I have a weird relationship with Xbox Live. I happily pay every time my subscription runs out but I rarely use it, it’s more for trying out multiplayer modes that have been cobbed together at the last moment. That sounds stupid now that I think about it.

Anywhoo, today I finally caved and bought Modern Warfare 2 knowing that I could justify it by using my Xbox Live account. Buying something to validate something I’ve already bought, it makes sense and is not crazy in the least. I ripped off the shrink wrapping on the case and threw the disc in the drive along with busting out a brand spanking new headset.

I then attempted to use that Xbox Live account I’d neglected for so long only to find My NAT was set to strict. So I couldn’t get into any games and a brief foray into the world of Party Chat was met with disappointment when nobody could hear me.

So rather than spending the first 90 minutes of the game gunning down hapless foes who happen to fall in the middle of the venn diagram of ‘never playing the original’ and ‘being new to games altogether’, I ended up running diagnostic tests on a network. Obviously, I pursued opening the NAT up in an attempt to getting online and apparently the ghetto setup of wireless – Macbook – Xbox over Ethernet isn’t fixable.

I eventually busted out a 20 meter long ethernet cable and ran it through the house straight from the source. Still this isn’t the first time I’ve had problems with networks and I have to wonder why? Getting your device online should be the easiest 5 minutes of your life but the lack of a built in wireless receiver makes it more than troublesome.

I guess (trying to find the point of this rant) is that networks, and all technology, need to work invisibly. The man on the street who just wants to play some games online shouldn’t have to know what IP addresses, subnet masks or PPPoE connections are. Presumably the idea is that ethernet networks are so unreliable and fiddly that people just run out and hand over the £60 to Microsoft for a shiny wireless adapter. I thought about doing that, gladly I didn’t though.