Sony's more sustainable approach to PS Plus Extra and PS Plus Premium looks like the right call after Microsoft's Game Pass strategy hurt game sales on Xbox consoles.
If MS are fine with trading some game sales revenue for subscription dollars, it's fine - and future proofing, subscriptions are the future and can be more lucrative in the longer term.
It's good for a consumer perspective, but from a developer's perspective, it's terrible since they make less money.
Just wait until every devs makes trash games with microtransactions because cutting down on quality and adding microtransactions to make any real money is going to be the only way to survive in the industry. Let's see then if it's good for the consumers.
Agree it’s great for consumers and isn’t game pass very profitable wasn't those numbers release in their financials.
People are really stupid if they care about companies who make millions or billions. People should care about their own wallet. What’s wrong with people. The gaming industry will be fine. It’s only growing.
@lifexline - "isn’t game pass very profitable wasn't those numbers release in their financials" No those numbers wasn't release in their financials. Just revenue.
@orchard I think its better for everyone including the consumers when the business model is designed to produce high quality gaming. Just because you are getting crap for cheap doesnt mean you are better off.
I think the consumers are voting with their wallets which business model they prefer.
@DarkZane, We already end up with Micro-transactions, DLC and Loot boxes/Gacha, and the developers are still saying they're not earning enough, plus, the crunch time/deadlines and incomplete games/day one patches at release... I'd hate to see Gamepass dominate and further exacerbate the issue, it only seems to help a small number of developers succeed.
@lifexline, I'm holding to what I said- you said profitability numbers were released in their financials. I'm telling you they are not. Yes, Phil was at a conference once and said "and it's profitable" . If you consider that evidence that it's profitable, that's fine, but MS doesn't release that info for Xbox like PlayStation does
The GP model with big budget games releasing day one isn't sustainable. Sure, it's great now, because MS are throwing all kinds of money at it, but inevitably it's going to come to a stage where something has to give. Studios will start seeing budgets slashed or there'll have to be an increase in subscription prices. Neither solution will benefit developers nor consumer.
Regarding all this "killing the industry" stuff, as long as there's a free market and the barriers to entry are low for publishing a game, we'll all be fine. If anything is out of balance: value of games, price of sub, fees given to devs for product... The market will correct- customers will leave, devs won't put their games on the service. It's like an evolving organism. If competition gets stifled due to bad behavior by big companies, that's when we run into problems.
and the question is how long will they take the hit for?
Starfield should be a game that sells 20 mill easy, now id say wed be looking at 5 mill at best in the first few months.
They need to stop with engagement numbers, that does not equate to new money or revenue thats just the existing base playing.
The stat Microsoft should be us showing in liue of not showing us sales numbers anymore is new subscriber numbers after the release of big AAA titles.
If starfield releases and they gain 10 mill subscribers then that is obvs very good but seeing as Microsoft only tell us engagements numbers id say there aaa titles are not driving up the numbers because otherwise they would say hey we just gained X million amount of new subscribers since in the first month of X games release.
Only MS has the pckets to sustain this business model, it would put everyone else out of business to release first party games that cost 100s of millions of dollars day and date on a cheap sub.
God if war earned 700mill plus in its first 3 months, someone tell me how many new subscribers sony would have needed to make that back? if it released on its sub service?
"Starfield should be a game that sells 20 mill easy, now id say wed be looking at 5 mill at best in the first few months."
Microsoft does not care about sales, that´s why Starfield will no be available on Playstation.
"They need to stop with engagement numbers, that does not equate to new money or revenue thats just the existing base playing."
They won´t. It´s working for them. According to CMA´s investigation report, last year, Xbox dominated 60-70% of the Cloud Gaming market, which means that the vast majority of people playing via Cloud are spending their gaming time on Xbox ecosystem. And that´s exactly what they´re aiming for. Despite PS5 excellent sales, MS knows that million of consoles sold does not equate to millions of gamers playing that console in a steady monthly basis.
I mean, what happens when gamers beat the one and done type of games that Sony is known to do so well, like Ragnarok for example? They´ll patiently wait a full year for the next AAA first party banger like Spider Man 2 this year? Will they have their eyes distracted by games from the competition like Zelda and Starfield? Probably yes. That´s why Sony is investing on GaaS this generation. They don´t want Playstation gamers to look interested on games or services from the competition every far and between Playstation´s first party releases. To those companies, a busy mind is a distracted mind. That´s why those companies and publishers are investing on gaming services and its content, to keep you there, on their ecosystem.
