C64_Critic wrote:fod wrote:
The important thing is that Microsoft keeps making their exclusives available to Game Pass for PC. I've been playing Xbox-related content nearly for free for the past 4 years just by accumulating Bing points and spending them on Xbox Live Gold and Xbox Game Pass subscriptions.
Color me intrigued - as someone who has accumulated over 100k Bing points over the years and never redeemed them, you're saying I can use them for something that will score me free games? I wen to the "Redeem Rewards" page but I don't see anything called "Game Pass for PC". Can you give me some more specifics?
Mahalo!
Whoa, you mean someone else has fallen into this "trap," too? Suddenly I don't feel so alone. All right!!
Kidding aside, I haven't spent a dime on anything Xbox related in the last year, as I use my Bing points to buy things from the Xbox Marketplace on the Xbox One. Usually, I will redeem my points for an Xbox gift card (values vary between $1.25 up to $25) which immediately adds that amount to your Microsoft Account balance. After you use your points on the gift card, simply go to a game you want to buy, either on your PC or on the Xbox One, select checkout, then "Pay with Microsoft Account balance."
You can redeem points for Xbox Live Gold and Game Pass, and it should apply to both Xbox One and PC. I have redeemed points for Game Pass, but have never played on PC, though I do get messages about it periodically. I have bought games on my PC before and had them show up in my Xbox One catalogue, and I do believe the two are linked. That is to say, if you buy a game that has a version on both PC and Xbox (such as Recore or Shadow of the Tomb Raider) you buy the game once and own it for both systems.
I also bought Game Pass Ultimate on my account a few months ago, and received an e-mail with a code to redeem on the Microsoft Store. I gave the code to my wife, and she used it to redeem Game Pass on her account, no problem. I believe anytime you redeem for Live or Game Pass, you are given a code which is not tied to your account. You are free to give it away, sell it on eBay, etc. However, when you redeem a Xbox or Microsoft Gift Card, that balance is immediately applied to your account and can not be transferred. It's all in the fine print when you checkout. Still, I was pleasantly surprised I could "gift" Game Pass to my wife's account. Since she plays way, way more than I do, it's been a great use of my points.
I call it a trap because of the compulsive need it gives me to search on Bing every single day, hoping to rack up more points. Darn that Microsoft marketing, they've got me hooked!!