3. Games for Windows Live DirectX 10 wasn't the only flop out of Redmond this year. The hotly awaited PC implementation of Xbox Live, called Games for Windows Live, turned out to be a heavily nerfed version of the Xbox 360 stalwart.
As Jason Cross lamented in one of his more caustic columns, Microsoft is screwing up Live on Windows. The interface almost assumes you have an Xbox 360 controller for your PC (and since the first two Live games on the PC were first person shooters, who the hell would use a game pad?); you can only get to the guide while you're playing a game; the friends support sucks; and it fails to give PC gamers everything they get for free through GameSpy Arcade and other services.
Microsoft can rescue this service, but so far they have chosen not to. There's still a smallish trickle of games that support GFW Live, but it doesn't compare to the number of games, for instance, that you'll find on Steam. GFW Live needs work, and 2007 was a terrible year for the service.
Ten worst technologies of the year
Posted on Tuesday, January 01 2008 @ 2:15 CET by Thomas De Maesschalck
ExtremeTech lists ten of the worst new technologies or products of 2007. Here's one of them: