One of the features that I love about the Xbox and Xbox 360 is Live. Over Live I can play games with other people from the comfort of my own home over an internet connection. I've played with people of various nationalities and ethnic groups. I often play with complete strangers but do have a few people I'll play more often with. The most important parts of any good multiplayer game is the actual community that plays that game. Often you will find a few jerks online but for the most part it's not bad unless you are playing a Tom Clancy game. The Tom Clancy games (Rainbow Six and Ghost Recon specifically) have some of the most game play types and best server connections. This has given the game a fairly large loyal following that moves from game to game. Rainbow Six 3 for the Xbox was one of the most played online games on the original xbox. I spent probably hundreds of hours playing that game. I made a few friends and often played with them and their friends. But on those occasions I hunted down a match with strangers I often met racists and jerks online. Still this was not a completely horrible experience because I could leave and find a new match that had a better group.

When I first got my 360 is was a really nice experience to play Call of Duty 2 online since most people where nice and there was very little trash talk. When GRAW came out for the 360 I picked it up and unfortunately a lot of those jerks did too. It was still a fun game online and I played the game a ton. I just started playing GRAW 2 on live and have found the experience very frustrating. My rank right now is a 1 online since I just started playing. The problem now is when I join a ranked room I'm often met by someone saying "boot the 1." I think I've played online all week and maybe played three or four ranked matches. I'm either booted or the match never gets started. I don't know why but a lot of people are creating rooms and just sitting in them. So far I've only been in one good room. It was an unranked room and we had a great time. I played several games and actually gained some of the online achievements. I sent a couple of the guys friend request and hope to play with them more to avoid the crap I've been experiencing.

I think the major problem here is how Ubisoft (developers of the Tom Clancy games) implements their ranked matches. They match you up by rank but allow the person acting as the server to control the game. This person can kick people out of the room and change the game preferences. They also allow you to replay the same people you just played. Many people like this but I hate it in a ranked game. You end up getting unbalanced teams and are subject to the server's whims. I much rather play a ranked match like Gears or Call of Duty 2 than of GRAW 2 or Rainbow Six: Vegas.