Those of you who thought up the perfect Gamertag, and who were frustrated to learn that someone else had already claimed it, could be in luck. Xbox is about to release nearly one million Gamertags that have gone dormant.
The release of the Gamertags “back into the wild” will begin on Wednesday, May 18th at 2:00 p.m. ET / 11:00 a.m. PT. The Gamertags will be released over a 24-hour period in order to give Xbox fans in various countries an equal chance to get one.
It is worth knowing that the recycled Gamertags aren’t going to be released to all Xbox users. Xbox says that it will release the Gamertags “to our valued Xbox Live Gold members with active subscriptions and at least 1 year of cumulative Xbox Live Gold tenure”.
The Gamertags that Xbox is about to release are from accounts abandoned from the original Xbox era. These accounts never migrated over to Xbox 360 and, as a result, have been inactive for quite some time. Xbox won’t share the actual list of recycled Gamertags, but they have posted the categories that many of the Gamertags fall into:
* Proper Names
* Pop culture references (Entertainment, sports, gaming)
* Types of Food
* Geography and Travel
* Science and Technology
* Math and Numbers
* Animals
* Some of the greatest inventions of all time
Xbox points out that changing your Gamertag won’t impact your Gamerscore, Achievements, or your Friends list. In other words, you won’t lose anything by attempting to obtain the Gamertag that you’ve always wanted.