“We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills. We shall never surrender.” – Winston Churchill
When old bulldog face intoned those celebrated words, he was probably talking about World War II or his marriage or something. But that’s a load of irrelevant rubbish – I’m quoting them in the context of getting Xbox LIVE in South Africa. So let’s pretend it says “South Africa” instead of “France”, and forget about that bit where it says something about defending islands.
Anyway, the Xbox 360 console launched here in South Africa in October 2006, and Microsoft promised us local LIVE support “within the year”. Then apparently South Africa tripped and fell off the edge of the universe. Bits of me must be drifting somewhere in a vacuum, the bitter cold of infinity pushing these moments of dreamed existence through the last scraps of my brain stem. Well, that or Microsoft found other stuff to do and didn’t bother bringing LIVE here after all.
Of course, South African gamers are all over LIVE with fake UK and US accounts anyway. We’re probably breaking some sort of end user agreement here, but then Microsoft did start it. Besides, Gears of War 2.
In fact, it was the release of Gears of War 2 that really had me riled about the lack of local LIVE support. Like everyone else on the planet, I lined up at the midnight launch for the game, with a confirmed pre-order for a Limited Edition. I’m sort of a Gears superfan. So imagine the devastation when I discovered the special DLC codes had been nixed from all the South African copies of the game. I mean, seriously, the Locust invasion of Sera has nothing on me getting no Gold Lancer or Flashback map pack. Not that the codes would have made much difference, mind you, since South Africa is region-blocked from downloading content banned somewhere else. Oh yeah, we can’t download stuff that’s banned in Germany and Korea. Why? Because. Which is a farce, since anyone with cash can hook up to a VPN service and get it anyway. Including people in Germany and Korea. Okay, maybe not Korea. Meanwhile, I paid R800 for a tin case. I mean, it’s kind of a nice tin case. But it’s still just a ****ing tin case.
So that was bad, but then it all got much, much worse. A few months back, Epic Games announced the Gears of War 2 All Fronts collection – a retail package including all the DLC map packs, an entirely new map pack, and a previously deleted chapter from the original release. Except that retail package isn’t exactly a retail package at all, but a bunch of DLC codes. Oh noes. I promptly wrote an email to Bill Gates (I really did), requesting his benevolent intervention in the coming cataclysm. The letter was shoved on to Mark Hyland, the guy in charge of Xbox brand escalation in the Europe / Middle East / Africa region, who actually responded.
“At present, the Xbox team are working on an international roll out plan for Xbox live,” he copy-pasted from some bland corporate memo. “I understand that South Africa is part of the plan. However, we are unable to confirm exact dates for availability and functionality at this stage.”
Awesome. Meanwhile, back in reality, I still can’t get my Gears of War 2 stuff. I propose a revolt.
Look, I’m not unreasonable. Broadband penetration in this country is rotten, and Microsoft certainly has some legitimate scepticism about chucking money at an infrastructure that’s ten years out of date. Nobody wants to field calls from Fanie in Pofadder who’s bitching about lag on his ostrich-powered 64k dialup. I don’t expect a fully-featured LIVE service with a local CDN installed here overnight, and neither should you. Let’s just start with the region blocking, and pretending South Africa tripped and fell off the edge of the universe. And mostly the Gears of War 2 All Fronts collection.
Petitions don’t work. Petitions are full of people who couldn’t be arsed to do anything except write their names down. The sort of people who can barely commit themselves to writing in full sentences, much less an annual subscription on a premium service and substantial investment in product. If you want actual results, get writing actual letters. Email Mark Hyland ([email protected]), John Press ([email protected]), or Microsoft’s PR people ([email protected]), and tell them you want your stuff. Constantly, emphatically, and above all else, exceedingly politely, because I don’t want my 20267 Gamerscore wiped for account fraud.
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