Free stuff from Microsoft for playing games

[Larvi]

Anyone else taking advantage of Microsoft's Live search promo? If you are bored and have some time on your hands, head on over to http://club.live.com and you can earn points by playing word type games that can be traded in for MS stuff such as Vista Utlimate, Office 2007, Xbox 360 games/controllers and even a Zune or Xbox360.

I've been playing for a couple of days in my spare time and already about a 3rd of the way to getting enough for a copy of Vista Ultimate. I'm thinking of building a new PC this summer when the quad cores cpus drop in price so it will come in handy. The games are actually pretty fun if you are a fan of word games. Variations on crosswords/boggle/word find/hangman, etc. Since this is being sponsored by MS and is being used to drive traffic to thier new search engine I'm pretty confident that it's legit. Just thought I'd make smogoner aware if they weren't already. If this is old news feel free to delete it.

 

[cookie]

Free stuff sounds cool but somehow I don't trust free stuff from the world's biggest money-grabber.

 

[Surgo]

Big money-grabbers are usually legit. Thanks for the link, Larvi.

 

[cookie]

The games are bullshit but the chicken one+anagram solver=big points quick
For a fast typer an Xbox 360 is actually possible.

 

[Larvi]

Yeah, for the chicken one I use www.anagrammer.com to generate the permutations. But from what I understand there are only a limited number of games in each category, I've heard the chicken one cuts you off at about 1000 points. It looks like Microsoft is adding new games on a regular basis though so the points available from it should increase.

Personally I'm getting most of my points from Flexicon and Crosswire right now. They go pretty quickly for me and give good points, plus I find them fun. If you really want the Xbox360 it may be quicker to get Vista (~$349 retail value) or Office 2007 (~$500 retail value) instead and sell them on Ebay since they take much fewer points to get. Not sure if they are OEM copies or Full retail copies though.

 

[hollabackitsobi]

lol I know getting that 360 isn't going to be easy. And i could just as easily be wasting my time playing Castlevania. Oh well, thanks for the link Larvi I'll probably check it out and if it seems possible waste my summer getting a 360.

 

[makiri]

Hey thanks for that tip on the Vista and Office, I'm going for Vista and depending how long I can survive playing these games maybe Office, but for now my 80 ticket ass is going to take a break and take a real crack at it tomorrow.

 

[Pidge]

If the 1000 ticket limit is true for Chiktionary, I'm going to move onto Seekado with this:

http://www.download.com/Wordsearch-Solver/3000-2130_4-10111238.html?tag=lst-0-2

I already have a 360, so I'm going for the Zune. But I'll probably end up getting the most expensive thing I can get and sell it.

 

[BFC]

Awsome site Larvi im going to try and get 360 so i get Wii for my birthday. How many tickets do you need for the 360?

 

[Larvi]

Thanks for the link Pidgeot, I'll definitely check that out when I move on to Seekadoo.

BFC, the 360 is 35000 tickets, not sure if it's a core or premium either (can anyone tell from the picture?)

Here's a rundown of some of the prizes that I'm interested in and how many tickets:

Xbox 360 - 35000
Zune - 20000
Office 2007 Ultimate - 9000
Vista Ultimate - 6000
Xbox 360 Wireless controller (also works on a PC) - 2500

There are also prizes for as few as 125 tickets (song download) for those with less patiences. I'm currently at 2319 tickets and hoping I get stuck on a few more of those 2hour boring conference call at work like I was yesterday ;)

 

[BFC]

Thanks for the link Pidgeot, I'll definitely check that out when I move on to Seekadoo.

BFC, the 360 is 35000 tickets, not sure if it's a core or premium either (can anyone tell from the picture?)

