Really ? I thought Microsoft does pretty well with their MS points.

Well they stopped that for exactly this reason. For Dragon Age Origins you can get the complete pack for like $15 now, but for Dragon Age 2 you get the game for $15 and then the DLC is still $10 each. For anyone who wants the complete experience EA is guaranteed $20 digitally.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/microsoft-phasing-out-virtual-currency-system-6349074

This article still has it as a rumour but I have seen others that have it as fact. Site I found the better article on is down at the moment though.

Yeah it's a rumour of a rumour of a rumour and very unlikely to happen because the day it does the backlash against how much the rest of the world gets ripped on prices will be HUGE.
Don't believe me? Look at Apple who caved and brought prices actually inline with US ones. Right now Points allow them to hide VAT etc and nobody minds because 600points is 600 points everywhere. The app store is set to accept cash/points you can buy games on demand on the xbox with a cash value or the equiv points cost (so if you get a good deal on points you can save money). Removing points would be a mistake and MS knows it.

DLC goes on sale on console frequently. I haven't seen ME3 DLC on sale yet, but all of ME and ME2 DLC has been on sale several times, usually for 50% off. I didn't pay full price for a single New Vegas DLC and had it all within 4 months of release.

Now with that said, if you want DLC for something unpopular, you'll be paying full price on Live, because they don't bother putting DLC for unpopular disk games up for sale, usually.

MS is having a publisher sale this week and you can pile up on map packs from Halo Reach, get Iron Brigade and its Martian Bear DLC, etc., all for half off. There's a ton more great stuff (Castle Crashers, etc.) but those are my top picks for value.

Now, will it be as cheap as Steam's sales? No, usually not. But something is on sale to Gold subscribers every week, and most weeks the sale is for everyone.

Actually, now that you mention it, I think I do recall that. I passed as I was planning to get a GOTY ME3 when it comes out.

You know I still prefer the ME games on PC don't know why even if I do have to spend more on the DLC's the game seems to play better...

I couldn't tell ya, really, they play pretty smooth on XBox 360. RDR, though, 90% of the time it plays smooth but then you get hung up on a knee high set of wooden steps (you walk to the side of them instead of up them) in a firefight and die. Grr... Hard to be too mad though, the game is overall amazing.

Is the Gold thing common? Because I will never have Gold.

About 25-33% of the sales are for Gold Members only. If you really don't want to pay for it there's tons of people like me that buy the family pack w/o actually using all the slots. You have to log in once from the family pack's parent's console so just find someone local (or give them your creds and then change them afterwards). You can simply set full permissions on a child's account to buy their own points and do whatever they want so you're not stuck being saddled with the parental controls.

Good to know most of the sales are universal. I don't play online games and get Netflix and such on my BD player, so there is really no need for me to get Live Gold. I'll look into the family thing though...

Theres at least 1 gold exclusive every week usually a game reduced by upto 80% and any DLC's dropped by at least 50%