When I bought the 360, it came with a free month of Xbox Live Gold (a $7.99 value!), the tier of the Xbox Live service that lets you play online with other people. I didn’t make much use of it, quitting after a crappy round of Saints Row in which 2 on 2 became 2 on 1 when my teammate dropped out before the game started.
With that said, I decided to give it another shot with the supposed Gold exclusives coming up (demos that Silver members would get either later or not at all) and with my recent borrowing of Call of Duty 2. So far the single player in COD 2 is great; I’ve played all the way through the Russian campaign already. There are frustrating parts, yes, but they’re overshadowed by how good the game is.
So naturally I ventured into the online arena with my newly reacquired Gold status, and played a couple of quick games. The verdict? So far, I have yet to enjoy any of the online play that Live has to offer. My first game started poorly, with me getting sniped about 10 times in a row by the same person. Okay, chalk that up to my newness to this kind of play, but that still kind of seems like cheating. Continuing, our team ended up losing the match. Fine, whatever. Tried one more; this time it was Capture the Flag. Not my favorite, but I’ll give it a shot. 10 minutes go by and the final score is Allies 5, Axis (us) 0. Frustrating, but we put up a good fight, I suppose. Only it was futile; the final board showed that the Allies had 4 players to our 2… that explains a lot. After that I pretty much gave up. I really wanted to enjoy myself, but it’s not easy when you’re always, always outmatched.
Part of it probably owes to the fact that I’m really, really new to a game that has been out since the 360 launched a year ago. Maybe there’s an issue with the way Live sets up matches, but a lot of people seem to be happy with it. I think the heart of the problem lies in the fact that I end up playing with a bunch of strangers, which makes it hard to even enjoy being there. If this had been a game with a bunch of people I know, I don’t think it would’ve been nearly as frustrating.
The big drawback to that most of my friends are not gamers. I know one person with a 360 (it’s a start) but we don’t have any common games (yet – that could change with Call of Duty 3 and Gears of War). I guess when looking at Live as a socially-oriented gaming platform it would help to have gamers that I’m comfortable socializing with.
A couple other things popped into my head as I was writing this as well. I think I may just be frustrated by this genre of game; shooters and I don’t have a great history. Racing or something less intense may be a better fit for now. What I think I’d enjoy even more is more of a co-op, non-versus type of situation (like Halo’s campaign mode.
So I have another 3 months to figure this out, otherwise I guess I’ll revert back to a Silver membership.
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