Games for Windows Live goes free

by Xav de Matos { Jul 23rd 2008 at 1:15PM }

This topic sure to be a hotbed of commenting action. Yesterday Microsoft announced that Games for Windows Live, the PC-based equivalent of the Xbox Live service, has changed to a completely free business model. After a lukewarm launch against PC service powerhouse Steam the Games for Live service has ended the Gold/Silver distinction for PC gamers that Xbox Live subscribers are subjected to. Changing to a free model means gamers can compete in cross-platform gaming (where applicable) at no additional charge. The question now remains, does this move signify a a change that must be made to the Xbox Live structure or are the services two completely different beasts. Consider, only a handful of games and features exist on the PC side of Live and with strong competition from other free services it's a move Microsoft had no choice but to make to survive. So, what are your thoughts on Games for Windows Live going free?

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in. Via Engadget]

Tags: games-for-windows, games-for-windows-live, gfw, gfwlive, live, pc-gaming

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Vcize @ Jul 23rd 2008 1:20PM

I really wish GFWL would have caught on. The lack of an XBL interface across ALL games (not just steam games, etc) is one of the things that drove me away from PC gaming in the first place. Unlike on the 360 though, MS can't force games to support it, so it's probably never going to catch on.

And before it's brought up...

XBL on the PC: huge failure
XBL on the 360: huge success

XBL on the 360 is not going to go free in the wake of this.

sifer2400 @ Jul 23rd 2008 1:24PM

i agree 100%

joey @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:16PM

the only way for MS to make Xbox Live free is if SONY and NINTENDO have comparable and free service.

xenocidic @ Jul 24th 2008 11:04AM

maybe if they had done this back when shadowrun launched, the game wouldn't have died such a horrible death

todd @ Jul 23rd 2008 1:25PM

Where's the Uno? I was going to buy it but don't see it.

chenry @ Jul 23rd 2008 1:28PM

I wouldn't expect XBL to go free; it's a much more expensive system to run I'd imagine. Moreover, XBL has been nothing but a success. MS needs to get the ball rolling for GfWL before it can consider charging. There aren't enough games and not enough incentive to bother paying for the service either. Plenty of alternatives to GfWL when you have a PC.

Captive audience, I guess is what I'm saying.

I wouldn't mind a price break though.

MDJ2010 @ Jul 23rd 2008 1:51PM

Can't see it going free on the 360, and to be honest I think anyone who would complain is a bit cheap, it's more than worth the money.

Tim Emmerling @ Jul 23rd 2008 1:55PM

I hate paying for the service. The WII service is free. The PS3 service is free. Somehow, they think they can jack us for the $50/year and we still end up paying for it, willingly and for many, gladly. I'd love to see them make this service free, or knock down the cost by about 80%.

James @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:09PM

The thing is that XBL is a very, very good service, as opposed to the service that the Wii offers (nonexistant) or what the PS3 offers (not integrated enough) and I'm very willing to support Microsoft if they continue to keep XBL going and improving upon its already great features.

Mr.U2 @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:31PM

Tim: James definately has a point. The 360 has the best service, and Microsoft is seemingly a lot more dedicated to their console than either Wii or PS3. And seriously, its only $0.14 a day. Who wouldn't gladly pay that for an awesome service?

David @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:38PM

I agree with Mr U2. I got a 13+1 month card from Buy.com for 38.99 a bit ago and that works out to $3 a month. That's a great price for the friends list, game support, and the time I've spent gaming online with friends local or not.

Have you ever spent a couple hours gaming with friends on CoD4? Then turned around and tried to game with friends on Mario Kart? Which one did you think was worth $3 a month (or $0.004 cents an hour if you use a 30 day month).

It probably cost's more to have the system powered on and running a game that to subscribe to live.

Now broadband internet, that should be either free or less than what the cable company charges for it. How come everyone comes down on $50 a year (or 13 months actually) for Live when broadband is $50 a month?

dUb @ Jul 23rd 2008 6:24PM

I really don't want to question anybody's economic status, but Live is like $4 bucks and some change a month. Come on kid it's well worth the price.

Mark @ Jul 23rd 2008 6:20PM

"what the PS3 offers (not integrated enough) "

Back on the Xbox, XBL wasn't integrated in to everything and it still cost the same. So, the value went up, but PS3 is launching what Xbox 1 had at a cheaper price than it had it.

I know that $50 / year to play online isn't a big deal, but I guess the question comes up if we have to pay for it anymore. With XBLA, DLC and video marketplace making so much money, do we need to pay this fee to play online? I think the infrastructure and development costs are being covered by the money made on those other things.

James @ Jul 23rd 2008 7:54PM

Yeah, I know the PS3 was offering what the Xbox 1 had for free, but you should reread what you just wrote.

