November 20th 2012 8:00 am PT

Xbox LIVE Marketplace Holiday Offers

We are heading into the Holiday shopping season, and the Xbox LIVE Marketplace has some deals that just went live and will be available until Monday November 26th.*

Last week I posted the Xbox Black Friday deals that will be available at our national retail partners, so be sure to check that list out as well.

Be sure to follow me on Twitter as I’ll be posting additional sales I come across, especially on Friday when things really get in to full swing.

I’ve created an Excel spreadsheet of the deals and embedded it here as Excel Web App. This will allow you to perform basic sorting and filtering functions on the list directly in your browser by just clicking on the down arrow in each column header. If you have Excel installed, you can also click the download link (on the bottom black bar) and download the sheet directly. If you want to embed this sheet on your site, feel free to do so that way when if I have to update it, you won’t have to do anything to have accurate information.

 

* Content availability may vary by region

Deal, Xbox Live By Larry Hryb, Xbox LIVE's Major Nelson

permalink: http://majornelson.com/2012/11/20/xbox-live-marketplace-holiday-offers/

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Steve-Melton/574790934 Steve Melton

    Not anywhere close to as strong as in previous years, but hey, hopefully someone else will find a lot of good in the list. Grateful for sales either way.

    • http://twitter.com/ENich1 E.Nich

      I bought some games, for me is a good list.

  • http://www.cheapassgamer.com/forums/blog.php?u=324759 Tylerh1701

    Hi Major. Should we keep an eye out for any one-day sales on Black Friday or Cyber Monday on the Xbox Marketplace? I remember last year I got Beyond Good & Evil for 240msp! Thanks. :-)

    • NewfieJG

      Unfortunately these are the sales

    • http://www.majornelson.com Major Nelson

      Yup…I’ll have a post on Friday for BF deals and Monday for CM deals.

      • RampageDeluxe

        Awesome, I was hoping to hear that.

      • http://www.cheapassgamer.com/forums/blog.php?u=324759 Tylerh1701

        Awesome, thank you!

      • http://twitter.com/ahleungtt Henry Leung

        You mean xbox live deals or other stores’ deals? For us living outside US, other stores’ deals are meaningless.

      • http://www.facebook.com/manuel.aranda.142687 Manuel Aranda

        I really hope the BF and CM deals are better than this. Not saying these are bad mind you, I picked up 2 for me and 2 for my bro from this sale so it’s pretty good imo, just hoping for better deals on the one day sales :)

        Oh and Major, I noticed Sega Vintage Collection: Streets of Rage Collection isn’t on the list, but it is on sale on the dashboard at 400 msp. Might want to update that.

      • Z4M0

        Thanks for the info. I’ll be holding till we know what’s on the table to decide what do buy.

  • Hugoku

    I hope this list is not final.
    Might get Spelunky and the Monster World collection. Other than that It’s a bit dissapointing..

    • mcmax3000

      The list is probably final for the week long sales, but they normally do one day deals on Friday, and Monday, so good chance there will be additional stuff then.

      • Hugoku

        Hopefully I’ll get a chance to check them out. I have historically been bad at keeping up with thanksgiving sales.

    • Z4M0

      ^THIS …and I am Alive (this week’s DOTW)

  • mcmax3000

    Some good stuff in there (Rock Band Blitz is a steal for 600 MSP), but anything I want in that list, I already have.

  • http://twitter.com/Jawby Nick

    Booooo… C’mon Microsoft. You can do better than this.

  • http://twitter.com/TenaciousG_ James.

    not a single thing i want. again

    • http://twitter.com/Tjoeb123 Tyler Beale

      Yeah. I was hoping Sonic Adventure 2 would be on sale here as well, like it is on the competition.

      • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

        Might have something to do with it selling very well every week since release, maybe it’s not been selling so well on PSN? That’s no excuse though.

        Also the SVC Wonder Boy and Alex Kidd sales have been bettered on PSN as the games are available separately on there (more trophychievements, grr) and all of those games have been one of your American dollars each recently so those collections really should have been 240 MSP here.

    • http://www.cheapassgamer.com/forums/blog.php?u=324759 Tylerh1701

      I think Spelunky and Rock Band Blitz are both good first time sales, as well as the SVC collections. Not sure exactly what you were looking for, but this sale isn’t too bad to me…

    • http://twitter.com/JoeyBVCR Joey

      The ones that could interest me…. already bought and played…. Minecraft and Tony Hawk HD please

  • http://twitter.com/korahn Eric Starr

    If i didn’t already own Blitz, that would be an automatic grab for me. As it stands though – nothing else has my attention from this sale.

  • Calum Young

    @MajorNelson give us something better on sale.

  • http://twitter.com/worlan Worlan

    I want buy Dead Island Game, but i get a great “ERROR, Esta oferta no es válida en tu región.”(ERROR, This offer is not available in your region.) Well is very common message here. #xboxlivechile D:

    • http://twitter.com/Dorwrath Ω Jalil Purtow Ω

      If you live in America you can get Dead Island GOTY edition for $10 at Best Buy Friday

      • http://www.facebook.com/people/Steve-Melton/574790934 Steve Melton

        If the error is not in English it’s likely they don’t live in the United States…

      • http://twitter.com/ProfessorAnatil Professor Anatil

        What Steve Melton said as well as the last line of the message indicates they are in Chile “#xboxlivechile D:”

  • http://twitter.com/FireEmblem6 Anthony Brantley

    Was really hoping to see Minecraft on here!

    • http://twitter.com/JoeyBVCR Joey

      And Tony Hawk HD too

      • TheGlobalizer

        Wouldn’t be surprised to see them in the Christmas week deals. They seem to like to put Summer of Arcade on sale during that week.

        • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

          Not to mention this Summer of Arcade was the worst in years…

          …purely speaking in terms of sales, of course!

  • http://twitter.com/Chunky_2336 Adrian Torres

    Still waiting for Banjo and kazooie to go on sale. Please make that happen this x-mas Major Nelson!

  • http://twitter.com/MykeJayy Michael J

    Deals for the Scratch n Match app.

    Metal Slug XX
    Worms: Ultimate Mayhem
    Worms 2: Armageddon

    All half off.

    Might pick up the Sega Vintage collections at half off, seems fair enough at that price.

    • http://twitter.com/Nitramuse Nitramuse

      What is this Scratch and Match you speak of?

      • ungeheier

        It’s in the sales app. Might be US only.

        • http://twitter.com/Nitramuse Nitramuse

          Really? Even such kind of things are US only? Sucks.. we don’t even have Rewards in the Netherlands… sucks to be a small country, I guess…
          Major, while I’m at it, can you tell me (or tell us) if and when Rewards and this Scratch and Match stuff comes to the Netherlands?

  • Dre

    Does any one knows when there is going to be a free gold weekend?

    • Lee Rayson

      i dont know but i can do you one better, msg my gamertag DarkGin87 and ill give you the 14 day code i got with halo 4

  • Lee Rayson

    id say this is pretty decent

    • http://twitter.com/GreenMistt Miller

      of course you would.

      • Lee Rayson

        Well for me it is, darksiders dlc, dead island dlc, a few games i want to pick up

        • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

          Oh yeah it’s definitely not as bad as is being implied but it could and should be better.

          • Lee Rayson

            Of course there always room for improvement, could put a few arcade games at 200 msp but for now im happy

  • http://twitter.com/ProtagonistZero Bryan K

    There should be better Games on Demand deals!

    • ungeheier

      Games on Demand should have games the same day, or even before the Disc based versions are released. THEN they should also be $20 cheaper (at least) than the Disc based versions. I’d buy more games that way, thats for sure.

      • http://www.facebook.com/chris.grub.5 Chris Grub

        It would make swallowing the cost of those season passes a lot easier too.

        • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

          Or we could go back to when content wasn’t held back during development to sell separately later but I guess that’s a little too much to ask!

          • http://www.facebook.com/chris.grub.5 Chris Grub

            I’m all for DLC, just make sure the community gets at least 6 weeks with the game and takes input from the people playing the game as to what they’d like to see.

            Everyone would be much happier and DLC would sell much more.

      • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

        Hear hear. I mean that twenty dollar undercut at launch is probably asking for too much but digital versions having parity releasing alongside their retail counterparts is already being done over at Valve HQ, Sony Towers and Chez Nintendo so it’s not that big an ask is it, Microsoft?

        Downloadable games should cost less than at retail because they cost
        less to make and release and are worth less to the consumer as you’ve
        managed to sell them a product that you still technically own. Are ungeheier and I the only ones seeing this?

        Throwing in DLC with a digital purchase wouldn’t hurt either and would make downloading a retail game a more attractive proposition. Of course then you’d need to offer greater storage capacity at prices that aren’t ridiculous!

    • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

      You’ve got to laugh. Microsoft made a big song and dance about Games on Demand making them the first console retailer to offer full retail games for download and
      since then every rival has not only caught up but often surpassed them.

  • http://kevinmurphy.wordpress.com murph

    $6 Rock Band Blitz = 25 DLC songs for Rock Band 3, even if you hate the game (which is pretty fun!)

