Many Faces Of Me

After posting some images of my Avatar in my last post, I was inspired to have a look at the many in-game avatars I've created. This is just a sampling of what I grabbed, and are missing some fun ones, in particular, my character from Saints Row 2.


From Left to Right:
Top: Rock Band 2, Fallout 3, Rainbow Six: Vegas 2, Guitar Hero: World Tour
Bottom: Rainbow Six: Vegas 2, Mass Effect, Guitar Hero: World Tour, Fallout 3

The top row R6:V2 character is my Snake Eyes inspired clothing, while the one on the bottom row is showing off the face underneath the mask.

Sorry for the appalling quality of the images that go into making this collage, but they're photographs taken of the image from my projector against my wall. If you look at the full, giant sized image, you can make out the individual pixels!!

Testing The New New Experience

Considering that the present Xbox dashboard is still referred to as the New Xbox Experience, or NXE, I'm not sure what to call the newest update, due some time next month. NXE was introduced some time in November of last year, and brought with it a whole new clean dashboard, party chat options, and, most noticeably, Avatars. One of the biggest additions that the new NXE update will include is the ability to purchase full Xbox 360 games from the Marketplace storefront, storing and playing them directly from your hard drive. All this, and much more will be available for every Xbox with an internet connection from mid to late August onwards.

But I have it now!

A few days ago I was informed through one of the many computer game websites I read that there was a site set up by Microsoft where you could apply for access to the new update early, on a Beta test basis. I signed up, and yesterday evening, minutes before going to bed, I received an email informing me I had been accepted. Turning on my Xbox this morning, I was greeted with the query "Would you like to update now?", and I excitedly accepted! Some six minutes later and I was looking at... oh... the same old dashboard.

At first glance, visually, there is nothing new. The dashboard remains the same as the NXE style, but then, that wasn't what was getting an update. I clicked into my Achievements list and found my first new feature. The first blade now shows a cumulative Achievement score for every game that is registered to my Xbox, titled Achievement Progress. Every game I could possibly get Achievements in. I now know that I have 12065 Gamerscore out of a possible 46645G. That is 632 Achievements unlocked from a potential 2088. I have less than a third of the Gamerscore available to me. Wow! I'm not entirely surprised. I've only experienced a brief period of being a Gamerscore whore, and I've only gotten over 1,000G in two games. The Achievement Progress blade also shows an icon for each completed game, of which I currently only have one; Avatar. Despite having over 1,000G in Burnout, as well as unlocking all the Achievements that come on the disk, I don't get an icon for that because I have yet to complete all the Achievements from downloaded content (DLC).

Realising that the update was at least working now, I dashed off to the Avatar editor. One of the most discussed new additions to the dashboard was an Avatar Marketplace, where you can spend real money to buy virtual clothes for a tiny digital you. My friends and I had chuckled about that for some weeks now, debating the kind of person that would do that.

Turns out, I'm that kind of person. Dammit! Don't judge me! They had Steampunk gear! My Avatar now dresses the way I'd love to dress in real life. I'm jealous of tiny virtual me! He flaunts his cool goggles and clothing at me every time I see him.

Apart from the new Marketplace, the Avatar editor seems to have been given an overhaul. It now runs much, much faster, with the various panels opening as soon as you click on them. And there is an Awards area, where you can get the clothes you won in games! Yes, thanks to the newest update, we now have the feature every Xbox player has guessed at since Avatars were introduced. Games can now award you clothing for your Avatar, making little you into an advertising board for your favorite games. Not something I'm complaining about at all. In fact, I'm be only too glad to show off to friends what games I love to play!

One of the final additions to Avatars that I can see is the ability to purchase Props. While playing in the Marketplace, little Quaid played with a radio controlled Warthog from Halo. He looked so gosh darned cute. can't wait to see what other Props appear over the coming months. Obvious ones such as guitars and drums for Rock Band and Guitar Hero spring to mind, but I'd love to see how creative and inventive game companies get with their Props. As well as the Warthog, the Monkey Island store has a huge cotton bud stick and the obligatory chicken with a pulley in it, among others. Far too cool!

There are loads more little updates that I'm sure I'll uncover as I go along. For now, I'm off to play with the new Gears of War map pack, Dark Corners! I got me some Horde to chainsaw!

I'm Real!

Thank goodness for that. I was beginning to feel very much like an artificial construct designed to aid an organic sentience in its interactions within a virtual environment. Now, thanks to Xbox.com, I know that I'm just a Real projecting my personality onto an Avatar. Phew. This short presentation may help clear things up for all you other Reals suffering the same confusion.

1,000 Going Once! 1,000 Going Twice!

As you may know, I have become rather addicted to Burnout Paradise since getting my Gold Xbox Membership and discovering a whole new world of fun with thousands of potential players.

What you may not know is that I have clocked up an incredible 137 hours of play on the game! 137! That is easily the most time I've ever spent on any one game. In the process, I inched my way forward through the Achievements that Paradise has to offer to increase my Gamertag status. And last night, while racing seven others drivers, I reached the magical 1,000 Gamerscore. Paradise is the first game I've ever gotten to the 1,000G mark in. The next highest is Mass Effect with 510. I'm certain that the Gamerscore for Gears of War 2 will beat that once I get through the campaign, but for now, that's how the ranking stands.

Basking in the glory of my 1,000G, I wandered into town today and found Avatar: The Legend of Aang: The Burning Earth. A:TLA:TBE is infamous among Xbox 360 fans as having the easiest 1,000G in any game ever! A video on YouTube shows someone starting up the game, flashing past the menu screens and cutscenes and getting 1,000G in under two and a half minutes! I managed it in less than five minutes, first time out! I can't say I'm not ashamed for bumping up my Gamerscore in such a low fashion. I am ashamed. It was cheap, and completely unsatisfying. But then, so was the game! Ha!

Before going Gold, I never had any interest in Gamerscore. I played games to play games, not to earn Achievements. Sure, if I realised a particular Achievement was easy to get, or close to completion, I might take actions towards the requirements, but I never went back to play a game just for the Achievements. I never considered the possibility of the 1,000G mark, as many of the games I enjoyed had online only Achievements. Earning the 1,000G in Burnout was incredibly satisfying, though. I managed it all by just playing and enjoying the game. I never went out of my way to earn any, and I never sacrificed my enjoyment of the game in order to gain Achievements. I glad that this was the game I earned my first 1,000G in. It was always fun, never a chore, and I'll remembered it fondly, even when they eventually replace it with a sequel.

Not that I'm anywhere near finished playing Paradise. I still love to just jump online and run races, or get in some challenges. I've only done around 285 of the 490 available challenges, so I have a while to go yet. I've made a bunch of friends through the game, and recently despaired that there is a 100 Friend limit on the 360. I'm quickly approaching that, and I've been online for less than 6 months. Soon I'll have to start weeding out the people I don't game with just to free up space.

Based on the fact that I am using it as a social experience and making a lot of new friends, I don't feel I quite deserve this t-shirt just yet. That said, I could post it to one of the people on my Friends List. He has a Gamerscore of over 68,000G! Crazy!