Full Xbox 360 game downloads arriving in August

by Randy Nelson on Jun 1st 2009 4:23PM

Beginning in August, Xbox Live users will be able to download full Xbox 360 games to their consoles via the service. Microsoft made the announcement during a luncheon following its pre-E3 press conference.

Similar to XBLA titles, new releases will be made available weekly for a price comparable to what the boxed version is selling for at retail. Once the service -- which is integrated into the Games Marketplace -- launches, 360 game download purchases can be made using Microsoft Points or using a credit card.

Mass Effect, Assassin's Creed and Civilization Revolution were used as examples of titles that will be available via the service. The possibility to downloading games on a rental basis was brought up but not confirmed, with MS stating that it is always looking to evolve its services.

Tags: e3-2009, game-downloads, games-on-demand, microsoft, Xbox-360

Reader Comments (108)

20 gig hard drive = fail for me :(

I'm in the same boat as you are :(

Yep same here for me :( Actually though I'm not sure if I would really want to download a full game anyways, no resale value would kind of suck.

Thank God for my (full) 20gig... Being able to buy full games from my couch would be dangerous.

Yea having the smaller hard drive size would hurt.

Although, one good thing is that once you're done with the game, you could delete it (true kinda scary) knowing that XBL keeps track of your purchase history so that you can download it again at anytime for free under the same XBL Gamertag. It wouldn't be as nice as keeping a bunch on a 120GB hard drive at once but you'd be able to switch out as you play other games you'd want to download.

Nice feature for those who want it... even with my Elite, I doubt it'd ever use it tho... I'm a little old school so I like having physical copies of media (CDs, movies, games, etc)

sony is officially fucked

Love it when people condemn one console camp based on another's conference when the condemned hasn't even had theirs yet.

If you think Sony doesn't have a full game download service in the pipe for their systems, then you need to look a little closer at the PSP Go.

LOL, yeah sure Sony is fucked.
Really old games, barely worth anything at trade in, are available for what NO doubt cost more than they would 2nd hand. What, you thought MS had the balls to take on Gamestop with new games in it?

Oh I'm sure Sony are just shitting themselves.

"sony is officially fucked"

*facepalm*

If MS announced swappable Hard Drives like a 1 TB HDD purchasable on NewEgg, I would totally go for this. Otherwise, I feel much better physically owning the game and being able to sell it once I beat it.

"If you think Sony doesn't have a full game download service in the pipe for their systems, then you need to look a little closer at the PSP Go."

You can already download some full PS3 games on the PSN, like Burnout Paradise.

Upgraded my 20 gig with a 120... GS has them for $99, found a coupon and I got it for $79, and with trades I got it for $0. They even had a transfer cable and DVD for me to borrow, moved all my saves/files over to the new 120 and returned it the same day. Not bad.

Buy a Western Digital BEVS 120GB drive from Newegg, find your T6 & T10 drivers, and DIY.

120GB for

"sony is officially fucked"

Sony already embraced this when they sold WarHawk and Gran Turismo in both retail packages as well as downloadables, and as another person mentioned, 'Burnout Paradise' is also available, it's MS that's joining the party on this one, and Sony's installed base is possibly better-prepared for this with larger hard drive capacities. But I don't think I'm gonna bite just yet with my 360 purchases - my 20gig hd can't handle that. Maybe if I get a new 360 when this one dies, yeah. But not right now.

These companies are just going all out, bandwidth-wise! I fear the impending cable companies' efforts to move beyond the 'experimental' phase they have in some cities charging for the amount of data you're pulling down.

i love where these game companies are going with this but i feel like they are progressing MUCH faster than the internet itself is in terms of bandwidth speed and allowance.

personally, i would rather have a physical copy of games since they are much more expensive than DRM free music and movies. if i pay $60 for a game i want to be able to take it to a friends house, let them borrow it when i'm done, or trade it in towards another game if i'm running low on funds. but i could eventually soften on this like i did with music cause it is very convenient.

With XBLA games, if you purchased one, downloaded it to your hard drive, and then later deleted it, you STILL owned the game, and could re-download it without having to pay for it again later. The only catch, is that you have to be connected to Live for this to work. And it's tied to your 360, which you can transfer to another 360 with a tool, but ultimately it's tied to your account.

I really wouldn't mind be able to download games IF they were cheaper than their retail disc-based counterparts. Long term, I think this is how all games will be delivered, if not this current generation, then by next generation.

And really Microsoft has been doing this already with the Xbox originals. This is just the next logical step.

Same here....and I refuse to uninstall Fallout 3 until I exterminate every living thing in the wasteland

I'm running out of space on my 120GB drive constantly. Between all the DLC I have, the installed games I play regularly, its getting kinda cramped. I wish they would allow external USB because I'd also feel better if I had some kind of backup system in place. I know I can re-download stuff but its gonna be a huge PITA if my 120GB drive goes pift and I have to Re-DL all my content. Heck, I have over 250 songs for RB2 alone, that'd take weeks to dl one song at a time.

Hah, I got downvoted by people who don't understand what a quote followed by a facepalm means. :P

Haven't played Mass Effect and that'll be my first purchase

Yeah this isn't a great idea since most people are still stuck with 20gb drives. Hell, even with 120 combined with all your xbla games and DLC, music and videos it's going to fill up fast.

Also, I actually missed a spot on the bingo card :(

A) Microsoft sees this as an opportunity to sell more HDD's.
B) Microsoft can announce a larger HDD for such features.

