Xbox Live Family Gold Pack - $100, coming November 1st?

shrike4242

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If this has been posted elsewhere, my apologies.

With the redesign of the Xbox.com website for the upcoming Kinect launch, things have changed a bit in the account management section. When I wanted to check on my XBL expiration date, I went to the My Xbox menu on the Xbox site, and noticed a couple of entries that didn't make any sense, Family Center and Accounts . Going into Accounts and then Upgrade / Manage Accounts showed the section with the selection for the month-to-month, 3-month and 1 year subscriptions, with the description of what you'd get for those memberships. Looking at the listing of the items you'd get, there are some extra items that don't tie to the Gold Membership:



If you went to Family Center (http://www.xbox.com/en-US/Live/Family), you can see a link to find out more about the Xbox Live Family Gold Pack:

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/Live/JoinLive/Membership?Family

I know this has been discussed previously on other sites, plus on here, though I can't seem to find it via search.

Previous links (as well as plenty of others):
http://gizmodo.com/5569822/xbox-live-launching-100-gold-family-plan
http://www.slashgear.com/microsofts-xbox-live-to-offer-family-gold-pack-2291071/
http://kotaku.com/5569782/four-play-for-the-price-of-two-with-the-xbox-live-gold-family-plan
 
Being able to gift MS Points is apparently possible now, but only within the family plan? LAME.

I've been wanting this feature since I bought an Xbox.
 
I was going to post something about this because I really want to know when you can do it.

It does say that there will be weekly 'family game' deals for those on family gold similar to the other gold weekly deal.
 
[quote name='shosh']so you can upgrade your current xbox live membership to family?[/QUOTE]I would say that when it goes live on 11/01/10, I'd assume so, as the info on the page seems to point that direction.

[quote name='Snuckles']So do family plan members get special discounts on games or xbox content?[/QUOTE]Obviously, they'd get the deals that any other Gold member would get, though as it says "Every month, Gold Family Pack Members will enjoy an exclusive discount on family-friendly games and more.", I'm sure they'll run some monthly deal on games like Hasbro Family Game Night and other "family" games.

[quote name='thrustbucket']I was going to post something about this because I really want to know when you can do it.

It does say that there will be weekly 'family game' deals for those on family gold similar to the other gold weekly deal.[/QUOTE]Should be November 1st from what I've read elsewhere. No info on the site on the date, though the 1st is this coming Monday.
 
From what I heard (microsoft said this somewhere) you have one "parent" account and subaccounts (each a different gamertag) and after you upgrade you can then recover the subaccount gamertags on different consoles. The gamertags all have to be on the same xbox at the time of the gold upgrade. So I assume you can convert existing gamertags into this plan as long as they're all on the same console.
 
Ok so I just got off the phone with Xbox support and asked a bunch of questions. They had just barely been trained on Family Gold and how it works - so they knew the answers. I could tell the guy was pretty knowledgeable and was not making shit up. (Shrike, you may want to add to OP and make this an info-thread sticky?)

- Yes you can span multiple consoles. Once an account is added to a family plan they work just like regular Gold accounts (with the exception of having restrictions managed by the master account)

- You can not just outright convert a regular Gold account to a family account on Nov 1. The person that is going to be the "master account" must purchase the Family gold plan for $99. However - if the person making that purchase has an existing gold account, it will deduct $5 per month he has left off of the price. Also, if you only have one day left in a month when you make a purchase, it counts as a full month (full $5 off). So if you buy a cheap 12 month card right now, add it, then buy a family gold account, that will deduct $60 off the price (5 x 12 = 60).

- Any existing gold account added to a Family Gold plan will automatically have it's time cut in half and added to the pool for everyone (example - You have 6 months left, it will add 3 months to the family gold plan).


I did not ask if you had to all be on the same console to start with. I don't know why you would, since it looks like you'll be able to do it through the web interface as well. The guy was fully aware that roomates were going to do it, and friends in different locations - not just families; apparently that's what Microsoft wants to increase live gold population.
 
Also, apparently there is a deal on the dashboard to get 2 years for $84.99 right now. If you were to buy that, then immediately buy Family Gold - you would have $120 off the price, which should put you well past a year.

