Needless to say I’m excited. For the most part these screens show very little in the way of new features (aka no sign of group chat) however they do show one of the coolest new features I could have hoped for, the “Launch Pad”. As I understand it the launch pad is the place to fire up all the homebrew games made using XNA studio express (did I mention XNA studio express is free and the first beta can be downloaded here). If these screens are real, and I’m told they are, then homebrew Xbox 360 gaming might not be as far away as I thought.
Unfortunately putting the launch pad to the side the updates seen in the other screens look little more than dashboard botox and appear to add little to the functionality. Still it’s early days yet if the last dashboard update is anything to go by it will be the last possible day of the “fall” in the US before we see any of this on your own system, which to be honest is fine as far as I am concerned.