There is a story about a Microsoft interview where the interviewer asked "You're in an 8x8 stone corridor… The prince of darkness appears before you… What do you do?" The candidate fumbled and was told that the correct answer was "You WASTE him! You *WASTE* the prince of darkness!!" The interviewer stated that one of the reasons for asking such a question was to uncover if the candidate was a gamer as the position had something to do with gaming.

It got me thinking about the appointment of product management for XBox at Microsoft South Africa, I don't know who they are, but I don't think that they would know what to do with the prince of darkness.

Interviewer: You're in an 8x8 stone corridor… The prince of darkness appears before you… What do you do?
<long pause>
Microsoft ZA product management: Sell him Vista Ultimate?
Interviewer: No… Quickly! You're about to be pwned!
Microsoft ZA product management: Oh, I know… get into a licensing agreement and join him in taking over the world!

I don't think that the product management in South Africa really knows enough about gaming to get through any real gaming related interview.  Let me give some reasons why not.

The console distribution channel seems confused and unsure of what they are selling and why.  Apart from sales staff not having a clue what you are talking about, the games that are on the shelves are sparse and outdated.  Last year, when buying Gears of War, the Sandton City CNA finally received stock after Christmas – the biggest game of the season, timed for a Christmas release internationally, was in short supply.  In October they had posters in the window, but come 'Emergence Day' nothing emerged – no locusts to waste or pwn for Christmas.  When I walk past the store I always pop in to see what they have on the shelves and it doesn't do the XBox justice – about three months after COD3 was released, they still had COD2 occupying their shelves and no COD3.  So, a new XBox owner is going to buy his console with a game that he thinks is a new game, but is already a classic – comparing his new console to a PS3 will be embarrassing.

The obvious suggestion is to go to a speciality gaming store, like the one in Northgate, which I did.  I walked into the shop, turned to the X-Box area and bolding asked "I want to buy GRAW2 please", "What?" was the reply, "I want to buy Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2, please" I repeated more explicitly "Oh, okay, here it is…".  The gaming shops are into PC games and just don't understand the X-Box and X-Box Live! subculture.  To sell X-Box games you have to know, not only what to do with the prince of darkness, but must also know what "Gears", "Graw", "Six" and other abbreviations refer to.

I was walking around the PC section of the same shop and there was a customer who I could see had money in his pocket and wanted to walk out with an X-Box or PS3. The salesman fumbled through interesting anecdotes about overheating and other rumours and, when pushed about the games and graphics, finally admitted that he is more of a "PC Man" and has never played a console game. The guy left the shop with nothing and his R6,000 plus still in his pocket.

By far the most obvious example that the product management here at Microsoft wouldn't know what to do with the prince of darkness is the lack of XBox Live support for South Africans. A lot of South Africans play XBox Live and log in using accounts created with UK or US credentials and there is a thriving online community. It is not uncommon to join a quick match and find South Africans playing a game. The 'gears' community seems to be the biggest (and most addicted) and once a game gets hosted in South Africa everyone jumps into the space so that they can play a lag-free game (thanks to the hosts for using your precious bandwidth – you know who you are). When I switch on my XBox, most of my friends are local and at least half of them are online for the entire evening or weekend.

I am not sure how many people at Microsoft South Africa really play XBox live but it can't be that many because I am sure they are not officially allowed to.  For those who have not, we need to give them some clues:

• XBox is XBox live – the only possible exception being games for kids
• Live enabled games, such as 'gears' or 'graw2', without Live can be played for a weekend or two before they become boring.  There are South Africans (we know who they are) who have probably spent an average of three hours a day for the last six months (500+ hours) playing 'gears' – the value proposition for the entire console and game changes drastically when you get that much entertainment out of it.
• X-Box Live is miles ahead of what PS3 has to offer and is the key difference between the consoles – if you want to sell XBoxes, get Live sorted out and get some market share!

Why is there no XBox live in South Africa?  I don't know really and when I stopped following the discussions last year there was a mention of 'negotiations with Telkom' (Telkom is South Africa's much hated, overpriced fixed line operator). Hang on a minute!  Does this mean that Telkom is telling me what to do with my (very expensive) bandwidth?  Am I being censored and is Microsoft South Africa colluding with Telkom?  Don't start with lies about consuming too much bandwidth, there is a 'gears' junkie who plays 'gears' (very well) on a dial-up line.

So to return to the interview…

Interviewer: You're in an 8x8 stone corridor… The prince of darkness appears before you… What do you do?
Microsoft ZA product management: We negotiate with him and offer the souls of local XBox Live users to him in exchange for being left alone.

The prince of darkness in South Africa is Telkom and he is not being wasted by anyone at Microsoft South Africa.

A new update of XBox Dashboard will apparently filter content based on originating IP addresses – supposedly all the South Africans will still be able to play live games but nothing is sure when your IP address originates in the realm of the prince of darkness. This is enough to make a whole lot of shotgun wielding COGs and locusts nervous and trigger happy and there is a petition online to bring this to the attention of somebody. 

This has created a stir and Microsoft is giving some answers on CraigN's blog and in this News24 article.  One official response from Cindy White cracks me up - "Xbox 360 is a true next-generation digital entertainment experience, that with or without Live the experiences can be enjoyed." Dont be such a noob!  XBox is no fun without Live, and this comment appeared in the GRAW2 forums echoes the feelings of many Xbox gamers - "I vow you will never see a single player achievement for me in Graw2 <snip> if i wanted to play single player games i would have gotten a ps1"

So, if you are from Microsoft South Africa and reading this please try and change things before you get pwned by Sony and Ster Kinekor.  You may need to start a new round of interviews though.

Simon Munro
Gamertag – Delph1za