Get three buddies to toss you $20 to add them to your family plan and it's damn cheap Live Gold.
 
[quote name='GenPirate']What happens if your gold expires in 2013, what would that do to the price of the family pack lol.[/QUOTE]

The way I understand it, add up how many months you have left. Deduct 20 months to pay for a year of the family gold, then after that I believe every 2 months would count as 1 month of Family gold.
 
It will be interesting to see how Marketplace work. I wonder if a subaccount purchases if all 4 accounts are able to use the purchase. It would also be nice if they put settings so that the primary could authorize all charges.
 
[quote name='mvp828']It will be interesting to see how Marketplace work. I wonder if a subaccount purchases if all 4 accounts are able to purchase them. It would also be nice if they put settings so that the primary could authorize all charges.[/QUOTE]

They are, sort of. But I don't know the details yet. I'm pretty sure by default they can not make purchases with the masters live points. But they do allow you to gift them and/or set up a recurring allowance.

I wonder what happens if a sub account adds a point card. Does it just go to them or to the whole pool?
 
[quote name='thrustbucket']They are, sort of. But I don't know the details yet. I'm pretty sure by default they can not make purchases with the masters live points. But they do allow you to gift them and/or set up a recurring allowance.

I wonder what happens if a sub account adds a point card. Does it just go to them or to the whole pool?[/QUOTE]

Yea that's kind of where my thoughts are about the whole thing.

It will also be interesting to see what this does to the price of Marketplace items. I can just hear that fuck bag Bobby Kotick now, "Oh well since these maps are going to be going to 4 people I better charge 4800 pts."

EDIT: I edited the previous post because I didn't realize I word puked... Meant to say I was wondering if all accounts are able to use purchase without paying more.
 
I just checked my account and now it's showing me as having a 1 month prepaid membership - I used to have at least 2 years to go!! Has anyone else seen this? Note that I got a bunch of freebie months a while back via that once upon a time promotion. Have they now gone back and killed all the extra months? It's not clear to me why they'd be able to do that. Nobody broke the rules with it. Or are the extra months now just going to show up as a stream of 1 month prepaid memberships with no defined end date? It's sucks either way because now I have absolutely no idea how much time I have left, nor how it would translate to this family membership.
 
[quote name='crunchewy']I just checked my account and now it's showing me as having a 1 month prepaid membership - I used to have at least 2 years to go!! Has anyone else seen this? Note that I got a bunch of freebie months a while back via that once upon a time promotion. Have they now gone back and killed all the extra months? It's not clear to me why they'd be able to do that. Nobody broke the rules with it. Or are the extra months now just going to show up as a stream of 1 month prepaid memberships with no defined end date? It's sucks either way because now I have absolutely no idea how much time I have left, nor how it would translate to this family membership.[/QUOTE]Single month memberships always show as single-month memberships, and they shift from one to another if you have a stream of them in a row.

There is an end date, though it used to be clear of where it was on the Xbox site, and now, it's nowhere to be found. It used to be right on the main page for your account and now, poof, it's gone.
 
MS needs to add that point-gifting option to general Gold users... I've been stuck with an extra 90 points for so long. When's the last time you saw an offer for 10 free points?
 
I'm all over this with my brother and sister(who also both have gold accounts) but what I really want is some kind of game sharing like there is on PSN. If I buy Pac-Man on arcade, why wouldn't my family be able to play my game? A family shouln't have to buy the same arcade game 4 freakin' times to enjoy it together. Make this happen!
 
[quote name='mrosnwo']I'm all over this with my brother and sister(who also both have gold accounts) but what I really want is some kind of game sharing like there is on PSN. If I buy Pac-Man on arcade, why wouldn't my family be able to play my game? A family shouln't have to buy the same arcade game 4 freakin' times to enjoy it together. Make this happen![/QUOTE]

I think the Family account is only one console (at a time), so I'm not sure this will do you any good. At least that's how I understood it. I thought it was just to get your kids (and/or spouse) to also be able to play games online, send voice messages, etc. It's not like getting 4 full memberships to use on 4 separate consoles.

