Strictly speaking I won't call 1vs100 an Arcade game, firstly because you don't actually pay for it, it's included with your Gold subscription, and secondly because you don't actually find it under the Arcade Games section.
Instead it appears under the Spotlight section of the Dashboard, where the latest episodes are announced. Essentially there is a schedule much like on regular Television, and you log into the Live game at those specified times.
I made use of the reminder feature, but this oddly enough didn't appear to work. Being an American Beta program, and considering I have a US account, I had to be up at 2:00 this morning to play with the Americans at midday their side of the pond.
Initially I had some trouble getting in, mostly because you download each episode just before it starts, and my 384k line wasn't exactly up to the task of doing this quickly enough. When the episode was downloaded, I was told repeatedly that the game was full, this being a Beta and all, but eventually I managed to get in.
Now bear with me, as this won't make sense from the start, but this is exactly how I had experienced it, not knowing what to expect.
Upon first connecting you are asked whether you want to take part in a Public or Private game. Essentially Public means that you will partake completely, and thus can be selected to form part of the crowd, the mob and even be selected to become the One. Of course you can also win prizes in this game mode, which is of course the incentive for playing in the first place.
Private on the other hand I think makes you basically invisible, and thus you can only be part of the crowd, by answering the questions and such, but you can't win any prizes.
So I chose public and on we went. Basically how it seems to work is that a 100 people from the pool of public gamers are selected as part of what they call the "Mob", one is then selected to become the "One" and the rest remain as part of the crowd.
Then in the usual gameshow trivial pursuit fashion a general knowledge question is asked, with three possible answers. The X, A and B buttons are used to choose answers from left to right, while the Y button is used to cheer with your Avatar.
Quite cool is the fact that questions are of recent events, and none that I can remember are based on events in history. Pretty much everything is applicable to the modern day. Of course a lot of the questions are biased towards the American public, considering this is only available to North American Live subscribers at this point in time.
So everyone in the game is asked the same set of questions, and everyone has the same amount of time to answer, the difference being that people in the crowd can't be eliminated.
The purpose of the One is to continue answering questions correctly, and in the process eliminating all members of the Mob who get it wrong. As members of the Mob are knocked out the One levels up to the higher prize bracket. Before every new question is asked the One has the chance to either take the money, or to face the Mob again hoping to up his or her winnings.
Now this is where it gets interesting. For the Beta, winnings are essentially broken down into Microsoft Points, and on higher levels free Xbox Live Arcade games. Highest winning I recall was when the mob was down to 50, and the going stakes were at 3000 MS Points. Finally I start seeing the point of Microsoft's silly online currency, and it works really well here. I'm guessing here that these winnings are added directly to your Live account, and thus shouldn't be a problem for non-US residents, however you also score sweepstakes entries for participating, I think I got about 63, which of course as South Africans we won't be eligible for.
The great thing about this game is that everyone can be a winner. The One obviously wins whatever he cashes out, but I have yet to see the One actually win. When the One loses, the remaining members of the Mob split the winnings, which this morning amounted to everyone getting a Free Arcade game, and some MS Points. On top of this, the Top 3 members of the crowd also win an Arcade game for each round. The only reason I didn't get top 3 was because of what I figure is a wee bit of a button lag on answering, as I had streaks just as long as the Top3's.
On the topic of lag, I was very surprised to find the game running flawlessly on my connection, which shouldn't even be eligible for Xbox Live, never mind working properly. The game immediately detected low bandwidth and warned me that some features might not be available. Now this game is supposed to work like a proper live TV show, and thus you are supposed to have Voice communications throughout, at least that's what I gathered from the trailer. In my case however the announcer asking the questions seemed to be pre-recorded, possibly part of the small 30Mb download for each episode, but I did get some live transmissions in between rounds, or during breaks, so I'm guessing the bandwidth constraints were the problem. Still it's fantastic that the game caters for everyone, and I can't say that the gameplay itself was influenced in any way by my slower connection from the other side of the world. And from what I read on the stats pages, there were almost a 100 000 people playing the game all at the same time, which makes it even more insane.
