I love amazon

Only thing I can think of that explains this would be gift-giving.

Amazing, no more of having to buy those effing points. I was getting tired of having to buy an X amount of points to only have to use a little over half. Man, i hate math. Just want to see the actual price.

Well also you don't have to have left over points

I seen that on CheapAssGamer.  I just hope for when you buy a code that it actually works.  If you get one the doesn't work then it will probably be hard to get a new one but, this is a step in the right direction I think.

"Only thing I can think of that explains this would be gift-giving."

No left over points is a good thing. Thanks for the heads up, Jeff!!

US only? Come on, I live in Canada. I should be able to buy Xbox Live Arcade games through Amazon.

Ah, Lost Cities. I think I was only one of the, like, twenty or so people that bought it.

I'm certainly glad I don't have to buy games with spacebucks anymore.

This is nice though it's odd seeing round numbers instead of $9.99 or $14.99.

Any news on this coming to amazon.co.uk? Or are we being left out as usual?

Sweet. Looks like I'll be getting Penny Arcade Ep. 3 from Amazon, even if I have to wait a while after it comes out.

Hey look good old Geometry Wars is 10 Bucks: http://digg.com/u1WwL

"US only? Come on, I live in Canada. I should be able to buy Xbox Live Arcade games through Amazon."

You're not alone, Matty. Canada's left out too even though we're in the exact same release region as the US. :(

Lost Cities is a very awesome game, but you can play for free on BrettspielWelt. And Carcassonne, and Settlers, and Dominion!  Hmm...maybe I shall go do that now...

The other catch is it might not be secure.

Here's an overview of the good and bad points I've found with this (at least the ones that weren't already covered in the main post):

+ You can sort titles by price low/high, price high/low, bestselling, customer reviews, and even date of release.

+ All games have a short description, pictures, and many include a preview video.

+ Sometimes games could possibly end being sold for less than their price on Xbox Live, as not every title is currently being sold for the same price the game would cost over Xbox Live. Please note that this isn't currently true in a way that benefits consumers. At least not yet.

- As you might have guessed, the service is for the US only, at least for now.

- Not every game is sold at the "correct" Xbox Live price. The original Geometry Wars is five dollars more, and the deal of the week for Penny Arcade Adventures doesn't apply at Amazon.

- Not every XBLA title has been made available for download. For example, Super Street Fighter HD Remix is noticeably absent.

- When sorting by release date, the list is incorrect. Peggle came out before Assault Heroes 2? That's news to me.

- Sorting by bestselling and customer reviews produces a fairly poor list of games that will leave you wondering if this crap really is what amazon customers are buying and enjoy. RoboBlitz? Aces of the Galaxy? Astro Pop? Really?

I like this idea, but it looks like it has a few kinks to work out right now. The whole "buy games and not points" thing sounds sweet though.

I don't really understand... why would I not just buy MS point and games from my Xbox?

Seems like a good thing, if Amazon ever has special sales on point codes like some other retailers do.

Finally a way to gift MSP!

They are also planning on doing the same for  Wii and PSN

The only downside, as usual, is that it's not available for anyone outside of the US. Oh well. I think most Europeans are pretty used to getting constantly shafted anyway already, just one more thing to the list.

Hm, cool, but would be cooler if it included other DLC. Looks like my leftover space bucks aren't going anywhere until they offer Rock Band songs, too. Good part is after I kill my last 600 Wii Points on BitTripBeat, no more Wii Points!

I wish Microsoft would quit frigging around with their stupid point system that is designed to do nothing more than be another source of nickel and diming their customers. It seems every time I buy something on Xbox I am short 200 or 400 points. But Can I buy 200 points? No! I have to buy 500 or 1000 and have points left over again. Thanks Microsoft! Would you like even more of my money for free? Hell you've already burned me with 3 defective consoles, so why not?!

When I buy something off PSN that costs $9.99, Sony charges my credit card $9.99 and off I go. That is called doing business and respecting your customers. Not coming up with new schemes to steal from them. Oh yeah, I don't have to pay Sony for peer to peer gaming either.

Why is it that there is still no Microsoft backed gift system and I have to turn to Amazon to gift for the Xbox Live Marketplace? It just seems silly that they don't have there own gift system in place

Lame that the smallest point balance you can get is 1600 msp. i was hoping i could gift 400 msp at a time.

If they could link my purchases directly to my XBL account this could really be something. But purchasing a code that I then have to enter into my XBL account? Seems even more tedious than just pushing the button that adds XBucks to my account.

Honestly, M$ just needs drop the malarkey and adopt a PSN/Steam model. Clean, easy, and easily giftable.

Yeah, copy/paste is so hard...

So as niche a benefit this may be, this is cool for Amazon.com Rewards credit card holders, such as myself. FOUR TIMES THE REWARDS POINTS, BABY.

Three cheers for abstraction layers!

....Yeah...No.

"If they could link my purchases directly to my XBL account this could really be something. But purchasing a code that I then have to enter into my XBL account? Seems even more tedious than just pushing the button that adds XBucks to my account.

Honestly, M$ just needs drop the malarkey and adopt a PSN/Steam model. Clean, easy, and easily giftable. "

Thats pretty cool, shame the Amazon UK store doesnt have it yet

Oh No!
Microsoft's plan to get everyone to buy 200 more points than they need to has been foiled!

bla blaa blop...