    • http://www.cheapassgamer.com/forums/blog.php?u=324759 Tylerh1701

      600 MSP = $7.50, in the US anyway.

      • http://kevinmurphy.wordpress.com murph

        Ooops, I knew that. My MS Math Skills are off today. Still a good deal ;)

        • http://www.cheapassgamer.com/forums/blog.php?u=324759 Tylerh1701

          Yes it is. It’s the one game I’m buying from this sale. (I already have Spelunky and South Park, otherwise I would have bought them as well.)

  • Ian Jentzsch

    Why does “The Sacrifice” never go on sale for the original Left 4 Dead?

    And this has never been cleared up for me, could I buy it for L4D2 and it will work with the original game?

    • http://www.facebook.com/pwc327 Phil W. Czyzewicz III

      Unfortunately Left 4 Dead 2′s The Sacrifice won’t work for the original game…

    • http://twitter.com/MKTheory John Doe

      That makes me mad too. Microsoft clearly has proven countless of times in the past that they don’t care about the first game. Their has been so many times where they kept putting L4D2 content on sale, but never did the same for L4D1. They just had a L4D2 sale during shocktober. C’mon!!!!

    • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

      Better question is why do any of L4D1+2′s DLCs carry a price tag at all when they are free on Steam?

  • Volitar Prime

    That is a great price for RB Blitz. I am really tempted to get the Sega Vintage packs but wish that the Streets of Rage one was included.

    • http://www.facebook.com/people/Toni-Kuhalampi/825090472 Toni Kuhalampi

      It seems that Streets of Rage is included but not on Major Nelson’s list. The price is 400MSP and I found it out on WPCentral (great site, btw!).

      • Volitar Prime

        Thanks!

  • Russell Gorall

    Seems like you just really want people to follow you on Twitter.

    If you are selling stuff to us, it really isn’t my job to make it easier for you.

    • http://www.majornelson.com Major Nelson

      I want to make it EASIER for people to stay connected to what is going on. Twitter is the easiest way. Got a better idea?

      • ungeheier

        Call me… Maybe?

      • http://twitter.com/ProfessorAnatil Professor Anatil

        While I’m more of a PS3 gamer (far more RPGs, which is all I play), Major Nelson is one of the great things about the 360. The most identifiable representative between the MS company and the gamers. The PS3 has a whole team which makes it easier I’m sure but having that one guy you can identify as being it is a nice touch on MS’s part. The fact that Major Nelson acts just like a regular gamer and has no problems talking with the gamers helps too.

      • http://twitter.com/siteuntitled Site Untitled

        IMHO, nothing beats RSS – but you already have a feed so…

      • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

        Russell’s a silly sausage, but since you’re asking how about a greater dashboard presence?

        If the Xbox Live team wants to stick huge adverts on my opening screen they could at least be useful. I’d like shortcuts to what’s new and what’s on sale right there as soon as I sign on I can immediately see what’s on the menu, what flavour it is and how much it costs.

        Quite often there’s been content discounted that I wouldn’t have known about if I hadn’t been browsing either on here, on CAG or on TrueAchievements, almost as if the discount is being “hidden”, and that’s just not cricket.

  • http://twitter.com/TrashMKX Trash

    lol at all the crybabies!!

    • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

      ;~;

  • http://www.facebook.com/episodejap.episodejap Episodejap Episodekr Episodetw

    these sales are pathetic

    • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

      I disagree, but will say they could and should be better. I’d give them a C+, maybe a B-.

      Of course they should be an A+. maybe even an S if we use gamer logic, every week… or stuff could just not come out grossly overpriced.

  • http://twitter.com/ChicoEdge Chico Edge

    I picked up Daytona USA and I’m eyeing some of those Sega Vintage Collections. I wish I knew what XBL’s sale for Black Friday will be.

  • RampageDeluxe

    The On demand games on sale are still more than in store price.

  • http://twitter.com/seekul Luke Es | sE ekuL

    Thanks for the work Major. Can you please add a column for content type? I would like to sort the avatar items away from the actual games and DLC.

    • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

      Or hide them? ;D

  • http://twitter.com/Prdingo eLbiChaN

    Awesome, finally i can get the L4D stuff on offer, i’ve bee waiting patiently up until shocktober deals which i thought was surprising they didn’t have any L4D stuff on sale, whats that saying about being patient? =D

  • http://www.majornelson.com Major Nelson

    Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light was just added to the list. It is 50% off

    • RicardoDawkins

      Already got this for the same amount. Hope some ppl grab it, too. Pretty good game.

