In some ways I really like it, in other ways I really don't.
Things I like
I like that I can download game trailers and demos and trial versions onto my Xbox 360 hard drive for free.
I like that certain games available to buy are old games where buying the original version of the game for whatever platform would now cost far more than what they're asking, due to scarcity of the game (e.g. Triggerheart Exelica for Dreamcast costs about £60 for the Japanese import game on ebay, but is only 800 points = about £6.80 on XBLA... though changes are it doesn't have "story mode", and has HDTV support...)
I like that it queues things up for download, pauses the download when it needs to, and you can set it to carry on downloading while the rest of the console is switched off too (though my guess is that it uses about the same amount of power as being fully switched on).
I like the convenience of loading games from the hard drive, not having to look for discs.
Things I don't like
I don't like the way buying Microsoft points with a credit card leaves your card on the Xbox 360 by default (I mentioned this a few times in earlier posts).
I don't like the way that games are often advertised as the full game, just like the original, but they're often missing crucial parts of the game (e.g. "Story mode" in Soul Calibur and Triggerheart Exelica...)
I don't like separately priced "downloadable content" for games - the way that game publishers now charge you for most of a game when it's released, then you can buy more of the game (and avatars and wallpapers to use on XBLA) for Microsoft Points afterwards. "Beautiful Katamari" was especially terrible for this!
I don't like the way that the price is fixed for a game with Microsoft Points under XBLA and the price never comes down.
e.g. A normal game comes out on a console, the RRP is £50. After a week it's £40. After a month it's £30. After a year you'll find 2nd hand copies in the "4 for £20" section in your local high-street video-games shops, and about the same price on ebay.
That's my favourite time to buy games, when they're cheap as chips. When you have a game on XBLA, the price never drops. So you have a situation where supposedly budget releases of little downloadable games are more expensive than popular high-budget games like "Mass Effect" or "Bioshock" or "Blue Dragon" on the high street.
I bought two compilation disks from ebay of XBLA games - the one that comes with the "Arcade" version of the console, and one called "Live Unplugged". Buying them like this on disk, the games work out as about £2 each which is far closer to what they're worth.
Some examples of how contemporary price cuts compare to XBLA prices... You can buy "Doom" on XBLA for 400 points (about £3.40), or you can buy "Doom 3" for Xbox in any high-street videogames store in a "4 for £10" offer, which includes "Ultimate Doom" and "Doom 2" - for £2.50. Doom 3 was originally priced at about 20 times more than it is worth now, but now that game packaged with the original Doom as a bonus is cheaper than just Doom on its own on XBLA.
You need another game to get the most out of your "4 for £10" offer? I suggest "Midway Arcade Classics", which includes "Defender" (400 points), "Gauntlet" (400 points), Joust (400 points), Paperboy (400 points), Robotron: 2084 (400 points), Smash TV (400 points), and Root Beer Tapper (400 points). So... 2800 points, that's, oh... £23.80 for games you can buy on a compilation disk for £2.50 in shops.
The game applies to more XBLA games that are re-releases of old games - there's usually a cheaper compilation out or another remake that ends up being cheaper if you just wait patiently.
See how this all pans out? How it works against the way that high-street videogame pricing typically works, to the player's disadvantage? It feels like another method that a games distributor is using to keep prices artificially high, though I suppose it technically isn't. If XBLA games dropped in price the same way that normal games drop in price, I'd be far more inclined to buy games. I'd feel like it was a bargain, a good deal.
You can "beat" the system a little bit, by buying pre-paid Microsoft Points online from Amazon or whoever, as they sometimes undercut the RRP of those cards by a pound or two, but that's generally the best discount you can hope for.
I also don't like the way licensing works. If a friend is visiting you, and they want to play a game they bought on XBLA, they can download it onto the hard-drive of your Xbox 360, but will only have full game access on their own account - you can't play it with them unless you go to their house and play it on their Xbox 360. Or, you buy a copy. That's not very social.
I've also wanted to play some games multiplayer with a friend in my house, but it turns out that multiplayer is only supported on the game if my friend and I each play on our own Xbox 360s in our own houses, via the Internet through two Xbox Live Arcade Gold Membership accounts. Two people sitting next to each other in front of one console can't have fun playing the same game, oh no! That also makes for very un-social gaming! >_<