"If starfield releases and they gain 10 mill subscribers then that is obvs very good but seeing as Microsoft only tell us engagements numbers id say there aaa titles are not driving up the numbers because otherwise they would say hey we just gained X million amount of new subscribers since in the first month of X games release."
10 million subscribers won´t mean much if after one month all of them unsub. They rather have 2 million new subscribers via Starfield that are active on the service for an extended period, like one year or more. That´s the definition and goal of MAU.
You guys really missed my point in regards to that part, was pointing out that starfield would've been a big seller, Bethesda games usually are now it wont be.
and the question is how many new subscribers will these big games bring in when they release and will mS tell us the numbers rather than giving us bullshit engagement numbers.
Ill be playing it on GP so wont be contributing to the sales, just like 90% of people on gamepass.
@ Obscure
considering Xbox is the only company actually playing in the cloud space them dominating isn't exactly impressive if the competition aren't even trying in that field.
They might not care about sales but they do care about subs and now that MS has all these big studios making very Expensive games those sub numbers need to grow and grow massively and thats what these AAA games should be doing for the service.
the numbers will need to grow exponentially to account for all the new studios making high cost games, if no ones buying games which lets be honest they arent, and new subscribers are coming slowly, how exactly is that sustainable?
"You guys really missed my point in regards to that part, was pointing out that starfield would've been a big seller, Bethesda games usually are now it wont be."
It´s will obviously sell less copies once it will be available day one on both PC and Series consoles day one. Not to mention that it will sell zero copies on Playstation. But Starfield will still sell big regardless, it´s an big open world RPG game by Bethesda after all. It´s like a cult.
"Ill be playing it on GP so wont be contributing to the sales, just like 90% of people on gamepass."
In case the game delivers, the moment you start and play Starfield, you among millions of gamers around the world on PC, Series consoles, mobile and TVs will spend hundreds (maybe thousand) of hours out of the Playstation ecosystem. So other than having fun, you´ll be helping Microsoft achieve its goals. They will be more than happy to have you and millions of gamers hooked on Gamepass.
"considering Xbox is the only company actually playing in the cloud space them dominating isn't exactly impressive if the competition aren't even trying in that field."
Didn´t say it´s impressive or unimpressive. Xbox is the actual leader in the Cloud space and such achievement must cause a very good impression on their executives, investors and shareholders. That means that investments on Gamepass, XCloud and Microsoft first party games will continue. Yeah, Phil Spencer just greenlit a new Halo game build from the ground up on UE5 despite the fact that Xbox invested millions in R&D for the Slipspace Engine. Just to throw it away after just one game. And yes, 343i continues as the Halo main developers.
You see, Microsoft are pretty confident in whatever they´re doing, I wouldn´t bother and worry about them now and the foreseeable future.
"the numbers will need to grow exponentially to account for all the new studios making high cost games, if no ones buying games which lets be honest they arent, and new subscribers are coming slowly, how exactly is that sustainable?"
Microsoft is willing to go pretty hard on competition, they´re will spend big money on new games, new technologies, new studios and even more publishers if allowed to achieve their goals.
"God if war earned 700mill plus in its first 3 months, someone tell me how many new subscribers sony would have needed to make that back? if it released on its sub service?"
Well, Jim Ryan himself confirmed that Sony doesn´t have that kind of money to blow like MS does, but Ryan strategy for Playstation is working.
I'm not worried about MS at all, they have the pockets to do what they are doing and I'll happily take what I can from a 2 trillion dollar company especially as the competition is strong amongst all 3.
What I'm worried is Ms taking the lead and forcing Sony and Nintendo into a position where they need to offer the same things to keep there consumers from.jumping ship which will lead to lesser experiences and more mtx for those platforms cause they simply can't afford to keep the quality high while charging minimal for IT.
if things stay exactly as they are in terms of market position then happy days. Sony and Nintendo keep doing what there doing no chamges needed and Ms keeps doing what there doing minus buying the whole industry up.
First thing to point out here according to Xbox they have missed their Gamepass targets 2 years in a row. As for your take on GoW is absolutely 💯 idiotic. GoW alone will generate more profit than Gamepass because they take all the profit as its a 1st party title whereas Xbox only gets a fraction as they have to split the payment to all the developers in some way.