    • http://twitter.com/JoeyBVCR Joey

      Please Minecraft and Tony Hawk HD

    • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

      It’s been said but Sega Vintage Collection: Streets of Rage is on sale as well, just isn’t on the list. In my opinion it’s the best one of those four. I penned a guide to speedrunning the Achievements over at x360a if anyone’s interested in banging those out.

      I’m pretty sure this now means LCGoL has been half off like four times in as many months…

  • http://twitter.com/PriusGuy2004 Chris Hofer

    I bought both DLCs for “Dead Island”, and I also bought “Magic 2013″ and its DLC. Oh, and I picked up “Spelunky”, too. Good deals for me! Still not sure about “Rock Band Blitz”. Glad to see (per a response from Major below) that there will be additional sales on Black Friday and Cyber Monday! Woot woot!

  • ChickenSansHead

    Good sale! I purchased Spunky and I’ll check out the demo for South Park. Lara Croft GoL is a good game and I recommend people check it out. I also like the Excel applet, but I’ll second the motion to add a content/category type to enhance usefulness.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Alejandro-Gomez/100000933174125 Alejandro Gomez

    L4D, Portal 2 and Dead island Hell Yeah!!

  • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

    This is open to all yet the only thing on offer to paid subscribers is a crappy game at a crappy price.
    Another shining example of the value of Xbox Live Gold membership and your worth as a customer.

    • TheGlobalizer

      If you’re subscribing to Gold just for discounts on games, you’re doing it wrong.

      • http://twitter.com/Navarin Bennijin

        Not just, but I started wondering just why I’m subscribing to Gold a while back.
        “Exclusive discounts” is listed under the perks of Gold membership. I should know, much to my chagrin I renewed it yesterday. Sure, I used a cheap prepaid card (as everyone ought to for Live and Points) but still.

        So we get online play (free on every other rival format), exclusive discounts (that are often matched or bettered by the competition or even Microsoft’s own free for all sales) and a bunch of apps (I don’t use).

        I’m clearly not the only one feeling more and more let down by Microsoft and it shows reading through this blog every week. Maybe they’d step their game up if they weren’t the market leader because it all seems very “I’m #1 so why try harder?” to me.

        • GamerMuscle

          I don’t bother with gold now and I’m probably going to sell my Xbox , The pricing is totally off as well as.

          - The sales are pore
          - Old games remain expensive
          - Allot of games get multi-player discontinued anyway after 1-2 years
          - MS advertise on the dash despite users paying for gold
          - Download Games are overpriced
          - Voice quality is terrible
          - Dash takes longer to load when connected to live due to the way it does icons
          - Almost all the apps come with most TV’s now or work better on other devices
          - Bing is given a whole page and I have never used it and don’t know anyone that does
          - The adds don’t match my interest just MS trying to sell me generic pop culture stuff why not advertise actual games I would like to play , maybe some indie games or things I might miss easily ?

          . only reason to bother with gold is if you want to play with friends on-line and to be frank its not worth the price I will just play on my PC and my next primary console will probably not be MS/Xbox

    • http://twitter.com/MKTheory John Doe

      You make no sense at all. Every Tuesday Gold members get a discount on game content. Silver member get jack spit. Regardless if the Tuesday deals is crappy to you or not, the point is that it’s for Gold members only. Every freakin’ Tuesday. But noooooo the one week, where there’s an event that EVERYONE can benefit from it, all the sudden you feel like you’re being alienated? ARE YOU SERIOUS?!
      Microsoft making these temporary deals for EVERYONE is the smartest thing they did because that increases money for them. Microsoft would had finally got my money, but unfortunately they don’t care for the first Left 4 Dead game anymore.

      • http://twitter.com/Nitramuse Nitramuse

        Tuesday deal? Seriously… what is wrong with MS? Yesterday I learned about Scratch and Match…and now Tuesday deals? Is there more we don’t have?

  • BlinkFandango

    Picked up Spelunky and Magic 2013, so not a total fail for me. Games on Demand prices are still ridiculous though. Hopefully some better deals on Black Friday.

  • http://www.facebook.com/macy.slator Macy Slator

    i didn’t expect too many great deals from microsoft. like always.

  • http://twitter.com/joakgarp Joakim Garpenstedt

    Majornelson: Could you make a comment on why Microsoft has set a higher price tag for Games on demand than what a physical copy costs in stores? You don’t want to compete with stores or why? Dont we Xbox Live-users deserve some free On demand games for a limited time when we already pay you a monthly fee to play online.

