This is just the beginning. Look for prices to continue to rise cause Xbox Game Pass isn't sustainable in it's current form. They gonna make you pay for Call of Duty one way or another. It was fun while it lasted. Hopefully they don't shut down the VPN loophole cause i'm definitely out if I gotta pay full price. Cause Game Pass is not worth $15 a month with its current offerings.
In case people still don't get it, Microsoft's wants to put COD on PSPlus. That's their whole plan. Period. Full stop. Obviously Sony would have to put it on Premium in order to absorb the licensing costs and even then they would have to raise their price. Microsoft would raise GamePass prices too.
This would turn Call OF Duty from Sonys biggest Rev stream into their biggest expense. And it would force them to raise Plus prices or prevent them from making money at all. So Microsoft is holding a gun to Sonys head. That's why Jim is fighting. And so would you.
Get ready to see subscription prices soar. Microsofts plan is to make PlayStation their biggest customer.
This is what I would do if I couldn't innovate and capture the market through my own work.
Value is subjective, of course. I think there are people who would pay $30/mo knowing there's still an extraordinary amount of content if we're being objective.
However, I do agree that you will see a massive dropoff in subs. Closing this loophole was absolutely inevitable, and, while you do have plenty of people who pay $15/mo gladly, there are quite a few people who exploit the $1 cost.
Will the cost increase with the acquisition of ABK (if successful)? I really don't know about that. I think Game Pass can remain at its current cost or less IF Microsoft succeeds in their AI pursuits —if we get to the point that entire games can be designed with AI. That would be disastrous for the industry and the labour force, but great for Microsoft and the consumer. Games like Call of Duty had a history of asset recycling and it's kind of the perfect test subject for Microsoft as an annual franchise. The acquisitions also allow all of the previous content to be on the service without investing in their development. It's allowing content they didn't actually develop to be there in perpetuity because they own it. At this point, it's just cost to maintain the servers.
It isn't a foregone conclusion that prices increase. I think they will at least temporarily because they're likely looking to maximize profit. If they successfully eliminate the competition? Oh yeah. Increase for sure.
Fun fact. I could spend $70 on mlb the show on ps5 or I could take that $70 and get almost 5 months of game pass and play mlb the show as well on top of Stanfield just to name one other game.
The beginning of them not giving the service away for $1? The start of them closing the "loophole" and doing what every other service does?
You are that type of gamer huh? plays in the Xbox eco-system constantly, secretly love it, but pretend that you don't, either to fit in or just in denial.
It's every day on here. They go to extreme cases then it never pans out the way that they hope.
The fact is the price will increase MS said it themselves late last year. With all these day one third party games lately plus its own exclusives releasing this year the price will go up I think late this year it will raise.
$1 offer wasn't going to last forever, and everybody knew it. Game Pass is already profitable, and, with the exclusives it's getting in the next few months it will increase subscriptions.
The was obvious, it was coming sooner or later, they had to raise the price of Game Pass somehow. And with the amount of people exploiting the $1 trial offer, it's no surprise that they not only closed the loop hole, but just ended the offer all together. I would not be surprised if they increased the price of subscriptions in the near future.
"Cause Game Pass is not worth $15 a month with its current offerings"
So access to hundreds of games including dozens of recent AAA games isn't worth $15 per month. But spending $70 for one game is worth it? I can understand not wanting to pay for a subscription. That's fine. But saying it's about value is a bs argument and you know it.
Thats a misrepresentation of how much its going to cost you. For one thing, how many months do you pay to enjoy all the games you listed. (Even assuming you would have played/paid for all of them)
Even if I only complete 1 game a month … assuming they retail for $70 (average is probably closer to $45). That’s $840 a year, but I’m paying $15 a month so $180.
Compared to the competition if I bought $70 game each month it’s $840.
The silly thing about your argument 343 is that alot of us still like to own our games thats what you guys on xbox keep missing. Sure ill gamepass on xbox, but I still buy on ps. I do have ps plus but really ive just been playing games I own.
@Yarbie1000 Isn’t sustainable ?? It being 18% of MS revenue in 2021 bringing in $2.9B of the $16.28B they made isn’t sustainable?? It’s literally brining in billions. Just because they’re taking the $1 option away doesn’t mean they’re changing the prices. Ppl be so ass backwards , ppl been taking advantage of the $1 for a month sometimes it be $1 for 3 months for so long. Or maybe the ppl complaining on this thread thinking of a price increase doesn’t even have a Xbox or gamepass. It’s not worth the $15 a month lol you definitely don’t have the service. Paying $15 a month .. I get access to the whole gamepass library Xbox and PC , EA Access , discounts that be up to 90% off on some games , can cloud play games on my phone or tablet on the go , and also get they monthly Live Gold free games (even though the been ass recently) but still all for $15 a month. That’s not worth $15 to you ??? Or mayyyyybe you don’t even have a xbox to begin with.