Ah, so according to that article I was wrong. You can move accounts to a different console, however all the accounts are tied to the same credit card and pile of microsoft points. So that could be an issue.
 
[quote name='shrike4242']Single month memberships always show as single-month memberships, and they shift from one to another if you have a stream of them in a row.

There is an end date, though it used to be clear of where it was on the Xbox site, and now, it's nowhere to be found. It used to be right on the main page for your account and now, poof, it's gone.[/QUOTE]

Thanks for this info. So it's just the new awful website. I should have figured it. I couldn't find an end date anywhere. Maybe on the console somewhere?
 
[quote name='mrosnwo']I'm all over this with my brother and sister(who also both have gold accounts) but what I really want is some kind of game sharing like there is on PSN. If I buy Pac-Man on arcade, why wouldn't my family be able to play my game? A family shouln't have to buy the same arcade game 4 freakin' times to enjoy it together. Make this happen![/QUOTE]

anyone can play an arcade game as long as you play it on the console that it was purchased on
 
[quote name='thrustbucket']anyone can play an arcade game as long as you play it on the console that it was purchased on[/QUOTE]

Yeah I know that, but we don't live in the same household. My brother and I get together and do our downloads all at once every few weeks with a memory card. I load up on his system, buy what I want, then go back to mine and redownload to my system, and vice versa. That way we buy once, but both get the stuff. It's kind of a pain to have to do it that way, but it saves us from paying double for everything. I was kind of hoping that all the accounts under the family banner would all collectively own the content that the master would buy, since the fee is shared and the points are shared. Guess that's asking for a little too much. Might consider keeping everything seperate. Not sure yet.
 
Was bored this morning and just called them again for some more clarification:

- You do not need all 4 people to be present on the console at the time of purchasing the family gold plan. You can add them later. Furthermore, you can add and remove people as you like with no restriction other than they have to be on the same console as the master account when it's done (which really surprises me and is awesome).

- If a sub-account adds a points card, it will NOT go to the "pool" of points, it goes to that gamertag like normal.
 
[quote name='shrike4242']There is an end date, though it used to be clear of where it was on the Xbox site, and now, it's nowhere to be found. It used to be right on the main page for your account and now, poof, it's gone.[/QUOTE]

Clicking "View Billing History" from your account page will bring you to https://billing.microsoft.com/home.aspx which shows you your most recently redeemed sub cards under "Your Services", clicking your most recent card will show you your current xbox live subscription end date.

Really annoying to have to go through so many hoops to see your subscription end date, but figured some, like myself, like to keep track of this. =]
 
Yeah, I heard back from Xbox support and they directed me to the billing site. I've got through 7/1/12. So that's... 21 months? So basically I could get the family play for a year. Or I could just stick with the lone gold and my kids are SOL, but I'm gold for almost 2 years. Hmm. They don't play online that often even on the Wii, so maybe it's not worth the bother. Mostly I think they'd just like to be able to send voice messages to their cousins. :) But if they add something like that trivia gameshow again I might do it anyway as then we can all play online together at the same time. Presuming the replacement gameshow is any fun....

I've got a related question. If I were to do this and IF I were to get a second 360, could two of us be playing the same XBLA or Indie download game at the same time or even together online? Or would I have to buy two copies of the game, one in the main account and one in one of their accounts? How does this stuff work?
 
[quote name='crunchewy'] ...But if they add something like that trivia gameshow again I might do it anyway as then we can all play online together at the same time. Presuming the replacement gameshow is any fun.... [/QUOTE]

Somewhere I heard that the replacement game might be "You Don't Know Jack".

[quote name='crunchewy']
I've got a related question. If I were to do this and IF I were to get a second 360, could two of us be playing the same XBLA or Indie download game at the same time or even together online? Or would I have to buy two copies of the game, one in the main account and one in one of their accounts? How does this stuff work? [/QUOTE]

I think that is the question on everyone's mind... If I get a chance later tonight I might call and ask about this.
 