As for the main point digital sales and subscriptions being the most profitable and more on Playstation. Playstation digital sales destroy Xbox/PC sales. Also Playstation is doing fantastic all round. They broke the record last quarter and industry record with $8.8 billion revenue and record profits. So they're doing fantastic. Playstation up 56% whereas Xbox with minor boost from Gamepass was down 13%.
'What I'm worried is Ms taking the lead and forcing Sony and Nintendo into a position where they need to offer the same things to keep there consumers from.jumping ship which will lead to lesser experiences and more mtx for those platforms cause they simply can't afford to keep the quality high while charging minimal for IT."
As I said before, Nintendo is in a league of their own, they are not worried about Sony or Microsoft quite the contrary in fact, Nintendo and Microsoft has been business partners for some time, as Microsoft allowed some of its exclusive games to be ported to the Switch.
Such partnership will only grown stronger in the future in case Nintendo decides and release a next gen console as powerful or superior to the Xbox Series S. It´s possible that Starfield and even TESV might be ported and released on Nintendo´s next gen console.
In Sony´s case, their actual position can only be undermined by Sony itself. I mean, Playstation needs to and make sure their exclusive games to deliver in consistency and high quality levels above the competition to justify $70 investment from it´s customers.
That´s why I have a good laugh every time I heard uniformed people say Xbox doesn´t care about quality of it´s first party games, they couldn´t be more wrong and naive. It´s all about perception. I mean, why would I continue with Playstation while paying full price for games which quality is inferior in comparison with the competition where those games are "free"?
In resume: all Sony have to do is maintain its high quality for first party and exclusive games, and Playstation will continue to lead and be successful.
If you have gamepass why would you pay? That game, as a Microsoft owned ip will be on the service indefinitely from day 1. If you think this fact won't severely hurt Starfield sales wise I don't know what to tell you. They'd be luck to hit 20 million. My guess is you'll hear some engagement metrics from Microsoft at the outset then you won't hear anything from them sales wise afterwards as they do not want give up their phony narrative regarding gamepass effect on game sales.
I remember ms being pretty open during the 360 Era. Since early to middle Xbox one Era they got pretty tight lipped. Aside from giving useless stats like hours on things. Sh I fall asleep all the time when gaming.
I don't know what you mean when you talk about one and done games on PlayStation. I don't speak for everyone, but I don't think I've played any game to the end once and put it down forever. Actually, maybe Killzone 2, but that's because I found single player to be a chore. Multiplayer was fun in doses. You can't just say they're one and done because many are driven by narrative. I quite enjoy retreading the stories and watching the cutscenes again.
Don't know who you're speaking for, but it ain't me.
It seems like a short term vision to say yeah Sub dollars to recoup lost sales however there's a few things we can learn from this.
1) Microsoft has stated they are not satisfied with the overall growth of gamepass despite claiming a profit https://www.eurogamer.net/m...
2) the model tends to lead to development of more live service esq titles like halo infinite with its 10 year plans, sea of thieves as examples.
3) AAA games are not coming to it day and date were seeing indie games that may not have reached an audience getting some recognition and good for them but it's not like GTA 6 is going day 1 game pass maybe 3 years on when sales drop so really that's telling.
4) there's a push to still buy DLC for the games you don't technically own if it was profitable why not include it
5) were seeing dramatically high job cuts and lower quality first party titles comparatively vs the 360 era
6) while Sony and Nintendo can launch a game in a traditional way and sell north of 10 million units Microsoft base their metrics on made up numbers like downloaded or played.
7) what percent of users honestly simple create a new email every month to get the $1 for 3 months offer over and over again or exploit the gold loophole that still exists but 3 years of gold at a deep discount from key sites pay $1 get go ultimate for 3 years for $50 these users must make up a percentage of their sub and contribute nothing to the revenue.
At the end of the day being pro consumer is good but when it comes at the determent of the industry and your quality that's different you can't be pro consumer all day every day you need to turn a profit to keep pushing for better quality games
Microsoft isn't on services because of consumers... Some games sellers... Hundreds of millions, maybe even billions if Microsoft didn't destroyed halo and gears....
By your words Microsoft is like ONU just want to help people.. They are one the biggest companies in the world, if gp doesn't start to get millions and millions of new subcribers, no doubt they will become 3rd party its the only path to make back any of the 80 billions in profit. Not in revenue, profit.
