concept and saves you all spending hours trawling through chat rooms to find each other to start a game.

Microsoft require that you have a valid email account to pay for a gold account, which must of course be linked to your gamertag through your Windows Live ID. What is interesting is that using your gamertag for some bizarre reason, doesn't count as logging in with your Windows Live ID, so if, like us, you don't log in on your computer using your Windows Live ID for a year, you will lose the ability to purchase a gold membership and pay Microsoft your money. Poor you.

On the note of this gripe I did ring up MS Support and follow through all the steps they could suggest but apparently without the Live ID I cannot change the Live ID associated with my gamertag to a new one, thus allowing me to give them more money. They actually don't have a system in place for this, meaning that any downloads, saved games, anything like that you have - associated with an account with a lost Windows Live ID - is in the terms of the rep I spoke to 'Completely unrecoverable and useless' Sadly I feel Microsoft could do a lot better in this respect, I'd love to be able to pay them money and play online again against my wife but for some reason they don't want my precious English pounds. We can only hope that at some day they change this crazy policy and let us back in the Gold Club.

Summary: A great service, but it's a shame that Microsoft just don't seem to care.