Rumor: Meijer's catalog lists $100 price cut for Xbox 360 Elite

I was at Vintage Stock in Blue Springs,MO just yesterday and the manger was telling me that they where dropping the elite by one hundred. I was asking how much cash I would get out of a 20gb Xbox.

I've had similar thoughts in the past. It would be nice to have a neat stack of consoles and not have to have satellite units around your TV.

Then again my receiver/stereo stack isn't what it used to be since I don't have a CD or tape player and my PS3 replaced my DVD player.

This isn't related, but I believe it very strongly. If you cannot afford $50 dollars a year. You probably can't afford internet and you probably have a lot of other very serious problems with your spending habits.

they need to make the arcade version $150 and throw in 6 months of XBL when MW2 comes out.

them jawns would sell like hotcakes

Why do people complain about $50/yr for XBL? Is it because they're stupid or don't have a job or both? Explain.

It's because everyone else is doing it for free with comparable quality.

Well....except the Wii. At least it's still free though :\

Well, if you're like me and only play online every now and then, you'd be rather hesitant to pay a yearly fee for online play.

Free on PS3 vs $50 on X-BOX... self explanitory don't you think?

@Captain Planet: Umm... have you been paying attention to the news about the economy?

step 1: buy a 360
step 2: install game to hard drive
step 3: no longer hear loud dvd drive
step 4: eat burrito
step 5: shat out eaten burrito

Pretty simple, I'm not a hardcore online gamer, so I play online from time to time. Spending $50 (or sometimes less due to offers) per year on something I won't be using as much seems not worth it for me, oh and I read somewhere that you needed gold membership to download demos as well....then that's another point.

...and if it distributed cold beer

I sure do get sick of people saying live is $50. If you are paying $50, a) you don't care about paying $50, which is fine if that's fine with you, or b) you're living under a rock, cause live cards are almost always on sale somewhere for $30-$35, especially around christmas time. They also stack on to your existing months, so you can buy and redeem them any time.

I'd rather pay for something that is fun and works well than pay nothing for the crippled piece of crap Sony has.

Cause no one has ever said the only reason people don't like the PS3 is because they're too poor to have one, right?

Oh my lord you guys are fucking hilarious...

All I've hear so far are typical fanboy rants about Microsoft's Xbox Live offerings.

"It's because everyone else is doing it for free with comparable quality."

"Free on PS3 vs $50 on X-BOX... self explanitory don't you think?"

"Umm... have you been paying attention to the news about the economy?"

"They complain because there is no logical reason to pay that much money for something that is free on all other platforms."

"Well, if you're like me and only play online every now and then, you'd be rather hesitant to pay a yearly fee for online play."

If you think PSN is better than XBL, you need to come up with something better than "it's free, that's why".

And we don't need to hear from you Taco, your fanboy bias immediately disqualifies your opinion on the matter.

As someone who owns a 360 with live and a PS3 with a PSN account I can honestly say this.

The PSN is definitely not as good as live. It's OK don't get me wrong, but live is just a lot more streamlined and fast, sure you can do a lot of the things you can do on live on the PSN, but they are slower and require a lot more steps to do.... and usually you can't do them from inside of a game.

So if you don't like spending less money than the price of a game once a year for the best online service available then sure don't... but please stop trying to suggest you can get the exact same experience anywhere else for free, because you can't. The PSN is good, but not live good.

Your last reply should have been your first (and only) one Taco. Thank you for yielding, there was no light at the end of the tunnel [hole] you dug yourself into.

real life friends or online friends.

If you do, then the advantages of XBL outweigh the extremely minimal $30/yr cost 10 times over.

I WISH Sony would start charging for the PSN if it meant they got it up to snuff with XBL. Cross-game voice messages and invites, party system, etc. Basically, don't make me have to use means OUTSIDE their network to set up a game with 8 of my friends. Kind of makes that network useless.

Basically, I'd rather pay a negligible fee for something that fits my needs then have something that gives me a headache for free.

If you've used both, the difference is very noticable..

Also, now that they're adding things like the tenure and free dashboard games like 1vs100 and Joyride, there's a lot more incentive to being a Gold member.