Not so much when game quality takes a hit to compensate. Xbox is literally shipping early access level titles hoping to add to it later if gamepass revenue increases.
How is a gaming subscription from a company not making games “smarter” for GAMING consumers?
You do need to make games to keep subscriptions future proof.
And since Microsoft is trying to absorb a large portion of developers… they will just dwindle their output as well as they cut the fat for better profit goals.
Sony knows gaming business better then Ms understanding gaming. We have had CEO's from multi billion dollar corporations say that putting their huge AAA games on any service day one isn't feasible yet fanboys don't want to understand that but when a indie developer praises these subscriptions than we see fanboys defending their agendas and brand loyalty
High fi rush on GP day one ✅ GTA6 on GP day one 🚫
Ms and Sony can self fund these day one games but from a 3rd party's POV they aren't in position to spend 100 million on a game only to put it on a service day one. These services can only be as successful as the quality of software
I have GP ultimate yet I am playing fallout new Vegas 😄. High fi rush is the first game in a long time that Ms can say is quality and even at that it's a rhythm game ----------------------------- -------
Great for consumers in short term and could be bad in long run.
1- Ms are playing with fire here, they are getting us their fan base used to just playing games on GP. We all know people who only play what's available on GP and whenever we speak about upcoming games the first thing they want to know is whether it's coming to GP
2- Ms wants to eliminate physical media and used games. What better way to do it then utilizing their resources to give gamers these games day one but once that mindset is there they can tweak however they want
I could careless whether it's PlayStation, Xbox or Nintendo but we as gamers shouldn't be settling for less options
M$ already makes in revenue 3 billion 600 million dollars a year out of Gamepass. get a damn calculator how is that not sustainable. Let's take Sony's side now say GoW2 sold 10 million copies, they make 700 million dollars in revenue. How many games can Sony and Nintendo make a year that sells 10 million copies? WTF are you people smoking.
Perfectly said halo infinite was a 500 million dollar game to build and most people paid $1 played it moved on I'm no economist but that is probably why the studio layoffs occurred. Gaming is a business and if you can't see a market and returns it's hard to justify the expenditure of production.
Hard to pay a thousand workers when the sub has to also distribute profits to 20 publishers alongside its own first party studios and keep the lights.
Indie devs though yeah you're games might be 250k to Dev and ms basically pay everything to get it day 1 so at that point you don't need sales any subsequent sales are just a bonus
Sorry, Orchard, it is not "smarter" for consumers, as spending money is the ONLY way to sustain any industry. People who only accounting for their own benefit are the same ones complaining after a luxury taken away. It's crazy to see how many people are celebrating giving as little as possible while the company supplying their needed source of escape remains at the bottom of every sales metric a cross the board. Who does that? Narcissists, opportunists, losers, mosquitoes and leeches are a few examples off the top of my head.
Simple antidote taught to me from my parents was if you aren't able/willing to pay full price you shouldn't be doing it. I'm more than sure none of you would take paycuts at work and continue your occupations. While companies, MS included, are laying people off, you guys go on about how great it is to get something while putting little to nothing in. Great job guys, glad to see you're winning. I wouldn't be quick to bring anything new out either with a community like this. It speaks volumes as to why MS is struggling because their ecosystem of supporters are NOTHING like Sony or Nintendo's.
The problem is they have put all their eggs into the gamepass basket and they have no alternatives once gamepass fails. They have literally brainwashed xbox users by reciting gamepass over and over. What happens when it it mo longer viable and you have essentially taught your consumers to not be games.
I think we're at the point where Microsoft is doubling down on Gamepass because they've got nothing else they can run with, they don't have enough positives to compete at the same level as Sony/Nintendo despite the flaws those two companies have.
SMH This comment right here says it all 😄😄 I mean I played most of the popular titles on GamePass in less than a month for $10 dollars and then move on. But hey whatever fits your boat. I'm not complaining 🤑😁
But not smarter on the business side of things. Game Pass is currently unsustainable long term. MS has deep pockets and they can eat some of the lost revenue but even they won't be able to Kei this up with out a major price increase.
Mark my words prices will be going up on Game Pass big time. It's only a matter of time.
The reality of it is that it's not MS eating the cost. It's the thousands of people who just got laid off. The lack of quality offerings. Mismanagement throughout their game division. All telling signs of what's really going on behind the scenes.
