Destinaion Arcade

So, Microsoft appear to be stepping up to the plate. We've seen that the PlayStation boys are able to have customised 'store fronts' for their various publishers in the PlayStation Store (on PS3 only, boo!) and with the New Xbox Experience, I had almost expected something along those lines in there. I mean, it's got some great features and is FAR more usable than the original dashboard used to be, but there was a lack of customisability in there from a Publisher's point of view, and that kinda sucks.

Major Nelson, however, has announced Destination Arcade, which looks to bring a much better discovery experience to the Xbox. Go have a look at the screenshots, it's pretty nice. It's a departure from the dashboard, but maybe it'll feature Kinect interaction some how. With this first simple change to what has been a neglected and increasingly over-priced part of the Xbox Live experience, we could see offerings like that offered by PlayStation. Soon, they may even one-up them. I'm not a fanboy, but Microsoft are quite an underdog, and Underdogs are always fun to root for.

In the future, I'd love to see a similar service offered for Retail/Games on Demand titles, offering access to DLC for games you've got, much like they're already offering on the Dashboard in a simplistic manner. The Internet is changing it's focus to User Content and User Owned Content, they call it Web 2.0. Maybe this is Xbox 360 2.0 in it's infancy? I wait with bated breath.