I love how the notice is worded to suggest that fan sites and media sites are obligated by ESRB guidelines. They are not. The publishers are. The publishers are obligated to remove materials from the channel if they misrepresent the game's ratings. The media are under no such obligation.

Yeah, that's pretty embarrassing, I admit.

If MS wants to make any headway in Japan, here's how:

1. Get permission to publish the new Final Fantasy game for the 360 in Japan.
2. Bundle it with the console for half the price of Sony's FF/PS3
3. Profit.

Actually leave off the profit, since they'd certainly be taking a bath on a deal like that, but at least they'd have an installed base afterwards. Since the Xbox 1 they've learned that you can't sell a console without good games targeted at the market.

They still haven't learned that there's no point in having good games available unless there's a must-have game that entices people to buy your console in the first place.

Japanese consumers are more than willing to buy foreign products. Like any consumer from anywhere else, though, they need a reason, and so far the Xbox 360 hasn't given them one.

This video doesn't give them one. You can't sell people on a "lifestyle" for a product that isn't more than a speedbump on the landscape.

Frankly, that reads like... "XBLA customers want high quality products at low prices, and I'm just not interested in that."

In other words, if they could have just dropped the original game without any update onto the service, but charged more for it, that would have been fine?

"taken while Bungie's own Frankie was online playing the gold build of Halo 3"

Frankie already stated on NeoGAF that the build was for reviews, and was not final.

@21: Actually, his name is David Candland, and yes, he does UI work on Halo.

It's worth noting that what Bungie referred to as a "beta" was in fact an internal build. The "public beta" was actually a Delta, so the current build would very likely be Epsilon by that reckoning.

It's worth noting that this was after an ex-Bungie contractor did the same and posted the results in the HBO forum a few days ago:

http://carnage.bungie.org/haloforum/halo.forum.pl?read=791829

So, Peter Moore just redefines the term "first party" any way he likes?

As far as I understood, "first party" meant a title developed by a studio owned by the console manufacturer, which is usually also the publisher.

So Moore is saying third party is the new first party? What?

Dope? My dream game?

You guys do realize that having an entire thread populated by nothing but astroturfers is sort of pointless, don't you? There aren't any real people here at all except the thread-starter, and my reaction mirrors his.

I don't mind if, as an alternative revenue stream, ad placements work themselves into games in ways that seem reasonable and unobtrusive.

These aren't games. They're product placements masquerading as games. To charge for them at all is to ask me to pay a company to advertise to me.

It's ridiculous.

Gapati> Yes, there is XBLA for the original Xbox. That doesn't automatically mean these are compatible, but XBLA did exist before the 360.