From a lazy consumer perspective yes it is absolutely smarter in the long term it is not smarter from the consumer perspective if the consumer can see the writing on the wall. Most consumers cannot, they prefer the immediate gratification hence the cheap Game pass service. They are doubling down on lazy consumers and have been pretty successful as is evident. Microsoft has showcased absolutely no commitment in any area that they invested. Games with gold is a joke, the connect was a joke, they can't commit to a full next-gen future and so they released series s. The cant invest in their own studios and help them prosper. They can't manage a singular of their long-term IP properly except Forza. I'm pretty sure then they won't be able to manage Game pass properly in the long run either.
Even with Game Pass, most of the best games will still cost $70 outside of the sub service. Atomic Heart is a rare case of a game appearing in Game Pass that I actually planned on buying.
And, this might seem stupid to most, but I’m still gonna buy it on ps5 instead because I’d rather play it with a better controller and video capture; vs justify my game pass subscription through it by playing it there for $10 a month until t goes on sale for ps5 or gets removed from GP.
Why would I wanna pay an extra $10 a month for games that MIGHT be worth my time?
No one is arguing if it smarter for consumers. It’s arguing if it’s sustainable for Microsoft and if it’s detrimental to the industry, you professional goal post mover.
🤣 some of you people are weird as hell. Why do you care how much a company is making off of a service? Oh this service isn't making them a ton of money, that must mean the shittier service is better..... What in the hell is wrong with you people and why do you care so much
What you fail to realize is that the Xbox Division has the backing of one of the biggest (belongs in the top 20) companies in the world. Microsoft can afford to make heavy losses with Xbox because it doesn't affect the overall business one way or the other.
You fail to realize that this absolutely harms developers, big and small. But you are too busy senselessly defending Microsoft's every move to see that. One can't help but wonder if you are actually a Microsoft employee.
I just get a monthly trial key for ultimate of eBay £1.98 just wait till yours runs out and redeem. I don't need to buy any Microsoft games just play them literally for free
Microsoft can fund Xbox forever with profits from Office and Windows. They want to build market share and then monopolize games. Sony can’t afford to lose money on PlayStation. Sony used PlayStation to support it’s money losing businesses.
This isn't good for consumers. MS has claimed that gamespass is profitable but there's just no way. It's revenue also year was revealed and we now have confirmation fhst games that launch day 1 on gp sell poorly as expected (why would you buy it when you can subscribe and play it and several other games all year for a similar price?) They also have confirmed they have to compensate game devs launching day and date for the sales they would have expected to get on xbox. So that means every big 3rd party launching day and date is lowlly getting paid at least 200 million. Some probably more. They have to keep currently 24 studios running and if activision merger goes through that will be 39 studios. That isn't cheap. Now with AAA budgets being in region of 200-300 million now on average I believe lets day theybrlewase 2 or 3 AAA'S a year which tbh is bare minimum they should be releasing to maintain the service tbh. That's like 900 million right there, marketing costs ontop, a few third party titles launching in day 1, then all the other 3rd party titles. You can quite quickly see their revenue is all or almost all being used. So any profit being made is tiny. Which makes it unsustainable.
I thought that man but the proof in the pudding the pay 2 play subscription route will put less money in devs hands and in return give consumers subpar games insert halo I'd rather pay to have a good meal (game) then rent a buffet of ok food (games)
Smarter isn't really the right word, economical would be a better choice. GP is excellent value for money and is the perfect choice for gamers on a tight budget but other than that, what does Xbox have going for it? Absolutely nothing. Not only is Sony pumping out GOTY quality exclusives every year, they are setting themselves apart further with things like Dual Sense and PSVR 2. Ask Phil Spencer why people should choose Xbox over PS and without even thinking he would respond GP, ask Sony and they could easily give a five paragraph response.
It's wild to see people actually against value for a paid service. They love a service that gives nothing, but can't wait to slam a service that gives you multiple day and date games.
The most hilarious part about some of these people, they're the same ones that hate paying for MTX, GaaS features, but will be the first to tell you to support the developers.
No, that's the thing: MS has only pulled their own pants down.
By all intent from my understanding, they've always projected GP pulling in over a billion subs eventually.
Let me repeat that.
Somehow some exec managed to convince then rest that Xbox, a console that at it best sold around 100 million, my not have broken that, could eventually pull in billion subs. That by putting GP on EVERYTHING GP will eventually hit a billion subs.
