Xbox 360 Dashboard Upgrade

[Taylor Hedgie]

This November the Fall Update will be comprised of a new Dashboard. Anyone wanna share their opinions?

I kinda look forward to the Avatar thing, just because they shoulda had one in place already.

[Weirdo94]

What they need to do is update the Marketplace with some goddang Vigilante 8 Arcade already.

I've been waiting forever for that game.

[Taylor Hedgie]

I wouldn't mind seeing something like PS is supposed to come out with SOME day, that Home thing, kinda like the Sims.

[Taylor Hedgie]

Yes I know this topic could be considered dead, but a rather large update is in store!

The new Xbox experience (NXE) came out this Wednesday and I shall put in my two cents. -digs through pocket-

Anywho, just as Microsoft promised, the download took 15 minutes. Only 13 minutes away from what they had originally promised! (2 Minutes). Yay Microsoft! Afterwards, you are greeted by thhe Avatars, which do look rather handsome. The only draw back is you don't really get to 'make' your own, but choose from a starting point. After that, you watch some snazzy vidya 'bout the NXE and whatnot. Ok, that's all cool right? Wrong.

I believe Microsoft said that the NXE would be easier to browse and faster performing. Both of which are lies. Take it from Weirdo94 here, his froze during the download! The dashboard is now full of huge windows that you must scroll through, which normally lags if you happen to go a bit too fast. To those of us who also use MSN on the 360, nothing has really changed, once you sign in your friends list freezes for about a minute as usual.
The friends window IS pretty neat-o, and the Party feature is a welcome change. And to those of us praying that you could use your dashboard while playing an Original Xbox game, keep praying.

Edit: Also, there is a whopping choice of THREE Avatar games. Woo-freakin'-hoo.

All in all I can sum it up like this:

If I wanted Windows Vista, I would have bought Windows Vista.

[Weirdo94]

Might I add that loading times seem to have increased, especially for playing music from the hard drive or an external device...

...it should not take a minute to read from an MP3 player AFTER getting an update intended to speed up the console, damnit.

Nice fail, M$.

[Quacker Duk]

I tried the Avatar system, and was very disappointed.

They tried to up the Mii by making them less generic-looking. That was a mistake, because the lack of detail on the Mii is why they "look" like the player. When they are all so vague, it just takes one good feature to match up with the person in question. The Microsoft Avatars look so specific and quasi-realistic, that I look at mine and say "Who is that guy? My hair doesn't look like that."

It's like how horoscopes work. If they were TOO specific on details, they wouldn't be accurate. However, they work on such generalizations, we SEE what we want to, and feel like they are referring specifically to us.