Members of the Xbox Live Rewards program learned today that for the rest of this month, a 15,000 Rewards Credit will be awarded to new buyers of $59.99 USD worth of Halo games, add-ons, and videos on the Xbox Store, including the recently released Halo: The Master Chief Collection.
The program is also offering the same amount of credits, which translates to $15 USD in your Microsoft account, for any pre-orders on games “that ship this holiday season,” along with free shipping.
While the deal might benefit new buyers who held off on picking up The Master Chief Collection after catching wind of its troubled launch, the news clearly doesn’t sit well with early adopters who were met with busted online matchmaking services and a handful of bugs and glitches after paying full price for the game in November.
343 Industries Studio Head Bonnie Ross made it clear that the company has plans to ‘take care of all owners’ and ‘make it right’ with fans who were feeling let down with the game’s launch, but we’ve yet to hear exactly what that might entail. While we wait for news, reports are coming in that there are still ways early buyers can take advantage of the new Xbox Live Rewards offer or at least receive some form of compensation.
On Reddit, a couple of users were offered a full refund on The Master Chief Collection after explaining their intent to repurchase the game while taking advantage of the rebate. Other users were offered three months of Xbox Live Gold after expressing their disappointment. Here are some excerpts:
“I just explained that I wanted to take advantage of the 15,000 points and wanted the refund for the purpose to repurchase and obtain the funds. She gave me the ‘one time only’ spiel but I just consider that jargon. MS takes care of their customers, especially ones who are loyal to the Xbox brand and who have bought +40 titles for their new console.”
“i just contacted MS and spoke to ‘Joan’. She said that we should get the deal if you have the digital copy of MCC. You just have to go post in the xbox rewards support. ‘Please sign in to this link: http://forums.xbox.com/xbox_forums/default.aspx and then click on Xbox Rewards Support and you will see the ‘Add a new post’ on the left side of your screen and please click on it to post a message.'”
“Can confirm, this is a thing. Seems they’re doing this for all who got it in the month of November. Sales rep told me ‘Okay so unfortunately we cannot offer the rewards points but what I can do for you is offer you 3 months of Xbox Live for the troubles’.”
Others weren’t so lucky, but it might be worth a try if you feel strongly about the situation. It’s also not clear if these users used their once-in-a-life-time-refund for Xbox Live or if was entirely separate. Good luck, if you decide to try!
In the meantime, more updates for Halo: The Master Chief Collection are still in the works while 343 Industries continues to improve the experience.