@Godmars290, They can easily put it on PC, but there's no way they'll get it on Nintendo/Playstation consoles, it's in their best interest to not have Gamepass available on their consoles, so it's hard to where they'll be getting their billion subs.
I'd rather pay a lot up front for a quality game, than pay over time for drip fed content of a game launched with bare bones and filled to the gills with monetization. They cant even put maps in their game but they can make damn sure their store and hundreds of items can all work perfectly. Meanwhile other 1st parties are launching complete experiences without any signs of intrusive mtx
So let's ignore Hi Fi Rush, Pyschonauts 2, Wasteland 3 and many more games over the many years of GP that I can't think of, not to mention all the hundreds of third party releases, in favor of pointing the finger at one game, Halo Infinite. A game where the single player was complete and has no intrusive MTX...right?
A game they only have because they bought a publisher . Otherwise it would have been more nothing if that deal wasn’t struck. Not much coming from the MS studios they had for the last 2 decades in the last however many years .
"A game they only have because they bought a publisher.."
That's usually where games come from.
Great goal post moving as usual,
- "Xbox has no games"
- "Oh, those don't count because..."
"for the last 2 decades in the last however many years ."
Development usually takes four to five years, MS announced games from their studios back in 2020, 2021, I say it's been exactly the amount of time of regular development.
"And how about when gaas and mtx are in said subscription games?"
You mean optional MTX and GaaS options that are normally found in every game anyways? Not understanding your point. You pay for online on both PS and Xbox is this your complaint for that also?
"How about the mentality of those paying customers saying “free on gamepass”?"
Take it up with them, is there going to be an actual point?
"Funny that what you feel the need to defend a company..."
What's funny is that I just don't live to only play triple A games. GP offers more for me, just recently I finished Chained Echos, Hi Fi Rush, started the latest Monster Hunter and a lot more than just the offerings from MS.
Crazy how people need to constantly attack a service and have no idea what it's about and that it is constantly providing games. Lies of P, Atomic Heart will be next.
But keep paying for a service that also drips old games and never offers anything newly released day and date, it seems people enjoy paying for that.
Its not a viable service. How many times does that have to be said and pointed out?
You're paying multiple publishers and studios from the one income pool of subscriptions. Then you're turning round and offering AAA titles, games costing hundreds of millions to make alone, with it losing millions in sales because a good chunk of its potential buyers are instead streaming it "for free" on GP. Such was obvious to anyone with a bit of common sense with the arsine announcement.
"Its not a viable service. How many times does that have to be said and pointed out?"
How is it not a viable service, I'm playing it right now. Enjoying it right now....not viable to who...the customer? The developers still putting their games on the service? MS still paying their devs for making games?
"You're paying multiple publishers and studios from the one income pool of subscriptions..."
So let me understand this...
MS is paying multiple devs to put their games on the service as well as putting their own games on the service day and date. And for the sake of argument let's pretend that the services they're getting constant revenue from monthly, yearly isn't covering the cost, which none of us actually knows, because we're all just assuming that only digital/retail sales are the only forms of income, but anyways....MS is willing to take the hit, developers are still getting paid, and customers like me get to play games like Starfield, Lies of P, Atomic Heart and more when they first release for a low yearly cost. This is a bad thing?
Let MS worry about what's not viable. As long as devs get paid and gamers are getting deals, then it remains a very viable option.
After all those words, Gangsta, I have a question: If GP is so great, why aren't games like Elden Ring, Hogwart, NBA 2K23, Madden, Fifa, or the like NEVER on GP? These games are some of the highest selling games that are available on XB. Using Elden as an example, MS sales only accounted for 19% of total sales. According to the latest metric, Elden sold 17.5 million copies, showing that MS's community only purchased 3.3 million copies. 3.3 million of 20 million means that less than 17% of gamers are buying games on the XB. This all while Sony made up a whopping 41% of sales. This was accomplished without the use of a service to substitute for a lack of selling games.
i think too many people are looking at xbox alone. as a publisher i would be worried if i had a game that simultaneously released on xbox gamepass and playstation/pc. how many would just play it on gamepass instead of purchasing on another platform. take hogwarts for example. if its sold 5mill copies since launch, how many sales would be cannibalized if it launched day and date on a sub service. reports from UK already showing that 80% of ps gamers purchased it physically. how many copies sold would they have lost to a sub service. again this is why aaa tittles do no release day and date on a sub service as it would not only effect the platform the sub service is on, but it will also take from other consoles/pc.
