Speaking at the Develop Conference in Brighton, Microsoft’s Jeff Sullivan has revealed some updated Xbox Live statistics. Probably the most important (or the one that will get Sony and Nintendo thinking) is the fact that 60% of all Xbox 360 users are now using Xbox Live. To put this into perspective, the original Xbox had just 10% of all its users on Xbox Live.
Sullivan also went on to state that over 500 million games of Halo 2 had been played through Xbox Live, over 900,000 voice and text messages are sent everyday and over 2 billion hours of gaming has been hosted through Xbox Live since it launched a few years back. Sullivan also said that Microsoft is well on course to hit 6 million Xbox Live subscribers by 2007.
Sullivan then talked about the two key drivers to continue the success of Xbox Live, the Marketplace and Xbox Live Arcade. 75% of everyone connected to Xbox Live has downloaded at least 1 item from the Marketplace and over 30 million items have now been downloaded, a number boosted by the recent “E3: Bringing it Home” promotion and the new ability to download items while playing games.
The Xbox Live Arcade is now used by 65% of all users. The Coversion rate between game trials and paying for the full game is currently, on average, 21%. Geometry Wars and UNO have around a 50% conversion rate. Microsoft have also imposed a much stricter approval process for any publisher wishing to add a game to the Arcade, suggesting the number of potential Arcade titles is quite high.
Sullivan went on to speak about the future of Xbox Live, Live Anywhere. For anyone who doesn’t know what Live Anywhere is, it is a system that will allow Xbox Live users to play with Windows Vista users.
Expected in Early 2007, the first title to support Live Anywhere will be Shadowrun (Huxley will not require a Windows Vista PC to play an Xbox 360 user). Sullivan said that PC Shadowrun will feature a limited amount Xbox Live features with its PC users acting as guinea pigs to see if the system will really take off. The first non-Microsoft Live Anywhere titles are expected in Fall 2007, after security issues are ironed out.
Originally Written By: Scott Webber
