Cactus Game Design Message Boards

In short, no. If you don't play online games there is zero benefit to xbox live and at the price you are losing money.

These days, Xbox Live Gold has multiple media services, including Hulu+, Netflix, an ESPN app, and more.

This is what I need to know. There is an ESPN app. Fine, I get that. What I need to know is whether the app only works if you have an existing cable account, or if I can watch ESPN exclusively through the XBox. I know that for Netflix, I have to pay Netflix a monthly fee, even though I am streaming it through my Wii. Netflix does not come included. It only comes accessible. Is the same true for ESPN and MLB.tv?

You must get ESPN through your cable provider to use it on Xbox Live (at least to watch live games I believe). However, it still has lots of clips and stories updated daily even if you don't have ESPN. I do not know about MLB.tv. Same is true for Netflix and Hulu, you have to already have an account. I have both Netflix and Hulo on Xbox Live, and find it saves a tremendous amount of money in comparison to having cable. Especially for Hulu, it gets updated the next day when a new show hits. Does Wii have Hulu?

As far as the proposed promo, lets crunch some numbers. 4GB console with Kinect is $300. 1 year of Xbox Live is $60. With the promo, it would cost you $460 total. By purchasing separately, it would cost you $420. So the better deal is actually just buying everything normally.

If you need some additional persuasion for making your first Xbox 360 purchase, I will give you a year of Xbox Live for free.

Quote from: Chris on May 06, 2012, 11:42:05 PM

Quote from: lp670sv on May 06, 2012, 11:38:27 PM

In short, no. If you don't play online games there is zero benefit to xbox live and at the price you are losing money.

This is actually incorrect. These days, Xbox Live Gold has multiple media services, including Hulu+, Netflix, an ESPN app, and more. It was recently announced that people spend more time in the media apps than they do actually playing games. I'd encourage you to do some research and see if any of the apps appeal to you, because if they do, you'll likely get your money's worth. Plus, there are at least a few games that can be played online that are family friendly.

and all of those have an additional charge and are accessible without xbox at all so.....

Quite a few of them have no additional charge, and a lot of it is about accessibility and convenience. Coming from a home that had only one computer (and no cable) for years, having Netflix and Facebook on my Xbox was a godsend.