Sorry about the OTT subject name, but this is very important news for 360 owners who have bought Shivering Isles.
The bug, in its early stages has the effect of disabling any new items from being created, and later on, if it has not been diagnosed, could even result in your character being reset and eventually your save file being corrupted.
As of yet Bethesda has not officially commented on the bug affecting the 360 version, but it has been unofficially confirmed....
Proof Here -
http://www.bethsoft.com/bgsforums/index.php?showtopic=677583&st=0Here is a quote from the UESP wiki that outlines the situation
A very serious bug has been found with Shivering Isles that will render the game unplayable in many ways about 50 to 120 hours of play (better FPS means bug hits earlier) after installing the expansion. The bug will occur if you have SI installed -- regardless of whether you access SI content or not.
The bug is thoroughly confirmed on both the PC and the Xbox. The only difference is that it takes more hours of play to affect Xbox users (at the very least 75 hours; with normal gameplay over 150 hours).
While the situation appeared quite bad initially, several unofficial tools are now available for the PC, and Bethesda has released a beta patch. Although no fixes are available yet for Xbox 360, the prospects for Bethesda eventually releasing an official patch over Xbox Live appear promising.
Bethesda's original official response was:
Regarding the issue in which Form ID's are being used at a high rate in the Shivering Isles content; we are aware of the issue and we are currently looking into a solution. We appreciate your patience, especially from those of you affected by this issue, as we carefully work out a fix that will correct this problem without adding any new issu"es. --NothingCatchy, Developer
Here is some advice for 360 owners who simply cannot leave this game alone whilst awaiting a patch.
Advice (Xbox)
There is currently no way for Xbox 360 players to fix the problem. A patch cannot be released over Xbox Live until after it has gone through preliminary testing (now being done on PCs with the beta patch) and approval by Microsoft. The release of a beta patch indicates that Bethesda is working on an official fix, but it takes more time to go through the process necessary for Xbox Live patches.
Uninstalling Shivering Isles may be possible, but is more difficult than uninstalling any of the other downloaded content. It probably requires:
Deleting the 1GB download file for Shivering Isles (see Official Mods on Xbox 360 for details).
Deleting all patches that have been installed (see Patches on Xbox 360 for details).
Reinstalling the patches by connecting to Xbox Live.
This process has not been tested, and is not recommended since it is possible to play Shivering Isles for many hours without problems.
It is also very difficult on the Xbox to determine how much playing time you have left until the bug will hit, especially because your playing time depends upon how you play the game. The more time you spend in menus that pause the game (inventory menus, reading books, talking to NPCs, picking locks, bartering, making spells, enchanting items, looking at maps, etc) the more playing time you will have available.
There is absolutely no chance of triggering the bug during the first 70 hours of playing time, if you started with a new character when you installed Shivering Isles.
If you were continuing play with a previous character (one you started playing before installing Shivering Isles) you may have 10 less hours of playing time than if you started with a new character (i.e., minimum 60 hours instead of 70 hours).
The only way to trigger the bug after only 70 hours of playing is by playing in very artificial ways (in particular, not using any menus or interacting with anything in the game) for the entire time. In other words, unless you intentionally force the bug to happen, you will have much more than 70 hours of playing time.
With normal gameplay, you should have at least 140 hours of playing time. If you follow the suggestions below, you will probably have well over 200 hours of playing time available.
Most Xbox players should be able to continue playing for quite a while before the bug manifests. With the following suggestions, you should be able to extend your available playing time to more than 200 hours, and also limit the possible effects of the bug.
Do not overwrite any saved games. Save to a new file each time you save your game.
Whenever you are not actively playing the game, go into a menu to pause the game (for example, hit the "B" key to open your inventory).
If you need to wait while playing the game, use the "wait" function ("BACK" key).
For example, if you go to the Market District to sell loot and arrive there at 7am, wait for an hour instead of just standing around for an hour.
Spend extra time doing activities within menus. For example:
Read some of the books in the game.
Spend more time talking to NPCs.
Try using the persuasion mini-game instead of charm spells.
Try picking locks instead of open spells.
If you are worried that you may be about to run out of time before the bug hits (i.e., you have played for much more than 100 hours since installing Shivering Isles), you can:
Check your save games, as detailed in Testing/Repair. If your save game passes the tests, you can keep playing.
Start a new, throw-away character instead of your main character. Be sure to completely restart the game first and then choose "New" from the first game menu, otherwise the new character's storage space will not be empty, and you will not get the maximum possible playing time. Time spent playing with a new character will not affect any other characters you may have. So explore some new places with a new character until an official patch is released, then go back to your original character.
To avoid quoting the entire page, here is the link to the wiki -
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Shivering:Reference_BugDespite all this advice, I am taking no risks, I am simply avoiding Oblivion completely until I hear news of a patch. In the mean time, I purchased Virtua Tennis 3 (A fantastic game in my opinion, although I do not think of my self as a tennis fan)
Lastly, if you use digg, and would like to help get this news out there, please digg this story -
http://digg.com/gaming_news/WARNING_Game_breaking_Shivering_Isles_Bug_Confirmed_To_Effect_Xbox_360 Thanks, and good luck.