And again, PSN may be free, but it's only got where it is by copying XBL. Imagine what the PS3's online service would be like if it weren't for the 360's. Most likely, it'd be no better than what the PS2 had to offer.

HEY! How'd I get lumped into the fanboy rants? I'm just saying, alot of people nowadays can't get jobs. And if you need to tighten your belt, the first thing you're going to cut are any non-essential services that you have to pay for on a regular basis.

There's no reason why Xbox Live should be paid. I don't bother paying €30 for 13 months of live (eBay, not even official price) gold BUT microsoft limits it to save money even though WE PAY.

They even have the courage to rip us off on like every single extra item like gamerpics, themes, whatever.

Why is Xbox Live so much better than the PSN, seriously? I JUST WANNA PLAY ONLINE AND I CAN DO IT FOR FREE ON THE PSN, end of discussion -> Xbox Live is overpriced.

Complain because it SHOULD BE FREE!!! DUH Has nothing to do with NOT having money. Hell I could have EASILY got a Pro Model and paid for live for 2 years instead of getting the Elitie.....but fuck that

If People just stopped paying for Gold on 360 like they did on PC then they would HAVE to make it free.....but you people dont get that....

@ paperless

Why don't you get a free Gold trial and experience the service yourself. I can sit here and bullet point feature after countless feature at you, but you really need to experience the service first hand to really appreciate it.

Again, more of the same "it should be free because ...blah blah it just should."

I haven't heard anything from the opposing side about the quality of service which is what you should be looking at from the start.

Quality?? so you are saying I should have to PAY to PLAY online EVEN THO most times you are simply connecting to another persons 360?? as opposed to paying nothing and most times being on ACTUAL SERVERS in a CENTRAL location??

If anything they should let you pay online from free and CHARGE YOU for extras like Crossgame chat, access to 1v100, Netflix, etc.....

Aggie,

You cannot use logic with people who defends MS making them pay for something that should be free.

The sad thing is, MS diehards should be ROOTING for Sony and PSN to completely catch up with live (I believe they are very close) that way, MS might be (now stay with me MS fanboys) FORCED to offer Live Gold for FREE. See that word FREE?

I will never understand the mindset of defending a mega corporation for being bent over the chair and happily taking MS's business in the backdoor.

Yes its ONLY $50 or $30....but wouldn't free be better?

Remember kiddies, competition is good for us.

If MS was the only HD offering in town, I can only shudder with fear on the terrible prices, micro-transaction fees, and prices that MS would charge.

hold up, battlefield cant be calling its a fucking game with no arms.

you sir are a fucking liar.

Awful lot of ps3 goons in this thread. Scatter goons, scatter.

@ Chris

You obviously have NO IDEA how Xbox Live works. There are servers, not fully dedicated ones obviously, but the service is centralized regardless of the game. When you log on, you log onto Microsoft's XBL servers in Seattle. From their, whatever game you decide to play, let's say Halo 3, you communicate with Bungie's servers which communicate with Microsoft's servers. You're never connected as a host to someone else's Xbox and vice versa.

You ------> Microsoft -------> Bungie -------> Microsoft

I don't know the techno-babble but this this process is the reason why XBL is so ahead of everyone else. This system is in place to prevent misuse of the service (cheating, hacking, etc) as well as managing the messenging, video, chat features. You know, all that behind the scenes shit we take for granted.

And please stop with the "it should be free". WHY SHOULD IT BE FREE? WHY? Is there anyone here that can give a logical fucking answer to this question?

"crippled piece of crap that Sony has"

Xbros sure are out in full force today eh?

"And please stop with the "it should be free". WHY SHOULD IT BE FREE? WHY? Is there anyone here that can give a logical fucking answer to this question?"

How is this for a logical answer.

Nowhere else do you PAY to play other people online, not PC gaming or console gaming.....zip. You buy the game, you buy the machine, you pay for your internet access...is'nt that enough paying already?

Look, I am not saying Xbox Live Gold is not a good service, I am just confused as to why so many of you who have paid well over $100 dollars as of right now for the right to play games online, would defend such a practice. If enough people rufused to pay MS like people did with MS's PC pay for play service...it would be FREE now.

Instead you bend over backwards to defend this fleecing.