Sadly I never made it to the Mob, or being chosen as the One, so I can't comment on that experience. The game does however keep the competitive nature going, because the scores of three people closest to you are listed at the top of your screen, including the answers they give after the timer runs out, and their current streak of correct answers. Thus you almost forget about the One and the Mob, and you just want to beat the other guys next to you. I'm guessing these four slots would be used if you were playing the game with four local players, such as in a family setup or at a party.
At the end of the day this is a massive amount of fun, I really can't believe how much I enjoyed partaking in it, completely forgetting that it was in fact 4:00 in the morning when the session ended. Episodes are basically two hours long, after which you have to join the next scheduled event if you want to play again.
Catering for American time it is of course completely unrealistic for us locals to partake, but then I have to ask why the hell isn't anyone jumping up and down to bring this to South Africa? This is the perfect reason to finally bring Xbox Live to South Africa, and even more so considering the owners 1vs100 Endemol already have a massive South African presence. I mean this could change South African gameshows forever, with people leaving Noot vir Noot and the like to become participants rather than just viewers.
Now this is where it gets interesting. For the Beta, winnings are essentially broken down into Microsoft Points, and on higher levels free Xbox Live Arcade games. Highest winning I recall was when the mob was down to 50, and the going stakes were at 3000 MS Points. Finally I start seeing the point of Microsoft's silly online currency, and it works really well here. I'm guessing here that these winnings are added directly to your Live account, and thus shouldn't be a problem for non-US residents, however you also score sweepstakes entries for participating, I think I got about 63, which of course as South Africans we won't be eligible for.
The great thing about this game is that everyone can be a winner. The One obviously wins whatever he cashes out, but I have yet to see the One actually win. When the One loses, the remaining members of the Mob split the winnings, which this morning amounted to everyone getting a Free Arcade game, and some MS Points. On top of this, the Top 3 members of the crowd also win an Arcade game for each round. The only reason I didn't get top 3 was because of what I figure is a wee bit of a button lag on answering, as I had streaks just as long as the Top3's.
On the topic of lag, I was very surprised to find the game running flawlessly on my connection, which shouldn't even be eligible for Xbox Live, never mind working properly. The game immediately detected low bandwidth and warned me that some features might not be available. Now this game is supposed to work like a proper live TV show, and thus you are supposed to have Voice communications throughout, at least that's what I gathered from the trailer. In my case however the announcer asking the questions seemed to be pre-recorded, possibly part of the small 30Mb download for each episode, but I did get some live transmissions in between rounds, or during breaks, so I'm guessing the bandwidth constraints were the problem. Still it's fantastic that the game caters for everyone, and I can't say that the gameplay itself was influenced in any way by my slower connection from the other side of the world. And from what I read on the stats pages, there were almost a 100 000 people playing the game all at the same time, which makes it even more insane.
Sadly I never made it to the Mob, or being chosen as the One, so I can't comment on that experience. The game does however keep the competitive nature going, because the scores of three people closest to you are listed at the top of your screen, including the answers they give after the timer runs out, and their current streak of correct answers. Thus you almost forget about the One and the Mob, and you just want to beat the other guys next to you. I'm guessing these four slots would be used if you were playing the game with four local players, such as in a family setup or at a party.
At the end of the day this is a massive amount of fun, I really can't believe how much I enjoyed partaking in it, completely forgetting that it was in fact 4:00 in the morning when the session ended. Episodes are basically two hours long, after which you have to join the next scheduled event if you want to play again.
Catering for American time it is of course completely unrealistic for us locals to partake, but then I have to ask why the hell isn't anyone jumping up and down to bring this to South Africa? This is the perfect reason to finally bring Xbox Live to South Africa, and even more so considering the owners 1vs100 Endemol already have a massive South African presence. I mean this could change South African gameshows forever, with people leaving Noot vir Noot and the like to become participants rather than just viewers.
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