Gears of War Drives Xbox Live Bandwidth Consumption

While Microsoft is forecasting 10 million sold units of Xbox 360 by the end of 2006, Gears of War may be the catalyst that will fuel the sales of consoles to the 10 million milestone. A strong argument for this is the major impact that the title has on the Xbox Live. Currently, Microsoft informed that Xbox Live has over 4 million users and that the company expects that number to grow over 6 million by the end of the 2007 fiscal year in June.

According to data made available by Sandvine Incorporated, there has been an over 80% increase in the number of hosts using Xbox Live over North American broad bands networks. This jump in Xbox live users is mirrored by a consistent growth in bandwidth consumption. Sandvine revealed that the traffic experienced by Xbox Live has increased by more than 30% since November 7. But Gears of War cannot get all the credit as Microsoft also released over 20 new games and debuted a TV and movie media download service.

"On November 6, 2006 Microsoft announced the pending release of their new service for downloading high-definition TV shows and movies using the Xbox Live network. The following day Microsoft released six new Xbox games, including the highly anticipated 'Gears of War' which sold 1-million copies and rapidly climbed the ranks of online games to become the top played game on Xbox Live within its first two weeks of availability. Microsoft reported that "more than 850,000 unique gamers had engaged in 10 million gameplay sessions" of 'Gears of War' on Xbox Live by November 21. At the time this study concluded, November 27, Microsoft had released more than 18 additional games and launched their TV and movie downloading service to the public," reads Sandvine's press release.

The traffic surge generated with the release of Gears of War is synonymous with a similar bandwidth consumption associated with the release of Halo II in 2004.