Xbox Live Gold price rise

[Anthony H]

So, Xbox Live Gold subs are going up in price. What do we all think of it? By the looks of the comments section of Major Nelsons blog, even Xbox die hards are finding it hard to justify Microsoft's move to up the bill. I can't believe the feedback will come as a surprise to Microsoft though, but is it justified, considering most (if not all) of Xbox Live's benefits can be accessed free elsewhere?

[Riff]

They're being pretty damn sneaky with that price hike being close to the Kinect's release. Maybe they're trying to snag a few more of those pastel shirt-wearing families into Live via new technology, and they'll make a few extra bucks on top of it.

Anyway, a price hike was inevitable. It's a successful service, and they're gonna milk it for all it's worth. It's just hard to take when MS won't be tossing anything extra our way for our extra $10. Oh well, that's capitalism for ya.

[Ian D]

Didn't know there was a thread about this already. I'm lazy so I'll just c&p what I posted on the site.

Count me among the annoyed. Not so much by the amount it has increased, just the sheer audacity of thinking that they could charge even more for a service which should be free.

If it isn’t scrapped I’ll be going down to silver by November. I was happy (relatively) paying monthly so I could quit whenever and can’t be bothered searching eBay or the like for a deal. If I want to play something online I’ll just get the PS3 version.

I actually sent Major Nelson an email about it (well, sent to him directly but by no means meant for him alone since he’s just the messenger here). He got back to me saying he’d pass what I said on to ‘the team’. I hope it wasn’t an automated responce, there was a spelling mistake and shorthand in it.

[Ian D]

Some friends managed to talk me into looking at the 3-monthly and yearly options rather than protesting via going down to silver.

If you look around on eBay you can find deals that equate to roughly £2.70 a month which is certainly better than the £5.99 they are trying to bleed from people come November.

What I don't get is why they are only raising the monthly price, there is clearly some angle or thinking here working behind the decision. Perhaps they want people to leap at the three month or yearly options so they get a sudden influx of capital to work with to fund Kinect when it inevitably fails at launch?

[Ian D]

Glad I held off a bit longer. They've got a deal running on the 360 right now in the spotlight bit for 12 months Gold and a terrible looking Halo: Reach Noble Six avatar item for £23.99, or £1.99 a month.

[KrazyFace]

Ian, that first post was LAZY! Hahahaha, anyway's I'm not a 360 owner (yet) but that's mainly coz I think MS are a bunch of penny pinchers! I read a while back that they wouldn't allow the BBC iPlayer on their system coz they couldn't charge for it!!! I mean, SERIOUSLY!? You're gonna hold back a service to your users because you can't charge them for it? *Ahem* I'm not trolling, honestly....

I was working out how much it cost for Plus last night, and if you break it up into monthly or even DAILY payments it dosen't seem all that bad, but then when I did the same thing with my house rent I suddenly felt that was quite cheap too!

I know you're probably thinking that I don't belong in this thread as I don't own a 360, but the truth is; it affects me too! I WAS going to get a new 360 slim when my girlfriend decided to re-new her mobile contract (then I'd get it for free) the other month, but when I started concidering how much extra just having it would cost me, I had to let it go. Even a with a FREE system, I'm put off by the idea that I'd be roped into paying for stuff my Wii, PC, PS3 gets for free. I know I don't HAVE to go online with it, but that's a bit like saying "Sure son, you can have this Ferrari for free... you just can't drive it out the garage!"

[Ian D]

I could have remixed what I said on the site but then people who liked the original would just complain and refuse to buy my new album. Wait...what?