Free XBLA game ... if you follow the rules

Itching for a gratis Xbox Live Arcade game? Microsoft is offering one of five titles for free, but you have to follow these four steps:

Live in the UK.
Sign up for 12 months of Xbox Live Gold between now and January 5. It must be done directly through Xbox Live, meaning you can't use that prepaid card your mom or significant other bought you as a gift.
Decide what game you want free: Zuma, Marble Blast, Sonic the Hedgehog, Assault Heroes or 3D Ultra Minigolf. Do this step in your head.
Download a gamer pic or theme related to the game. Only the first one counts, so make sure you didn't skip Step 3 before downloading a picture of a putter when you're hoping to nab Sonic.

See, folks? Even with digital distribution, TINSTAAFL applies: There is no such thing as a free lunch. Of course, if you were needing to upgrade or renew your subscription anyways, you might as well get something extra out of it.

Update: Sorry, one more caveat folks -- it's UK only.

[Thanks, Richard]

Reader Comments (44)

Uhm if you are going to use a Heinlen Ref at least get it correct. TANSTAFL :Their Ain't No Such Thing As Free Lunch:

You too! It's TANSTAAFL. Two a's. There ain't no such thing as a free lunch.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TANSTAAFL

But I, like you, signed in just to correct the TINSTAAFL.

Also, It's Heinlein.

That game is as addictive as crack.

My Live doesn't expire until like April...

and I'm low on money...

Should count pre-paid cards. Jerks.

Yeah. I don't really like giving out CC info for subscriptions, as they're usually a bugger to cancel... that, and I don't have a Credit card :S

Hmm.. Amazon sells 13 months for 38.99.

With this deal, you pay 49.99 for 12 months and you get a 5 dollar game.

You win! +1 to you.

So rewards the new member but fuck your loyal fanbase, am i getting this correctly?

just like the xbla sales.
I already own most of the games that were going on sale

Yep. That's pretty much it.

Spare the drama.

It's a promotion to get new Xbox Live users.

That's like saying you got royally screwed by Apple because they started a free i-Pod promotion after you already bought a shit load of MP3's off their iTunes store.

That's how business works.

LOL you said buy songs.

I bought a year subscription like 2 weeks ago. Imagine how i feel :p.

Who buys music from iTunes when they don't have a iPod?

"LOL you said buy songs."

That statement always irks me. Some songs just cannot be found illegally so I always try various online music stores.

Even if I couldn't get a card off Amazon for $39, I wouldn't ever pay for Xbox Live Gold with a credit card again. It took me literally MONTHS to get my credit card information removed from the account due to some bullshit "processing" period in which Microsoft tried to figure out a way to convince me to keep the card on the account.

yeah i hate that. i want to be able to remove my credit card and cancel an xbox live subscription from the dashboard.

They've taken $50 a year since I was a BETA tester. The only free game I got was for losing two weeks of LIVE during the launch of COD4. Gee M.S. keep up the "good" work! Oh and I had NO choice as to what game it was. I don;t even remember the name of it...Scuba diving and shooting...ZZZZZZZ

5. Profit

With the money you save getting a prepaid card from newegg, you could get an XBLA game and perhaps even ... lunch!

Puzzleloop?
Its free on the iphone/touch appstore.

Well I think the next step is just to apologize to those you've hurt and you're cured!

2:1 that gold becomes free at some point in January.

They are just trying to get people to prepay before they do so.

Fisty swore he would never be like those tadpoles that grow up and shoot colored gems out of their mouths, but he wondered what it might be like.

-The Sign Painter

What a stupid offer.

My XBL just renewed itself on Dec. 12th, so I can't get a game? Retarded. Let's reward those who renew their subscriptions in the time span of a coupe weeks and screw everyone else. Great offer MS.

It's not "free" if you have to pay $50.

The $50 is how much Live always costs, you are getting the game for free, you just have to renew your subscription to get the deal.

Source?

Located at the bottom of the article?

yeah, found it after, lol,
i totally missed it on first 2 read throughs.

I DON'T follow the rules

The new rule of free stuff is to make you feel like a scavenging beggar with arbitrary requirements.

you can play this game on msn messenger
http://zone.msn.com/en/luxor/default.htm
merry Christmas.

Sweet, my subscription runs out on Christmas. Looks like I'm renewing a couple days early.

I was planning on getting a new subscription so I did today. I went ahead and got the Assault Heroes theme. It's still not letting me download the game. What am I missing

Sweet, I was just about to renew my subscription.

I love my 360, but I regret signing up with a credit card after I heard about it being a bitch to cancel. I go out of my way to avoid places that do that. So anyway, to me, it isn't worth it, stay with the prepaid card if you can.

Um... According to the mass e-mail that Microsoft sent to me, the freebies are WAY different than the once Listed here. To me it says Hexic 2, Hardwood Spades, Poker Smash, n+, E4, the Crackdown: Getting Busy Pack, and the Halo 3 Legendary Map Pack.

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/community/promotions/2008/holidaygift/default.htm

I don't see assault heroes or zuma listed anywhere...

Wookie's right. Joystiq is posting the Great Britain deal, not the US. You'll notice their link goes to http://www.xbox.com/en-GB/ not http://www.xbox.com/en-US/. You should probably fix this Joystiq, you're costing people money on wasted sonic themes.

Also, the US deal is for new members only. Seriously Joystiq, you owe me 50 MSP for the crappy Assault Heroes theme taking up space on my hard drive.

Dammit! My live renews itself on January 24th!

I guess I'm not eligible to this.

Sorry but this is a mega lame promotion. You shouldn't have even posted it.

Free XBLA game ... if you follow the rules

Reader Comments (44)

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