If you have a friend or family member's birthday approaching soon and want to give them a game as a gift, you now have one more digital avenue to do so with. Microsoft has enabled gifting on its storefront, making it possible to send games through to anyone you like -- as long as you have their email address.
Microsoft has promised this feature for a long time and previously made it possible to gift specific Xbox games to people you know and love. Now though you can do more than that -- you can send anyone any games that Microsoft sells on its store. This makes the Microsoft Store at least a little more comparable with the likes of Steam, GoG, or Origin -- though we doubt anyone is still going to want to use it.
Still, if you do, here's how to do it.
First, go to the store page for the game that you're interested in. There you'll find a brand new button that says "buy as a gift." Instead of going the usual purchasing route, click that instead. You'll then be prompted to put in your friend's email address. Do so, and then head through the checkout as normal.
By the end of it, instead of the download starting at your end, they'll be sent a key that they can use to get their brand new game, all thanks to you.
There are some limitations though, as PCGamesN highlights. You can only gift games to people in the same region as you -- no sending games to your cousin overseas. And you can only send two gifts every two weeks, for some reason.
Microsoft promises additional expansion into other forms of gifting in the future, including paid-for PC and Xbox One applications.