On top of that, Sony's free service does not have ads. Yet MS's Gold paid service does. 1vs100 ads are really annoying on what is otherwise a cool primetime game. Why do you pay $ again? So you can sit through ads every 10 question break?

EDIT: If you don't have something nice to say, don't say anything at all. Or, um, treat people as you want to be treated. or something.

"If anything they should let you pay online from free and CHARGE YOU for extras like Crossgame chat, access to 1v100, Netflix, etc....."

That doesn't work because, as the Sony fanboys can't seem to comprehend, shit works a lot better when everyone has the same stuff.

Can you imagine how annoying it would be to send someone you're playing with a party invite only to get back "sorry, this user does not have access to parties, please play with a different person".

As for "if people would stop paying for it MS would have to make if free, that's what you people don't get", I would much, much, much rather pay a nominal fee and get something that I love than save a pault 2-3 bucks a month and have MS start cutting features or stop adding new ones that are worth 10x that amount to me.

And that's what YOU people don't get. For what XBL provides, for many of us, it's worth 10x what it costs. I can honestly say that for what I pay for it, XBL to me is one of the biggest bargains of anything I've ever purchased in my entire life. The amount of enjoyment I get out of it far exceeds the amount of money I spend on it. PSN on the other hand, even being free, doesn't even make the list.

But hey, this is what makes capitalism so great, you have an option for both. If all you want to do is play online in random servers with random people and run around as a mute doing your own thing, then you can do it for free on the PS3, so play that.

If you want to play with friends, grab a beer and have a good time like you're back in the old college dorm. maybe even use some teamwork in the games you're playing, then for an extremely minimal fee you can do that much more easily and smoothly, with it being a breeze to set up rather than a PITA that you have to set aside time for. So those people can play on the 360.

Then, everyone is happy.

"And fucking seriously, PSN doesn't charge you for that couch in your stupid fucking "apartment" in Home? How about that Deisal t-shirt your Home avatar is sporting? Yeah, that's what I fucking thought you stupid fuck."

Oh yeah? Well fuck fuckidy fuckfuck, and fuck...you stupid fuck.

So, your "comparison" is to use Home purchasable items? Really? Wow I had no idea that to play online games on the PSN you need to have purchased items in the Sony Home Mall.

See the difference here is that Sony does not FORCE you to buy things for the right to play online. It is free.

Free must be a four letter word to MS diehards yes?

Nice try Killjebus, but your answer is the same just cleverly reworded as everyone else's. You basically said "it's free here/there, it should be free on the Xbox too".

And I can't believe you just said PSN does not have ads...

PSN: Free, not as good as Live, but for a free service its good enough, no need to be in a 'status' to use demos or access certain aspects of PSN, don't feel like I'm being cheated if say a game's online is not as good as others as its a free service

Live: A far superior online service, $50/yr which may turn those who have no need to play that much online games, with me I feel if say I was playing Gears and their online service was not good or if I found out someone was cheating on say Halo, I'd feel little ticked of that I'm paying for something that I'm basically getting cheated of, still won't hinder my experience though

They both have their pros and cons, one is better than the other for various reasons, you just have to decide on your own.

"And that's what YOU people don't get. For what XBL provides, for many of us, it's worth 10x what it costs. I can honestly say that for what I pay for it, XBL to me is one of the biggest bargains of anything I've ever purchased in my entire life. The amount of enjoyment I get out of it far exceeds the amount of money I spend on it. PSN on the other hand, even being free, doesn't even make the list."

Maybe it IS worth the money. But wouldn't FREE be better? Again, that is why MS diehards should be rooting for Sony to offer the SAME experience for free, that way it would greatly influence MS to offer your wonderful online service for FREE.

A good service at a nice cost....nice

That same good service at no cost????better

Oh yeah, and PSN has ads as well, which is to be expected...

@ Killjebus

Nice. Try reading jackofalltrades comment before you pull out your jump to conclusions mat again. Stupid fuck. Thanks for perpetuating the Sony fanboy stereotype even further fuckwad.

And you keep saying "right to play online". It's not a right you fucking retard, it's a privilege.

Nice thread...for the most part a good discussion as well.

"Oh yeah, and PSN has ads as well, which is to be expected..."

