About a year and a half ago, my first Xbox 360 premium system suffered from the infamous red-ring-of-death. Instead of getting any sort of repair done through Microsoft, I took the system back to the retailer (which I had a purchased service plan with) and exchanged it for another one. I was allowed to keep my hard drive and soon learned that all DLC from the previous system wouldn't work offline with the new one because the data is tied into the tag, the hard drive and the system itself. This normally wouldn't be a big deal, but I don't have access to any sort of hi-speed internet where I live.

Microsoft's initial solution to this problem? We will give you a new gamertag and refund all of your points. At the time this seemed to be quite a bit of hassle considering they wanted a million different bits of information and faxed copies of my purchase receipts, and given that I could live without being able to play the (at that time) small amount of arcade games I had downloaded off of XBLA. So, I graciously declined and moved on with my life.

Now red-ring failure has struck once again and I decided to use my service plan contract to upgrade to an Elite. Upon receiving the Elite, I figured that as long as I had a new system with a new hard drive, and simply recovered my gamertag, that all of my DLC would once again work. However, I was most definitely wrong.

So today, I resort to calling Microsoft tech support because a close friend explained that Microsoft now had a process to change over the information to new systems in order to eliminate the offline access problem. While I eventually was told by an XBOX Live supervisor named Kristine that this process did exist, I was denied any sort of refund because the SKU transfer process from 360 premium to 360 Elite "doesn't exist." When I asked whether or not this fact was ever released to the public or given any sort of PR, I received silence.

Upon hearing this ridiculous information, accompanied with stupified silence, I attempted to reason with myself that this may, in fact, be a technological disadvantage that Microsoft has with their products. However, I realized that along with all of my arcade games, my Rock Band DLC would no longer work. When I asked the supervisor whether or not I could simply cancel my other gamertag, start a new one, re-subscribe to XBOX Live and get a refund for all of my MS points, she simply told me that that was no longer their policy.

Now what this means to me is that Microsoft eliminated the one out they used to offer when they were to lazy to fix this problem in the first place. Then they decided that transferring data from a premium to an Elite was far too challenging. However, instead of offering me any sort of solution, I now have all but the latest Rock band DLC that doesn't work offline, 20 aracade games that don't work offline, and a bunch of GH3 and GH2 DLC that doesn't work.

Naturally, I was rather upset with my options (lose a ton of money on DLC and don't play anything offline) and all I could get out of Kristine was a recycled apology about 55 times because the call was clearly monitored. The best part? When I explained that as a consumer, I should have some sort of voice in retrieving my DLC that cost REAL money from my REAL checking account, and she flat-out told me "No."

What do you mean "No?" Last time I checked, when you legally purchase something that you have proof for, said product is now your sole property. Also, instead of offering solutions or listening to what I have to say for future reference (or others who may experience the same problem), how about Microsoft just repeat themselves over and over or be completely silent because they know they are fucking me out of the money I willingly gave them to provide a service and gaming experience?

Needless to say, I am extremely frustrated and left wondering what to do. I suppose that Rock Band is now about 66% useless to me, and it's a real shame, because it was one of the best party games I ever purchased and had a ton of fun with it every time I picked it up. So now I have to decide whether to live with no arcade games and no DLC, or just sell it all and say fuck it.

I have never heard of anyone else having such a hard time with Microsoft (except for that kid who had the special art work wiped off his 360), and was wondering if anyone in the Destructoid community had any advice that i may have overlooked. I understand everyone has their problems, but this really pisses me off and I didn't know if there may be a solution anyone can offer.

I suppose for now I can email Harmonix and explain that I love their game, but I can't play it anymore because Microsoft feels that they have absolutely no resolution to my troubles...