Getting a little bit of Deja Vu? Well don't worry, your not stuck in some crazy alternate world with Denzel Washington. It seems though that Microsoft either really wants to do some crazy spring cleaning on everything they own, or they're doing all these makeover's because they think their products are ugly.
Whatever the reason, it seems Game For Windows Live is getting one big facelift, becoming more accessible to new players, and becomes almost comparable to Steam's platform. Everything has been super simplified, and also very dark colored. Peter Orullian, the man behind some digital distribution strategies for Xbox Live, will be handling the relaunch. Hit the break for Orullian's statement, and expect the relaunch in November.
"The store is really going to be a destination for games for PC gamers. Sure, we're going to have Live-enabled titles, and we love those, but that's not all you'll find here," Orullian, a group product manager, told me. He pointed to Amazon as the benchmark in the online retail space and as inspiration for Microsoft's new vision for the Games for Windows Marketplace: a simplified, yet more complete consumer experience; one that looks to remove barriers, provide vital information, such as game pages and corresponding DLC links, and utilize deals and promotions.
"We got a lot of feedback and responding to that feedback, there are some central things we think we're solving with this. The most important thing maybe is bringing the transaction component right to the web. Today you go on, and we have a website that talks about games, then we have a client. Feedback we heard is that's not always the easiest experience, so we're bringing the transaction component right to the web. The client will still exist, but it'll exist to manage really really large files that aren't maybe so easily managed through the web, and it'll be your transaction history; so if you need to re-download a game, you can go and do that. But it's not going to be necessary to go and look at and buy games."