Here's a rundown of some of the prizes that I'm interested in and how many tickets:

Xbox 360 - 35000
Zune - 20000
Office 2007 Ultimate - 9000
Vista Ultimate - 6000
Xbox 360 Wireless controller (also works on a PC) - 2500

There are also prizes for as few as 125 tickets (song download) for those with less patiences. I'm currently at 2319 tickets and hoping I get stuck on a few more of those 2hour boring conference call at work like I was yesterday ;)

do the # of tokens u get variy? That is a lot of tokens for that 360 im gonna try and get it ive been playing almost an hour i have 200 not sure if thats good. I think crosswire is the easiest game there.

 

[Pidge]

The picture of the Xbox 360 includes a hard drive attached so the premium version is shown. I'm surprised they're not offering Microsoft points as prizes. Yes, the number of tickets acquired for each game varies. On Chicktionary, solving a set gets you 20 tickets, while solving one set in Seekado gets 15.

 

[BFC]

The picture of the Xbox 360 includes a hard drive attached so the premium version is shown. I'm surprised they're not offering Microsoft points as prizes. Yes, the number of tickets acquired for each game varies. On Chicktionary, solving a set gets you 20 tickets, while solving one set in Seekado gets 15.

So the highest you can get is 20

 

[Pidge]

Well those are the only two I've beaten.

 

[BFC]

Well those are the only two I've beaten.

Crosswire is really easy and its 20 you do process of elimination.

 

[Larvi]

Flexicon is 25 which is the highest I've seen, Dingbats only gave me 3 so didn't play that again. Crosswire is definitely one that you can solve by trial or error even but it speeds things up a lot if you know a couple of the answers first. I've been following this thread on gamfaqs: http://boards.gamefaqs.com/gfaqs/genmessage.php?board=916373&topic=36008490 And a supposedly some people have been able to record a macro that will do crosswire for you (at least the 1st 2 rounds) I haven't resorted to that yet, I'm actually enjoying doing some of the puzzles so far.

 

[BFC]

Flexicon is 25 which is the highest I've seen, Dingbats only gave me 3 so didn't play that again. Crosswire is definitely one that you can solve by trial or error even but it speeds things up a lot if you know a couple of the answers first. I've been following this thread on gamfaqs: http://boards.gamefaqs.com/gfaqs/genmessage.php?board=916373&topic=36008490 And a supposedly some people have been able to record a macro that will do crosswire for you (at least the 1st 2 rounds) I haven't resorted to that yet, I'm actually enjoying doing some of the puzzles so far.

whats a macro and how do you use it?

 

[Larvi]

A macro just automates keystrokes or mouse clicks. It looks like they are using this software:
http://www.snapfiles.com/get/macromaker.html
Basically you would just record a macro dragging a line from each entry on the left to each entry on the right, then play it back to solve the puzzle. It probably would take a bit to get setup initially and the screen with the puzzle on it would have to be in the exact same place every time for it to work.

 

[Ecnemalas]

I already have a couple hundred points from Chicktionary, this is a pretty awesome way to get myself to Xbox 360... thanks a lot for posting this.

 

[Larvi]

I already have a couple hundred points from Chicktionary, this is a pretty awesome way to get myself to Xbox 360... thanks a lot for posting this.

Just noticed you are from Canada. You may want to review the terms and conditions before you spend too much time on it. I saw someone on another site complaining that they will only ship prizes to US addresses. I probably should have made mentioned that in the initial post.

 

[Ecnemalas]

Yeah, no stuff for Canadians, Americans only. It's a good thing I only have 360 tickets, or else that would have been a colossal waste of time.

 

[hollabackitsobi]

For some reason I can't play the games, I keep getting a Communication Error. Is this for anyone else or just me?

 

[Larvi]

Hmm..do you have any pop-up blockers enabled? It launches the game in a new window.

 

[Mike B]

Chicktionary's pretty awesome... Anagrammar saved my ass... 20 tickets every 40 seconds is very cool :]




edit: 1k tickets in 3 hours ?_?

 

[Larvi]

Just got 6000 tickets and placed my order for Vista Ultimate. Approximate shipping date is 8/11..wait, what? Talk about slow.