LOL at people that have to spend a crap load of money buying 120GB xbox hdd's.....such a rip off....and still won't be enough space!!

Considering the hefty price tag for the larger harddrive, wouldn't it be more cost effective to just purchase the game via retail?

The same question can be applied to the PSP Go. Off topic but it makes sense.

ace, that would only make sense if we knew how much the PSP Go is going to retail for, and thus far we don't.

I'm pretty sure we can assume it will be more than an xbox hard drive...

Downloadable PSP games can be saved to standard memory sticks and they're not very expensive.

Actually, I spotted a 120 GB HDD on google shopping for $75 yesterday. MSFT HAS to put out a 250 or even 500 GB HDD for this endeavor so that price should drop even more.

In most cases it would probably be more cost effective to buy the retail game compared to the downloadable game regardless of what kind of hard drive you have. Physical games tend to go down in price pretty quickly, either through price drops or sales. Other than Steam I haven't seen a lot of price drops on downloadable games and those are usually just on sale for a brief period of time before they go back to normal price.

I have seen the retail version of Mass Effect brand new in the $10 - $20 range at various online stores. I doubt they will try to match that kind of price.

Depends on how much gas is going to cost this summer. :P

guess ill be buying a elite sooner then i thought.

Also confirmed for the service are: Mass Effect, Bioshock, Lego Star Wars, Assassin's Creed, Sonic, Oblivion, Call of Duty 2, Burnout Paradise, Viva Pinata, Crackdown, Dirt, Fight Night, and Rainbox 6 Vegas 2.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/06/01/xbox-360-getting-full-retail-games-delivered-on-demand/

The majority of those can be purchased for about $10 used, some even for $10 new. I'm interested in how much they are going to try and charge us for them.

Masss Effect was shown to be $20, so that will probably be the general price.

ROFLMAO!!!!

This is Fucking over ANYBODY that DOESNT have a 120+ HDD....

I'm shocked that with this they didnt announce a 250GB HDD...

Or you could do it the traditional way: from media.

Absolutely not. It's an OPTION, man. It isn't 'fucking over' anyone. It's hooking up those who can take advantage of it.

Oh yeah man, they are totally fucking everyone over. I mean now some people have the option to download a game from home instead of going to the store while the other people (myself included) still have to go to the store to purchase a game. Man, I feel so fucked over, it's like thanks alot Microsoft for letting me buy the same games at the store that others can buy online. I hate my life.

Actually...I think we're all going to be just fine...what really would have been bad is if they were releasing online exclusive full games...but that didn't happen so no one got fucked over.

option my ass....just like the installing of games from the disc is an option but the other alternative is to listen to the LOUD ass dvd drive spinning???

The point is if they plan on doing this why not have larger HDDs??

You're completely right Chris. Microsoft should be obliged to time travel back to 2005, and launch the console with a larger HDD. Either that, or they should just simply not give us the option to install games at all right?

Sure it's an option. I'm choosing the option to not buy games this way because I don't want to. It's nice that's there for the people who want it though.

I still like having my discs. So how is it not an option?

now you are being dumb....they have YET to say ANYTHING about a bigger HDD....I need to hear about a drive larger than 120GB soon or this feature is pointless......

Well instead of name calling all I'm saying is that I have space on my 20 gig and if I wanted to grab a game right off the cuff I could. No, I couldn't get every title on the list (probably not even 3) before my HD filled, but it is an option. If I need more space I'll have to go buy a larger HD. Not all of us buy movies and TV shows for their consoles. I've got more than half of my HD free, and if I expanded that would still be the case.

As long as I can download one game the feature isn't useless, I and everyone else who has space have the option of taking advantage of this at varying degrees. People will use it.

Sorry if the idea of an option upsets you, haha.

Chris - do you understand that HDD space is not an issue? If your hard drive is filling up you can delete any purchased content then redownload later if you choose since it's in your purchase history?

Take a pill, man

delete abd redownload later???

Thats doing to much....even if it only takes 3 hours for me to download a 5GB file doesnt mean I want to do it everytime I need to make room.....they simply need BIGGER HDDs.....I dont delete stuff off my PC and then re-install it to make room....I buy a BIGGER HDD....whats so wrong about me wanting that??

omg, dude. Are you serious? 3 hours for 5gb? Get a new connection.

Look, I have the 120gb hdd and plenty of space. If I did need to delete some stuff I could. Do you think I don't have a bunch of demos and trailers taking up space that I haven't looked at in a year? I could clear up 5gb of space without noticing anything is missing.

It's not the ONLY way to get games, it's not the ONLY option. It's AN option, and a great one at that. I never needed to install games to my hdd, in some cases the game runs better off the disc - but it's a nice option to have.

I guess Sony fucked ANYBODY over who didn't upgrade their hdd aftermarket?

moron

Not me. I purchased the Uncharted pack with the 160 gigglebyte HDD, and even with my 15 game library I STILL have 100GB free. So I see no reason to update yet, but if I want to, a laptop hard drive of double the capacity (320 GB) is cheaper than Microsoft's 120GB HDD...fail.

That would be sarcasm, Professor Brad.

Still missing the point that it is an OPTION and regardless of the hard drive size you can always make room without losing ANYTHING.

Didn't think this was rocket science

MY 320GB HDD in my PS3 Cost $80 and its down to like 120GBs.....when it drops below 80GBs left I'm going to put a 500GB HDD in it...

all I'm saying is MS needs to be selling larger drives like NOW...

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Full Xbox 360 game downloads arriving in August

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