Today at Microsoft's press conference, the company unveiled its upcoming online gaming service, Xbox Live. The Xbox Live service will be housed in four datacenters under construction in Seattle and Tukilwa, WA, Tokyo, and London, in an effort to provide a scalable and secure service. Microsoft has committed to assisting publishers in the hosting, networking, security, and billing for their online games.

　　General manager of Microsoft Xbox, J. Allard, stated "within five years every important game will be online. There will be new categories of collaborative and competitive console games that are possible only online. The ability to download new worlds, levels, characters, weapons, vehicles, teams, statistics, and missions will change the way developers think about creating games, and will change the way gamers play them."

　　Several of Xbox Live's unique features were explained in relative detail during today's conference. Xbox Live will employ a unique player identification and login system dubbed Gamertag. Gamertag is each player's unique ID, which is used to access all games across Microsoft's global gaming service. Each Xbox Live player will also be able to compile a list of friends and will be able to find them regardless of what games they are playing on the network. As mentioned in a previous article, each starter kit will retail for $49.95 and will include a yearly subscription to Xbox Live and the Xbox Communicator--a headset that will allow players to vocally communicate while playing online. The Communicator also features voice masking, global muting, and parental control functions.

　　During a recent visit to Redmond, we were able to see the features in action. A pack in game with the Xbox Live start kit, Acclaim's Revolt, supported the communicator's speech functionality, as did a build of the latest entry in their NFL Fever series, NFL 2003. The communicator fits snugly in the top slot of the Xbox controller and was always "on" in both games. The speech quality was very clear, although there was a very minor tinny quality to the sound it was hardly an issue. The device was always "on" in both games although it could be muted in two ways, via an actual button on the unit and within the options of the game. Muting within the game also offers players a bit more flexibility as players will have the option to mute individual. Another brief demonstration showed off the possibilities of the voice masking features which will allow developers to offer a variety of voice altering masks to players seeking customize their online personas. By tweaking a few variables, it was possible to change a player's voice to sound like a robot, a little girl and several other voices. At the moment the voice masking feature appears to be a tool developers will be able to play with and offer to players as current plans do not involve making the voice changing utility available to consumers, although it may be a possibility at some point. One of the biggest strengths of the peripheral is that supporting the Xbox Communicator is a requirement for any game released for Xbox Live.

　　Xbox Live will also feature matchmaking services called QuickMatch, which will allow players to enter multiplayer games with a single button click. The service will also utilize OptiMatch, which helps players find games and opponents of similar skill levels. High-speed content downloads will also be a part of the Xbox Live equation. It offers players the opportunity to download and permanently store content to their hard drives, including new levels, characters, and missions.

　　The Xbox live service and network has been two years in the making, and employs military-grade security encryption technology. Next week Microsoft will be launching a beta test of Xbox Live that will incorporate 10,000 players. The complete Xbox Live service is scheduled for launch this fall. We'll have more details on Xbox Live as they become available.