RicaneliteIf you upgrade into an Elite, your Arcade games have a surprise for you
It's always fun when you get to test out new hardware: trying to see what works and what doesn't, looking for differences—the whole thing can be exhausting once you get into the details. I moved my Live account from my old system to the Elite easily enough, and then I started to redownload all my Arcade games. This is kind of a process since I have over 20 games and the system only lets you queue up to six downloads at a time. I sat down and played some Geometry Wars, and then I remembered hearing about the problems people had with migrating their games. I rarely have my system away from my home network, so I reached back and unplugged the cable to see if I could play the games without the online authentication.
All the games, all of them, turned into demos that asked me to download the full version. This is unhappiness in the making. I plug my cable back in and get on the phone.
I'm told by customer service that the only way to get the games working is to get my free data migration cable, and then he asks me to register my system to get the cable. Okay, I'm done getting customer service-d and the snow job has begun. I'm a little upset that among the many cables that come with the Elite they don't give you the data cable like they do with the standalone hard drive—and in fact many people online have been talking about their plans to buy the stand alone and return it after using the cable—but I'm even more upset that the cable is reportedly causing the same DRM to kick in with your games. No fun.
Why can't this be something that turns on when you move the games, and then you can call and get them unlocked again? If I bring my Elite to a friend's house that doesn't have Ethernet in the living room, we can't play Geometry Wars? That's silly.
C'mon Microsoft. Those of us who upgraded have spent $880 between the two systems, plus games. The least you can do is allow us to easily play the games we've paid you for. This needs to be fixed.
