Microsoft's Games For Windows initiative has caught a lot of anger from the gaming community for a variety of reasons, but some of those are about to erased, as 1up is reporting that a couple of big announcements regarding GFW Live have been made at Gamefest 2008.

First up is the news that multiplayer features such as matchmaking and cross-platform play with the Xbox 360 no longer require a paid GFW Live Gold account. Many gamers have been hostile towards Microsoft in the past for charging for these features, most of which are free on services such as Steam.

Next was the announcement that the long-overdue GFW Live Marketplace is coming, from which you will be able to pick up demos, trailers, and more. Microsoft plans to make it as functional and content-rich as the Xbox Live Marketplace.

---

In addition, it was announced that a change to the GFW interface making it easier for developers to make their games compatible with the service is coming. A pair of upcoming GFW games were also revealed in the form of Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II and Battlestations: Pacific.

Microsoft looks like they're finally ready to take their PC gaming service seriously, but with Steam ruling the market it may be hard or impossible to overcome the disastrous launch and convince gamers that GFW Live is the future of PC gaming. It'll be interesting to see how these announcements go over with the PC gaming community.

No Gears of War 2 For PC [9/29/08] 67% match
E3 2008: Halo Wars Coming In 2009 [7/14/08] 67% match
Games For Windows Still Alive [1/07/08] 67% match
GB Review: Gears of War (PC) [11/14/07] 67% match
GB Review: Gears of War 2 (360) [11/16/08] 33% match
World of Warcraft: WotLK Prepares For Inva... [11/12/08] 33% match
Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts Text Difficu... [11/05/08] 33% match