[quote name='crunchewy']Yeah, I heard back from Xbox support and they directed me to the billing site. I've got through 7/1/12. So that's... 21 months? So basically I could get the family play for a year. Or I could just stick with the lone gold and my kids are SOL, but I'm gold for almost 2 years. Hmm. They don't play online that often even on the Wii, so maybe it's not worth the bother. Mostly I think they'd just like to be able to send voice messages to their cousins.[/QUOTE]

Silver members on Xbox LIVE can send voice messages and do private one-on-one chat.
 
[quote name='notwen']Clicking "View Billing History" from your account page will bring you to https://billing.microsoft.com/home.aspx which shows you your most recently redeemed sub cards under "Your Services", clicking your most recent card will show you your current xbox live subscription end date.

Really annoying to have to go through so many hoops to see your subscription end date, but figured some, like myself, like to keep track of this. =][/QUOTE]Thanks. Found when my sub runs out, so I'm good to go for a while.
 
[quote name='crunchewy']
I've got a related question. If I were to do this and IF I were to get a second 360, could two of us be playing the same XBLA or Indie download game at the same time or even together online? Or would I have to buy two copies of the game, one in the main account and one in one of their accounts? How does this stuff work?[/QUOTE]


I am almost positive that they have not changed the way the DRM works. So when a game is bought, it belongs to the gamertag and the console it was bought on.

I haven't asked, but I would be very surprised if that changed, because how would it handle it if I let you in my family group, you bought some games, and then swapped you out for someone else?

They would basically have to allow everyone in the family group to play any game that anyone in the family group owns. MS isn't going to do that.
 
Yeah I think the whole game sharing thing will just be wishful thinking. That's the inherent problem with digital distribution. If I buy $60 halo, I can loan the disc to my brother, but if I buy $5 pacman, he has to play on my xbox only and can't borrow it. It's a flawed system, with no real solution yet. Maybe they'll devise a way to gift a game to a family member, letting them play it for awhile, but then disabling it on your console until the person gifts it back.
 
I know it may not be a popular request, but I'd really appreciate it if they'd let us have a "family wardrobe" or something like that for Avatars. Lots of times, I'll get a code for a tshirt or a hat and my kids would like to use it, but they can't. They'll be able to once they get GOLD but, even then, it'll be linked to their specific account. It would be nice if Avatar items could be shared or gifted back and forth or something.
 
[quote name='TXboxGuY']Silver members on Xbox LIVE can send voice messages and do private one-on-one chat.[/QUOTE]

They can? It didn't appear that way to me, but I'll check again. i was pretty sure there was no messaging at all, even textual, without Gold. Would be good news if they could do that.
 
Hmm.. I think I have just about 20 months, but the big question for me now is is there going to be Family Gold Subscription cards at retail? If we are stuck with paying $100 MSRP every year, I'll pass on this and make my kids suffer. $100 is still way too much to pay per year, regardless of how many subscriptions it will get me. These damned gold subscriptions should should have been per console from the beginning.
 
[quote name='crunchewy']Hmm.. I think I have just about 20 months, but the big question for me now is is there going to be Family Gold Subscription cards at retail? If we are stuck with paying $100 MSRP every year, I'll pass on this and make my kids suffer. $100 is still way too much to pay per year, regardless of how many subscriptions it will get me. These damned gold subscriptions should should have been per console from the beginning.[/QUOTE]

Q: Can I purchase the Family Pack at my local retail store?
A: The Family Pack is only offered online through the Xbox LIVE Dashboard or Xbox.com.
http://www.xbox.com/en-US/Live/JoinLive/FamilyPackFAQ
 
I might do this if I have 20 months or less left on my live. I just renewed one of my sons for a year so i could get a one year membership free plus it would be extended several more months for free for all accounts.
 
[quote name='Techsticles']Ouch!
http://www.xbox.com/en-US/Live/JoinLive/FamilyPackFAQ
Q: What if I have more than 20 months remaining of Gold? Do I lose all of that extra time?
A: If you have 20 months or more of Gold remaining, you can upgrade to Family Pack for free. Any remaining balance of Gold months in excess of the 20 months will be cancelled and you will not receive a refund for that remaining time.
[/QUOTE]

Wow. That's a little rude to auto dump the months beyond 20 when converting to a Family Pack.