First off XBL on the original Xbox was a new service. Of course it wasn't integrated well, Microsoft had much to learn and eventually did learn after years of the service on the Xbox. They took feedback and turned it into what became XBL on the 360.

Secondly, the fact that the PS3 is offering what the original Xbox had for an online service is nice, but the PS3 should have improved (and I will admit, its getting better) much, much more than what it arrived with. It was a much better service than the PS2, but why are you trying to prove a point by comparing a current-gen service to a service from last gen?

XBL on the 360 is worth it and I don't see any other service quite reaching the quality of it right now. That justifies the price for me.

Anticrawl @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:03PM

Live is only $28 dollars total a year if you are an informed consumer, I can live with that, not a big deal. Online gaming on my PS3 and Wii is lackluster. Glad they made Windows Live online service free, now it's time to go pick up a copy of Shadowrun for my PC and get that last achievement, didn't matter though because I already have a live membership and it would have been included regardless.

JAKEJAX @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:23PM

Please inform me on how I can get Live for $28 a year.

Rodney Jr. @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:30PM

Dont you mean $50 per year (or $50 for 13 months, depending on whether you bought a 12mth+1 card)?

Anticrawl @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:50PM

If you frequent slickdeals, cheapassgamer or the internet you should be able to find out where. The easiest way is to use google checkout with one of the many online retailers that sell the 13 month card for 38-39 dollars.

Anticrawl @ Jul 23rd 2008 3:05PM

Also if you don't like shopping online you can keep an eye on the limited video game 13 month cards which occasionally go on sale at Target for 30-40 bucks depending on how well they are selling.

Anticrawl @ Jul 23rd 2008 3:10PM

I bought a couple from buy.com when they still had their 38 dollar 13 month card deal, which you combined with the 10 dollar new user google checkout deal to drop it to 28. Just need more than one bank account or payment method and you could get a few of them for 28. I stocked up a while ago when they were on sale at a different site for less than 30 dollar shipped.

Vcize @ Jul 23rd 2008 6:17PM

Indeed, the sub-$30 deals for a 12+1 Live card pop up a couple times a year. As Anticrawl mentioned, with google checkout you can get it for $28 right now, and a few months back Dell.com had them for $25 and I loaded up on several years worth at that point.

webster1990 @ Jul 23rd 2008 8:05PM

I live in the UK and it costs £40 a year, i don't quite understand why we are getting charged more for the same service (minus a lot of videos and free content).

The reason i don't think it will go free (and why i am surprised the PC version has) is that anyone that has recently paid for a full year of XBL will be pissed if it goes for free all of a sudden unless MS were to refund them in the form of mspoints or otherwise.

JAKEJAX @ Jul 25th 2008 8:43AM

Cool thanks! I always were skeptical about the online deals. I figured they were to good to be true.

Aero @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:22PM

The main reason GFWL is going so badly is because it's built into the games. They really should have made the Dash interface a program like Steam, then just have some games support it with achievements/gamerpics etc. For example, if they ever do a Live Arcade over it and I wanted to buy one of those games, does that mean I would have to buy a GFWL game just to get access to the dash to buy that arcade game?

Rodney Jr. @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:26PM

In my opinion, GFWL was/is only going downhill because unlike the Xbox 360 and it's exclusive use of Xbox Live, PC gamers have a choice of how to do online gaming, Whereas 360 owners only have one choice--"Pay up or Shut up (stay offline)".

halongw77 @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:29PM

You fanboys need to quit mentioning PS3 and Wii's online service because they both have a crappy service. If PS3 and Wii had a system like Live I'd be more than happy to pay $50 a year and I'm sure the PS3Fanboys™ and WiiFanboys™ wouldn't mind either. As for GFWL I don't really care because I had Xbox Live to begin with.

Rodney Jr. @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:33PM

I have to agree with you on that, besides the fact that i've always loved Microsoft products (Officially making me one of those fanboys), i too had Xbox Live originally and have no problem for paying for the services they (Microsoft) offers.

Reaper0fanguish @ Jul 23rd 2008 2:56PM

"The question now remains, does this move signify a a change that must be made to the Xbox Live structure or are the services two completely different breasts."

Merehorseplay @ Jul 23rd 2008 3:39PM

I think gasoline @ $4 or $5 buck a gallon is a good deal if you compare it with the alternative. To those who love to pay for Xbox live service, Keep it to yourself (A holes). those who don't love it would like a louder voice on it being free.

monkeywithnoeyes @ Jul 23rd 2008 3:47PM

ofcourse xbox live should be free.. its silly to say otherwise. And the fact that a charged service for something that doesnt warrent a charge wasnt accepted on the pc because there was a choice of alternatives that offered the same quality experience shows us just what mugs we are to accept it on the 360 without question.

