Not more than three hours ago, Microsoft’s E3 2008 press conference ended to bated-breath from the crowds of press and journalists stuffed into one Californian exhibition hall. Substantial announcements were made and new footage was shown; Gears of War 2 gameplay, a Resident Evil 5 worldwide simultaneous release date, an expansion of Live’s on-demand video service, and of course, that epic Final Fantasy XIII announcement.
But the only element of this show that will likely affect all 360 gamers – regardless of genre-preferences, or frequency of play time – was the revelation of a entirely new dashboard system, centralised around a Mii-like “Avatar” which will replace the gamertag.
Of course, for many of us, this was less of a revelation and more of a confirmation; a surprisingly detailed report of everything demonstrated in the interface today was leaked by a survey company earlier in the month, leaving some to judge the implications of such a bold change for a while.
Well, it’s definitely arriving in October in a big way, with all signs pointing to it superseding the current “Blade” design completely, which by that point 360-loyalists will have been using for almost three years. The primary question in my mind is not whether the new UI will be any good, because it almost certainly has to be, but rather, whether it will be optional.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for change. The new interface looks like it will expand the casual user-base with its minimalistic but fun aesthetics, and the blatant design cues taken from Windows Media Center Edition look to offer HTPC functionality in line with Microsoft’s recent moves, such as the Netflix partnership for TV content, which was also announced today.
I’m just not 100% sure that the new UI is needed for Microsoft’s current core demograph. For the most part, I feel that the blade interface accomplishes everything a core gamer needs to do. Okay, sure, XBLA’s release list is getting beyond cumbersome to navigate, and when I just want to casually purchase an older release such as Pacman Championship Edition, I may as well consult a forum post as to where to find it. But these look to be volume issues that won’t be mitigated by the new interface either, from what little we’ve seen of it.
And I guess that’s my problem here: for such a radical change to something we’ve been using for so long, we have little idea to how what we’ve already been doing will operate in this new design; Microsoft dedicated most of the time it had to show (the admittedly impressive) new features, as would be expected.
The Final Fantasy announcement was impressive, but my bated-breath will wait for clarification on other issues first.
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