Xbox Live director of programming Larry "Major Nelson" Hyrb has announced that the Xbox Live Marketplace has now passed the 50 million download mark, which is somewhat amazing when you consider the 25 million mark was only passed some 3 months ago.
Along with that announcement, Hyrb also let the public in on some other interesting facts regarding the Xbox Live Marketplace and the Xbox Live service itself;
"The Xbox PR team just released some interesting data that I think some of you may find interesting. Check these numbers out!
- The Xbox Live Marketplace just passed 50 million downloads. That is double the 25 million mark from just three months ago.
- In the first week of Madden '07 releasing, Xbox Live members unlocked over 600,000 achivements and hosted more than 2-million hours of Madden gameplay.
- 'Texas Hold 'em' set a one day record as the fastest download item ever on the Marketplace. There were over 100 downloads a minute in the first 24-hours of release.
Other Xbox Live statistics:
- More than 50 million downloads of gaming and entertainment content from Xbox Live Marketplace to date
- Over 2 billion hours spent on Xbox Live by gamers across the globe since the launch of the Xbox Live online gaming network in November 2002
- More than 60 percent of Xbox 360 owners are connected to Xbox Live
- 1,300,000 text and voice messages are sent via Xbox Live every day. Currently totaling half a billion sent messages between the Xbox Live community per year, this figure is set to explode with the launch of the Xbox Live Vision camera on September 19, 2006 in the U.S.
- 65 per cent of all connected consoles already downloading and playing Xbox Live Arcade titles
- Over 8 million downloads of Xbox Live Arcade games following the launch of Xbox 360
- Over 2 billion Microsoft Points sold to date " -Larry "Major Nelson" Hyrb
As Hyrb is a Microsoft employee who's very job is based on Xbox Live content delivery, I'd probably say some of that information may be a bit on the optimistic side. For example, does Microsoft really expect an explosion in the number of messages sent when the Xbox Live Vision camera hits stores on September 19th? Are people suddenly going to start sending more messages just because they have a camera?
Along the same lines, do the figures regarding Live and Live Arcade usage count time spent idle/doing something other than gaming on Live and demo downloads? As many Xbox 360 owners have their machines permanently connected to the internet, there's always a chance a lot of those reported "2 billion hours" spent on Xbox Live could have been times when 360 users simply had their console on to watch a movie or play music, not actually use the Live service.
Either way, it's some interesting data to look at, and it certainly shows the importance of Xbox Live when it comes to the Xbox 360. Looks like Microsoft is doing well in their goal of making Live an integral part of the 360 experience. Check out Major Nelson's blog at this link for the post regarding Live usage stats and all your Xbox Live information needs.
