No its not the Nintendo Mii's pictured above, perhaps they got the idea from the Playmobil line of toys though. I have to say the Mii's look like them to a degree. Don't get me wrong, those simple looking Mii's are really fun & cool in the various games that are available on the Wii. But still, they are very simple and that's about where it ends with their abilities.

Now with the release of the NXE on the Xbox 360, more and more people have been saying that the new Avatars are like the Mii's. I just don't see it though or not as much at least. Just look at one of the OXM Editors Mii's that was created and used back in their March 2007 OXM issue and then compare it to one the NXE Avatars now for one of the OXM Editors. Side by side we are looking at simple basic shapes & colors for Mii's and compared to the fully animated characters of the NXE Avatars.

Now I've got a Wii and I just don't see any of the Community features that Live has to offer on the Wii. Ok, you can send a message to a Wii friend, provided you can remember that super long Wii number... Man I hope that I send this to the right person now. You can also spend the money an get Wii Speak with Animal Crossing and then chat with up to 4 people now. Where can I chat with a larger Party all at once again?

Should I even mention Sony and their Home project here and who are they ripping off? I think its more of a copy of the virtual reality world of Second Life than anything else. I'd rather have my Avatars in the NXE than mess with all of the Home stuff. You think scrolling through 100 friends in NXE is going to be some work, try running around a huge virtual world and searching for all of your friends. Oh wait, they can just come to my home and see me... like that will really fly.

Sometimes you just have to look at things side by side, to really compare them. I'll give you this, Home is not for me and I'm sure its fine for others that want that. The NXE I feel is great and the Avatars don't take away from my gaming in the end really. In fact I think its cool to see the Avatars and what people look like or how they see themselves at least. In the end I'm still just going to be playing games and the NXE is more than just the Avatars when all is said and done.

Yes some of the old Themes don’t work anymore and lucky for me I've never purchased a Theme. I feel bad for some that might be affected, but when it comes down to it, are we not playing games more than looking at our Dashboards? Things change over time and I feel the new performance and look & feel with the NXE is awesome in the end. Hopefully in time those not use to change will start to feel the same way.

The NXE has finally landed and now all of my co-workers have it as well... well the 5 of us on staff that own and play the Xbox 360 and on Xbox Live.

By the way, I'm the 2nd from the left and I'm sporting my Matrix Neo-TX look for now. I have to say its been a blast to look at all my friends and watch them come online, seeing how their Avatars have turned out.

In general I think that we've all been pleased with the update and the new look & feel of the dashboard menus. I'm sure over the next few days we'll have time to explore and find our own favorite features the NXE update has to offer.

For me the 8 person Live Chat is going to be a lot of fun I think. I like the Party Up mode and how it will keep us together, even if your game bumps you during an update. No more invite them over again, when your in a Party, your connected for all of the fun.

The improvements to Xbox.Com and the ability to select items from the Marketplace and queue them up for your Xbox is a very nice feature too and one I'm going to enjoy a lot. I can surf and find items I like and set them up and simply fire the Xbox 360 up and let it do its thing.

The next feature I'm looking forward to is the Xbox Primetime games and the ability to use your Avatars in these games. Set to roll out in the Spring now, will be 1 vs. 100 and allow you to play against other Xbox Live members and will feature Live Hosts and the ability to win real prizes.

I think things are looking pretty good for Xbox Live now and Gaming on the Xbox 360 platform and I haven't even touched on the vast number of game titles to pick up for the Holiday season.

NinjaBee is hosting a Launch Party tonight for their new XBLA game A Kingdom for Keflings, Tuesday Nov. 18th, here in the Xbox.com: A Kingdom for Keflings Forum. All you got to do is show up anytime after 6 p.m. EST to join in on the fun.

This is one of a handful of games that will allow you to make use of your Avatars with in the game play on Xbox Live. I can't think of a better way to brake in the New Xbox Experience than with a new Arcade title. Plus they have a really cool theme to get you in the mood as well.

NinjaBee will be on hand tonight to answer any of your questions about the game as well as giving away free codes for some of their NinjaBee games. They'll be there to party until the games official launch on Nove. 19th, so put on your PJs, grab you something to munch on, sidle up to your computer and your Xbox and get ready for a fun night with NinjaBee!

The video clip above outlines the steps that will take place on Wednesday when the NXE update is released. I've been previewing the features as of this past Friday and love it. Its really quick to install and get up and running. You'll spend more time playing around with the Avatar creation, but for now, you can just click a pre-made one and head off to game, then you can go back an change up your Avatar as much as you like.

What can I say about the New Xbox Experience? Simply... Wow! The new look and feel is wonderful and painless and your all going to love it.

I managed to get in from a early Preview through Major Nelson and in on the 3rd or 4th wave I'd say. So its only 5 days before everyone else gets the update and to have fun.

The Avatars are really cool to play with and I can't wait to try them out in some of the Prime Time games later on down the road. My daughter was really excited to see it when she came home and had to set hers up right away. When she was done with hers, she turned to Mama and said, "Hey, you want to set up your Mii now?" Sorry Microsoft, I took the controller back and told her its an Avatar.

The new interface really rocks and is so slick and improved from the old blades, I think people will really enjoy how well everything works together. Now the Live Chat with friends is not working right now, if they are not on NXE too, but your Voice messages back and forth work just fine. We'll all be back together starting on November 19th, right?

Netflix works really well and I'm impressed with how easy it works. I did the trial for now, that's right you'll get a free 2 week trial to start out with too. Select how many movies you like and start adding them to the Instant Watch Queue. I went with the standard 1 DVD out for $8.99 so far and unlimited downloads online. Guess I know what I'll be doing for the next two weeks.

I have more to explore and check out, I need to get in on some of the 8 person Live Chat soon, I've seen at least 2 or 3 on my Friends list have NXE so far. But now I need to decide on which game I want to play first under the NXE, if I can get the kids away from watching Netflix Movies that is.