Service wise, I pay more for Netflix (and only keep it around for the kids). FAR more value in GP than Canadian Netflix imho. Crave is even worse. Especially now that TLOU is over.
They already said before that GamePass is not profitable. Basic napkin math can show you how much GamePass misses out on direct sales, and especially when there are actually consistent first party AAA titles they lose out on billions of profit because subscribers would only pay dollars to play the one game rather than full retail. They even said themselves recently that it cannabilizes game sales. What sounds better to you as a dev? 1 million sales at $70 each or 3 million for a few bucks each? For a franchise that sells millions it exponentially loses even more. This is why major AAA games don't come to GamePass on their own. MS has paid them upfront before they earn anything through engagement. GamePass can only become more costly over time. It is not sustainable, and again, this has been said by MS themselves.
Microsoft is pretty serious about AI game development. Ideally, AI works alongside a full team of developers to eliminate crunch and allow for better work-life balance. In reality, it's very likely to eliminate jobs.
I only hope that people push back relentlessly against ANY corporation looking to eliminate jobs to maximize profit. If they keep the jobs and just support them with AI, I cannot really have much issue there. But yeah, that is the most problematic outcome in my opinion.
Unfortunately, Microsoft is a trillion dollar company and the United States is a plutocracy.
The only way to move the needle in favor of labor is to get bodies in the streets. I'm talking about massive, frequent, and prolonged general strikes.
I'm an American, and I cannot tell you enough how inspiring and depressing it is to see the French people in the streets over raising the retirement age or Indian people launching a massive (and largely not covered in US media) general strikes.
For me, it's more of an ethical dilemma, you have to train that AI on other people's work anyway, so should those people get paid for it in some way? Even if it's through some sort of royalty or something?
I think AI is potentially a great thing and will greatly improve humanity's quality of life, but there's so many ethical/morality issues that need to be sorted out first. I don't want to see jobs go, but it's inevitable, although I think AI should be a supporting tool and not the main show if you know what I mean.
That's exactly what I mean, mate. AI in a supporting role is fine, but if we're talking about eliminating jobs, that is extremely problematic.
Unfortunately, the latter is likely to happen because, as history continues to show, employee compensation, employment, and benefits are often the last things on their minds (if at all). If they can cut their labor force and maximize profit, they will. ANY corporation operating in the States would, I'm sure.
It's upsetting to think this can happen since I couldn't imagine doing something so far removed from sympathy for your fellow human... But of course they would do it because no one's looking to stop it.
Did you guys not learn about the industrial revolution? The benefits of free market destroying inefficient jobs but creating new and better jobs? I mean this is basic macro economic stuff
So in regard to services and content overall it's profitable but he won't say GamePass itself is profitable by itself, when we recently had MS say it wasn't profitable last year as well. With the lack of big AAA games lately I can see it not being super costly at the moment, but as soon as they lose millions of direct sales from finally catching up on first party releases on a consistent basis it will become more and more costly.
I'm shedding a few tears on this one. I've done it like 6 times or so, and was hoping to use it on Starfield if it's good. Well we knew it had to end eventually
LinkedIn is the professional social network Microsoft bought in 2016. The price has risen in that time, multiple times. For me it can be useful and last year I was being offered a monthly subscription for £15.95 (already a rise since the MS purchase) but this year I was being offered a monthly subscription for £34.95! Almost double.
True. When you look at it like it's a $10 game rental for a month, it's definitely disputable if it's worth it... It may be for new games that you really want to play
Oh and it seems for people that do the stack 3 years of gold and upgrade it all for the price of 1 month GPUltimate still seems to work. That's a big loophole
it was great while it lasted. but why are they doing it right now, right in the middle of their battle with regulators and while they are saying that they are not gonna increase games and subscription prices despite buying ActiBliz? this and the news about Redfall would not look good from the regulators' point of view. OR do they already have the green light for the buyout and is already making their moves to quickly recoup their investment?
This is just the beginning. Look for prices to continue to rise cause Xbox Game Pass isn't sustainable in it's current form. They gonna make you pay for Call of Duty one way or another. It was fun while it lasted. Hopefully they don't shut down the VPN loophole cause i'm definitely out if I gotta pay full price. Cause Game Pass is not worth $15 a month with its current offerings.
All those people cheering for the Activision deal to go through will start to see that there will be setbacks
This is the beginning folks I'm sorry to say gp rn isn't sustainable or healthy to xbox rn.
The dollar dream is over. Heckuva run tho, with the loophole. Great value.
Time to get that money back. No more samples. Time to see a return on these purchases.