Ads in Home yes. Ads on the PSN store yes. Yet all of these ads are game related. And none of these ads appear in Home mini-games or games period.

Yet when I play the free 1vs.100...every TEN questions I have to watch a phone ad, a car ad, and other NON GAMING related ads.

If I was forced to watch non gaming ads in mini-games in Home, I would be annoyed.

"Maybe it IS worth the money. But wouldn't FREE be better? Again, that is why MS diehards should be rooting for Sony to offer the SAME experience for free, that way it would greatly influence MS to offer your wonderful online service for FREE.

A good service at a nice cost....nice

That same good service at no cost????better"

If I could be assured that the service would be just as good, and at just as good a rate of improvement then sure, free would be nice.

But for the amount of enjoyment it provides, the fee is so small that I'm not going to be greedy and try to save a completely negligible amount of money at the risk of something that is probably my largest source of entertainment being crippled.

With the amount of enjoyment I get out of Live, I feel the tiny amount of money I spend on it is perfectly fair. The truth is, I would pay a lot more for Live than I already do if I could be assured that all the people I played with were still on it.

I've had 1000x more fun this generation of gaming than any other in the past, and Xbox Live is by far the #1 reason for that, for me. I spent thousands of dollars on a gaming PC that I get 1/100th the amount of enjoyment on as I get out of Xbox Live, so why am I going to sit here and complain about paying 1/100th the price for something I enjoy 100 times more?

@Capt. Fuck fuck and fuck

Fuck...fucking fuckfuck, fuck. Fuck faaaaahhk fuck, and a fuck with fuck....you fuck

FUCK!!!!!

oh and tard, mustn't forget tard in fuck....you fuck.

FUCK!!!!

Buy a 12-month subscription card of Ebay for $35 and you're playing less than $3 a month for Live. All the time you PS3 fanboys spend waiting for your mandatory installs could be used to work your local 7-11 and buy yourself a Live card too. And the good news is you'll have enough money left over for therapy.

@ eNrique

How the HELL is it a right? Explain?! Where the hell does it say, "online gaming is a right, you are entitled to play this game or any game, for FREE on this computer/console/etc".

WHAT ARTICLE STATES THIS STARTLING UNTRUTH??

Still waiting on a clear and logical argument as to why XBL should be free.

Longest... fanboy conversation... ever...

Killjebus,

You must be mentally handicapped if you don't think you pay to play online anywhere else... You yourself may not be paying, but SOMEONE is, and when it comes down to Sony, THEY are footing the bill for the servers, their maintenance and the bandwidth so they're losing money, which is one of the reasons, no doubt, that there isn't a price drop for the PS3 yet. On PC the servers are hosted by people who have the dough to rent or purchase them, or by a group of people who put their money together every month to pay the bills, and they're VERY expensive. PC gaming is the only place where you can legitimately get by without paying a single thing for online play, however, you must keep in mind that someone is footing the bill for the server you enjoy playing on. Microsoft is simply doing what Sony surely wants to do and what SHOULD be done- bandwidth costs a lot and so does server maintenance, as I've said numerous times already, and they're just not willing to foot the bill themselves when they're in the lead.

@ eNrique

You gotta be kidding me.

"Already paid for the net code, the multiplayer maps, the servers to store leaderboars, desing, characters, etc, etc."

Let me answer your [silly] question with another question. Why do people have to pay $15/month to play World of Warcraft? You already paid for the net code, the multiplayer maps, the servers to store leaderboars, desing, characters, etc, etc.

Sure Blizzard gets the money to maintain the servers and th....

Wait, what was that word?

MAINTAIN

Microsoft assumes most (if not all) the costs of MAINTAINING the quality of service that XBL provides. Where as Sony's PSN has no centralized system in place to MAINTAIN their service (because they have no revenue stream other than ad based revenue). This is why XBL outshines PSN in every respect. This is why XBL is constantly evolving. I've been a XBL member since 2002 and have seen my $50/yr evolve the service to what it is today. This is why we get new features, content, games, etc because Microsoft MAINTAINS the service and works with game developers to offer new features and content. The PSN, you get a standard affair, much akin to what PC was almost 10 years ago. There's nothing about PSN that makes XBL, in terms of features, stand out other than "it's free".