    My Xbox live 12 month subscription is also expiring in december. I don’t really play that much online anymore and can’t find any reason why I should continue my Xbox live gold membership. The discount as you call this, as we Xbox Gold subscribers get, is really an egg thrown at our face when we just have to go to a random price hunter site to find a better price for the game.

    • http://twitter.com/MKTheory John Doe

      “No one retailer has the lowest pricing for every product, and our program is about giving people 24 x 7 convenience and selection when shopping for Xbox 360 games,” explained a Microsoft spokesperson when Eurogamer asked the platform holder to explain its pricing strategy.

  • http://twitter.com/ProfessorAnatil Professor Anatil

    I’m glad to see a lot on sale but there’s not really a single thing remotely interesting. Where’s the love for RPG players? lol. I know there’s Dead Island which is RPG lite but I’m thinking more like Tales of Vesperia, Phantasy Star 2, etc kind of RPG.

    Edit: And I forgot to mention that I know a sale on some RPG games could be coming still so this is really more of a request to include some if none are planned at the moment.

    Also, a semi unrelated suggestion, has it been discussed before about being able to use MS points for GonD purchases? I think it’d be a great alternative in the event that someone had previously bought a lot of MS points but has hardly used any of them.

    • http://www.facebook.com/people/Bush-O-Connor/555604190 Bush O Connor

      you can buy the GoD games with microsoft points, it actually works out a lot cheaper if you know where to buy points online for almost half price. even this way the GoD games are a complete rip off.

      just press X when its on the payment screen on the marketplace

      • http://twitter.com/ProfessorAnatil Professor Anatil

        Thanks for the info, so far I’ve only purchased 1 GonD and was well over a year ago so I completely forgot about that. Thanks for the reminder and I’ll try to remember about it this time lol.

  • http://twitter.com/Gorkinlot Gorkinlot

    disappointment..,

  • http://www.facebook.com/ainsley.trumper Ainsley Trumper

    When do they go live?

  • http://twitter.com/AwkwardLoser Sour Polly Purebread

    I want to pull the trigger on BL2′s season pass but I’m kidna worried it’ll be a Black Friday deal like GEars 3 last year.

  • ryder4life22187

    first off MajorNelson hasn’t posted any BF deals yet as he stated he will post the BF deals on friday on CM on monday. This is just a holiday sale

  • http://twitter.com/joakgarp Joakim Garpenstedt

    Thanks for the link! My only wish is that it’s time that Xbox Live turns another approach especially for us that doesn’t go online that much. But maybe that will happen when the next Xbox arrives.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=537442886 Abel Diaz

    Spelunky’s half off. That’s all I needed to hear.

    • http://twitter.com/boe2BE Boe2

      Spelunky IS interesting, 1200 was really too expensive given the relative simplicity of the game.

      • Burritoed Squirrel

        Well, if it was on Steam, I’d be surprised if it was $15 as a base and rarely went on sale, but obviously since so many people on here said they already bought it, and it hasn’t been on sale before, clearly they thought it was worth $15. There’s no inherent worth, there’s just what people are willing to pay. Even if it was originally $10, I’d still wait for a sale. Microsoft doesn’t give me many attractive opportunities to take advantage of being a Gold member. ;)

  • LarZen

    Hi Major Nelson! Is this only for US? Thx :)

  • http://www.facebook.com/tom.andrew.399 Tom Andrew

    Totally underwhelming…brings nothing to the table. The marketing team that came up with those items for the holiday special should be fired.

  • TheRequiem95

    The Streets of Rage Sega Vintage Collection is also on sale. I suggest all of those Vintage Collections, especially the Monster World one. Both Daytona and Space Channel 5 are great deals at $5, too. Good Sega stuff this week!

  • http://www.facebook.com/ainsley.trumper Ainsley Trumper

    When do these run out?

  • Rodrigo Araujo

    I have a quick question, on my XBOX I have a USA profile that I use, and a Brazilian profile that I use when I’m in Brazil – such as now, can I buy the games on demand on my USA profile and also play them on my Brazilian profile, and these profiles are stored locally on the same xbox. Thanks

  • http://www.facebook.com/dee.nagata Crystal Acres

    I purchased my very first XBOX Live12 month ‘Gold’ subscription card from Walmart yesterday, and after reading these comments, there really isn’t much incentive here for me to redeem the card in order to JOIN XBOX Live.

    Since I don’t game online at all, I am going to return the card unscathed, and take my family out to dinner.

    $59.99 a year, is a lot of money to spend just to get these mediocre game content discounts. The On demand games that are on sale cost more than a retail store price.

  • ippotakamura

    Bro, You forgot to add the Streets Of Rage collection for 400, Probably the most important of all the deals.

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