Mindless fanboys will defend xbox live till the end and down play psn having never actually sampled it. Whilst its true that many games have teething problems with multiplayer on psn, these problems are just that.. they do get resolved quickly. Now if you take each consoles most popular online game COD4 you will find that the only thing that seperates them in terms of a quality experience isnt lag but constant inturruptions of "host has left game". I can garentee that this can be observed within 30mins of game time on each... and the unknowing observer would be hard to guess that the one with the game inturruptions would be the paying service.

The worse thing about xbox live is how its marketed, and left a misconseption, that its optional. When the only option is if you wish to experience the full value of a game that you've paid for you HAVE TO pay an additional price. It should never be a privilege to experience 100% of what is yours.. its should be a RIGHT. And the fact is that if you dont pay that addional fee then you're being charged the same as the competitors charge for something that is of less value.

So then we move on to the arguement of service.. how having a primium service equals a better one. You'd think.. yet let us not forget how microsoft messed up christmas last year, the most important time of the year, the time where people get the chance to see where their yearly fee goes to the most..and it was down completely for FIVE DAYS. No other paying subscription service would have you wait 5days.

P2P gaming favours the americans alone. Microsoft takes no other country (bar japan) into consideration. If it did then it would enforce an optional regional filter to be applied to all games. I'm in the UK, i sample lag free games up till 5pm simple because those games are hosted from the uk.. Come 5pm though the americans take over and will host all games leaving us with a lesser quality. And also destroying any sense of community leading to constant bickering a racial slurs being passed back and fourth between british and americans. A optional regional filter would be easy to implement and offer much better quality for our money.

Speaking of money..all this wouldnt be so bad if the UK wasnt charged TWICE as much by microsoft for xbox live. And then charged more for gamer pics, themes, map packs, movies, and anything else you car to mention.. again for a lesser service. We dont get TV, we wont get Netfix, and we dont even get some demo's released at the same time (we've still yet to see tales of vesperia). Yet we get get charged more for the service, a p2p service.

Yet we settle for it without question..simply because there are no other options there to make our investments have 100% value. The only options are move to a platform like the ps3 who's online is ever evolving. But then i dont stick with the 360 for a love of Microsoft, or any sort of loyality to them. I stick with it because of the games. And denieing myself those games or paying an addional yearly charge is little choice, or option.

SHADO1980 @ Jul 23rd 2008 4:06PM

Nintendo and Sony have free services for their consoles. Why not Microsoft? For some things I can see charging, but to participate in online multiplayer - I don't think so. The games cost enough without tacking on a service fee to use all the functionality of the software.

puhssy liquors @ Jul 23rd 2008 4:24PM

I heard that Xbox Live would be free as well, starting with the new dashboard update. Things like Avatar games (1 vs 100), Netflix, parties, etc. would be "Premium Services" you had to pay to get on Live. Here's the link:

http://xboxfocus.com/columns/31-running-riot/587-xbox-live-price-now-justified/index.html

Mark @ Jul 23rd 2008 6:28PM

No, that's not what he was saying in the article. He's saying that he can think of the things that are free on other platforms as free on XBL and that he's now paying for the new features.

pekosROB @ Jul 23rd 2008 5:23PM

I definitely agree that people who complain about $50 a year are cheap! I used to think games should be free back in the days of playing people online in Madden or NCAA on my PS2. But man the connection and play SUCKED. Granted you didn't have to hear 12 year old kids screaming in high pitched sounds on the mics...

Anyway XBL is an excellent service that provides updates to consoles as well as DLC that updates games with just the push of a button. Quit complaining about paying and suck it up! Maybe hunt for some coins under your couch to pay?

Anton @ Jul 23rd 2008 6:49PM

Actually - Live can be free - I've gone the past year without paying for it, every second game I buy comes with a bonus month, or 2 month card - they quickly add up :)

Clinton oxendine @ Jul 23rd 2008 7:48PM

what games do you buy because the only game i got free xbl for was halo 3 and that was a big 2 days wow. thanks Microsoft and the only thing you could play was the social matchs

fromat @ Jul 24th 2008 7:47AM

i live in the uk too so it is effectively $80 a year for XBL.

i occassionally like to play online but only very occassionally, i.e. once or twice a month. as a busy family man most my gaming time goes on completing the games offline rather than playing with others.

i don't mind paying but there isn't a pay as you play alternative to a whole months subscription so i end up buying 48hr passes off ebay for pence.

i'm not being cheap, i just don't want to waste money on something that i only use rarely.

good call for PC owners...it needs to be able to compete. XBL is streets ahead of PS3 and Wii so charges still seem fair by comparison.

tfd655321 @ Jul 24th 2008 10:59AM

This seems to have made it possible to play the 360 version of Shadowrun playable online with a xbox live silver account. I got into a match this morning. And since Shadowrun is now a bargain bin game that silver accounts can play maybe it will finally get the legs it truly deserves.