I also wonder what happens to your Family Pack if you feed your primary account with a 12 month "single" membership code. Probably flip your primary account back to a non-Family Pack membership and will set any other accounts back to Silver accounts when the Family Pack expires.

Another little gem of note:
Q: Everyone in my family is already an Xbox LIVE Gold member. Is there a limit to how long my Xbox LIVE Gold Family Pack subscription can be?

A: An Xbox LIVE Gold Family Pack subscription cannot exceed 36 months. If your family members have more than 72 months of Xbox LIVE Gold membership remaining combined when they are added to the Xbox LIVE Gold family pack, any remaining time on their subscriptions in excess of the 72 months will be cancelled and you will not receive a refund for any time beyond 72 months.
 
This seems like it's best suited for the deal discussion area since discussing how well the deal is going to work and whether fellow CAG users are trying this would be the direction I'd want to go to check it out.

I am interested in the XBox Live Family Pack, me and a buddy both have our own Live Gold accounts and one family member along with each of us who would then gain Gold access. This would be a nice fit ... 4 Live accounts that could all get Gold for $100 a year, and it would break down so we'd each get that second account set up to be gold for the price of the old single membership.

But, I'm concerned about the restrictions. I don't mind letting the other friend be the primary on the account, not having my credit card tied to it isn't a deal breaker and might actually be nice. I also don't mind the aspect where if I want to add my own points to my account, I'd need to buy point cards, since that's what I normally do anyways, that doesn't crimp my style. The part I can't figure out is whether or not the non-primary user is stuck with content restrictions. In this case, all four users would be adults, so I want to make sure there's no reason we all wouldn't still be able to see whatever we wanted on XBox Live.

So, the question to discuss? Are you going in on a XBox Live Family Pack with friends or other adult family members, and how's it working out for you so far? Have you found any major downfalls?
 
none of the damn links work and the new xbox site is messed up. even on the 360 dashboard I get some error message stating it cannot load my membership info. smh
 
[quote name='mvp828']I think that is the question on everyone's mind... If I get a chance later tonight I might call and ask about this.[/QUOTE]

Any update? I have 3 Xboxes in my house (got a couple really cheap when the Slim was announced) and 4 family members. My son and I keep our profiles on memory cards so we can port them to whatever TV we want. It would be nice to know if anyone in the family can go to any of the 3 360s and play the content I payed for.
 
[quote name='darthclem']Any update? I have 3 Xboxes in my house (got a couple really cheap when the Slim was announced) and 4 family members. My son and I keep our profiles on memory cards so we can port them to whatever TV we want. It would be nice to know if anyone in the family can go to any of the 3 360s and play the content I payed for.[/QUOTE]
I'm in a similar boat, 2 consoles in my house and another console in another house and we all want to share content. Unfortunately, after reading the FAQs on xbox.com, it looks like all the same rules apply.


Q: If I purchase an Xbox LIVE Arcade game, does it belong to everyone in the family?
A: Purchased content such as games and movies are licensed both to the console it was purchased on, and the individual Gold member that purchased it. So if, for example, your child were to buy an Xbox LIVE Arcade game on your home console, anyone on your console can play it. Additionally, if they leave for college, they could recover their account on another Xbox 360 in their dorm room and be able to play the game when logged into their account from that Xbox 360


So from that, it looks like just the single tag(of the 4 in your family) will have the ability to play it anywhere, and only the console it was purchased on originally will allow others to play it. Works out okay for 2 people like it always has, where you can just download something with your tag on a buddies system, then go back and redownload on your own system, but not for 3 or 4 if you all play on seperate consoles. I was on the fence over this whole thing and I'm leaning against it. The only quesiton I have now was asked earlier, and that's if you buy a 12 month card and add it to your family plan, just how long will it extend it, if at all? Since the head tag gets $5 a month for their remaining time, can I add a 12 month card to my head tag, say like 6 months down the road when I'm already into this plan, and get $60 off the following year? If so, it might be worth it to get a couple cards for like $39.99 and extend my $99 membership for cheaper.
 
there is a special on the dash for an extra month and 800 points if you sign up. My buddy already bought it and called them up. They gave him 800 points and 20 percent off.
 
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