back to article Microsoft to cash in chips on virtual currency

Microsoft will call time on its virtual currency, Microsoft Points, with a switch to real money on the cards later this year, it has been claimed. Future transactions across the Windows Phone, Zune and Xbox Live platforms will be based on the currencies of the region in which the user has pegged their account to, an anonymous …

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  1. Pirate Zebedee
    Thumb Up

    About time to

    Good - being an Xbox 360 and iPhone own it always puts me off buying add-ons, Videos etc. on the Microsoft Platform it tells me that it is going to cost my x amount of points then working out the real value, at least with Apple products you know how much it is going to cost before you purchase it, this will be a win for Microsoft and for the end user.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hmm

    Will it be as easy to empty these accounts, as it seems to be for Xbox Live accounts?

  3. thalter
    Thumb Up

    About Time

    I hope they do away with the old carny trick of making you buy points in fixed amount, where it seems that you are always stuck with an unused balance that is too small to buy anything.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Unhappy

    Unused points

    Yes, will microsoft give back those unused funds when the points system finally dies? it may be the odd £1-£2 or so for each user, but if each user has, on average, £1 unused (is that around 80 points from memory?), how many millions of XBox users?

  5. Norphy

    Good

    Would be nice if Nintendo followed suit

  6. Gareth 18

    Unused points

    I'm not that bothered about that part. Chances are that Microsoft will just convert them into cash and they will sit on your Live account waiting to be used much like your current points do. I doubt they will ever actually give it back to you.

    The big question is how do you judge what a point is actually worth? Depending on how many you bought initially (800, 2100, 4200 etc) it could differ as the price per point comes down the more points you buy.

    I guess the cost of content post change will need to be monitored to ensure that there is no sudden increases because they calculate the cost of content as higher then the cost of the points themselves.

    I think it is a good move if they do it, there are just lots of issues around how they do it.

  7. Oninoshiko

    Bad move for MS

    The idea of a system like this is to mentally decouple your purchases from the costs. While it may not work for the average elReg reader, this type of thing DOES work for most people. Actually letting people know what they are spending is the nice, ethical thing to do, but not great fiscally.

    If you happened to be the person running the conversion, you are the exception that proves the rule.

  8. Shaun 1

    With regards to having points left on my account, it will make no difference to me, as I'll still buy topup cards. Not willing to put my card details on my console (XBOX or PS3)

  9. John Tserkezis

    Itchy And Scratchy Land Money....

    ...It's like real money, but more fun... And now worth nothing.

    I was going to ask how anyone falls for this crap, but then again, if they can dupe Homer Simpson into it...

  10. djswivel
    FAIL

    It's just a rumor...

    This has already been reported on trueachivements.com and as they said, there is no proof whatsoever to back this story up.

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