NXE: First Thoughts

Today, of course, is launch day for the New XBox Experience. Around noon I remembered that, and went to see what was what.

The download process to get started wasn't too painful, although the graphics seemed pretty lame (flat colours, square text). Once I got through that, it was time to create an avatar for myself. I was impressed by just how much you can tailor the look of your character, right down to different types of nose shapes and styles of wrist watches. I was disappointed that I couldn't put myself in open-topped sandals, but just about everything else that "epitomizes" me is now there for the XBox 360 world to see (including shorts).

The navigation is a bit clunky to get used to, with too much superfluous crap that's just there to sell you stuff, but it definitely looks nice. Naturally one of the first things I wanted to do was see just what sort of avatars each of my friends had come up with for themselves, but it's still so early in the NXE era that only two of them have gotten that far yet. In a few days I expect more entertainment will be available of that sort.

I made sure to show Vicki what the dashboard now looks like, since she's been using the 360 more than I have recently. She's very fond of Hexic, in which you spin groups of coloured gems in order to match them up and accumulate points. Me, I'm still trying to rid the world of the Chimera scourge, over on my PS/3...

Overall, I guess my reaction is that so far I don't mind the new look. I had a good time designing my avatar, but don't really know that I'll actually get much mileage out of it beyond that initial kick. At least I can still find my way around to the things that I care about on the dashboard (my games, my friends, my messages) and the rest is all just window dressing at the moment.