Holton On NXE Update

With Microsoft's NXE update right around the corner, Tamer Asfahani interrogated Xbox LIVE UK marketing manager James Holton about what we can expect from the coming update, and from the rest of the year. The pair discuss Facebook, Twitter, Games on Demand, Last.fm, and of course, the Sky service.

A full transcript is right below the video.

The first thing I want to say is - obviously from an Xbox 360 point of view - it's always been about and always will be about gaming entertainment as well, so making sure we've got the right experiences for people from an Xbox 360, whether that's our own first-party titles like Halo ODST, Forza, Gears of War - those type of titles - but also at the same time making sure that we are also looking at positioning Xbox 360, particularly around the Elite, from a more entertainment perspective. So it's got the additional hard drive space for the game add-ons, Arcade games, movies, that kind of thing as well, so really sort of moving the console or keeping the console in its gaming roots but extending into like an entertainment foray if you like.

Things like the ability now - or in the Autumn time - to watch the Sky content on your console, to interact with your Facebook and Twitter accounts, the Last.fm streaming, as well as the kind of 1080p streaming of movies, kind of add more to make Xbox 360 more than just a gaming proposition.

Part of the update that we'll be launching shortly will give a new level of interactivity to Avatars. When we launched NXE we said one of our goals was to always have like an Avatar marketplace where you can buy and get different items for your Avatars. That can be things like branded items. As you can see there the guy's wearing a Halo shirt. Also, Avatars themselves will also have things like carry-ons, where that's a little radio-controlled car and that kind of stuff, so just adding more detail and more functionality to Avatars to make them continue for them to be an integral part of the experience.

Other little things here like Summer of Arcade, so that's currently a focus on our Arcade titles like Trials HD, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, things like 'Splosion Man which seems to be going down really really well at the moment. The next thing along is obviously 1 vs 100-

Also going very well.

Very well, yeah. Launched probably three weeks ago now, the real-time interactive quiz show where you're playing against other people over Xbox LIVE to win, in the UK, real prizes which obviously has gone down really really well. Huge uptake in the first few shows over the first weeks, and people are really excited about the fact that you're actually winning real prizes and competing against other people, so that's been a great success for us.

The next one here shows Games on Demand again from the update that we're going to do shortly. You'll be able to directly download full Xbox 360 games direct from Xbox LIVE. From an Xbox point of view it's about giving the consumer choice. We haven't launched the service yet so when it launches we'll see how we go in terms of demand for it as a service, what games are being downloaded, the types of games, are there certain genres that are more favourable than others, so I think it's a case of – launch the service and see what happens in terms of what people want from it, and tailor the experience from there.

Moving onto one of the new applications that will come in Autumn is Facebook, so the functionality on Xbox 360 to link to your Facebook account. This just gives you a flavour of what the Facebook application will look like. You can interact with your friends, see them online, messages, profile, that kind of stuff. I think for our audience photos are going to be the key, because – we'll just show some examples here – you'll be able to go in and look at your photos full-screen from the comfort of your sofa on your big-screen TV, which is a great kind of functionality that you'll only get on Xbox 360.

It's about giving people the choice in what they want to do. If you're more into your gaming experiences, you may not be interested in applications like that. However, if you're new to the console market and it's things like Facebook and Twitter and Sky that are going to get you excited about the console, then that's probably what you're going to use. Again, it's about delivering the choice of what people want and Facebook is one of the things that people are excited about.

I'll just show you Twitter. This is a video that just shows you the look and feel, so again it's not set in stone that this is what it'll look like but again, just for those people that are into Twitter and Tweeting then obviously you'll be able to do that on your console as well.