@gangsta_red: If MS keeps take hits for GP, paying devs to put their games on it, their own 1st party titles day one which eat into sales, at some point they'll stop because of all the added costs that eats up what reported profit it makes. At that point it'll go away if not shut down overnight. Something I've literally been saying about it since they announced D-1 releases.
If all you want to do is enjoy it while it last, fine. Just accept that you as an Xbox are the only one - not even MS - getting something out of it. Stop holding it up as something others should emulate cause while they simply don't have the money, most also know better.
"If GP is so great, why aren't games like Elden Ring, Hogwart, NBA 2K23, Madden, Fifa, or the like NEVER on GP?"
Madden and Fifa are on GP by the way. That's what's funny, it seems I'm always arguing with folks that never even tried GP.
And this is such a stupid argument because when were those other games you mentioned announced to be coming to Game Pass?
A lot of you guys seem to think that EVERY game is/was supposed to come to Game Pass. Absolutely NO one promised that, so why are we just naming games at random? The only games promised to come to GP day and date are Xbox first party titles.
Others like Lies of P, Atomic Heart, Monster Hunter Rising, Wo Long are the other games that have been announced. So why even try and argue something that was never promised like Elden Ring, Hogwarts, etc?
Such flimsy arguments.
@Godmars
All I'm reading is, "If this" and "if that"... Lots of if scenarios, but I'm not reading any actual answers to any of the questions I asked, why isn't viable to customes and developers now?
Another hypocritical thing I've noticed is a lot of people like to bring up sales but then have no idea the exact amount of revenue Live and GP is pulling down.
Which is hilarious, because a lot of people here are quick to tell others the difference between revenue, profit and sales when an Xbox with high sales article is announced. But seem to just stick with the sales narrative when it comes to GP.
"Stop holding it up as something others should emulate cause while they simply don't have the money, most also know better."
This is a hilarious statement from you , because all you have done since it's inception years ago is leave multiple comments on how the quality of games would go down, how only live service games would appear on it, how games would be filled with micro transactions, how it can't be sustained and now it's not viable
You want others to stop holding it up, then why don't you yourself stop constantly putting it down, especially if you can't enjoy it's benefits.
@gangsta_red: Wow, either your reading comprehension or willful ignorance. Betting the latter though. As usual.
As long as GP is around its likely going to be a good thing for consumers.
If it fails to turn an actual profit, if MS has to keep going out of their way to promote it, buying up popular 3rd party IPs to then make their studios another Rare or 343, if they can't make GP into another Steam or Apple Store with a billion users, they're going to close it down. Sell off what've got if lucky.
But again, while it lasts, GP is going to be great for its subscribers.
No doubt it is a great value, but it isn't sustainable. Xbox is getting destroyed in console sales, revenue and profit. At some point they will have to answer to the shareholders. Xbox has painted itself into a corner with gamepass. There is nowhere to go. Their have massively missed their gamepass numbers. Playstation is going to truck them this yr, since the chip shortages are a thing of the past. The whole reason they are going after Activision is they want to get their gamepass numbers more inline with what their goals are. They have a few nice looking games coming out, but nothing screams must have. Their console gamepass numbers are way below what they want and they are having to rely on PC gamepass numbers.
All these guys think they know more than developers that are actively working with gamepass, and look foolish when a Dev that’s been working with gamepass comes out and says this
“ All I can say is, we're aiming to get every single title we publish from now on, onto Game Pass. In doing so, we'll secure success for each title, and relieve immense pressure for the devs
Gamepass is a fantastic deal for gamers, and devs involved with it have been singing it’s praises and wanting to put more games there.
Obviously you’re not going to sell as many games, because they’re on a sub service, but devs are being compensated for those lost sales by MS gamepass payments and those devs seem happy, as some are putting future games on too
That's wild, I was digging some myself, trying to find any stories of developers who hated being on GP, got screwed out of potential money or had regrets.... couldn't seem to find anything, you would think after four/five years there would be at least one developer with a GP horror story.
I love GP and Idgf what haters gotta say about it. People seem to think they know MS business better than MS themselves. I’m sure MS clearly knew that putting games in a service would obviously affect sales. It’s not my problem to worry about these companies bottom lines it’s my problem to worry about MY bottom line…
I agree, which is why i bought my xsx, along side my ps5 and switch cause i don't need to buy any games for it and will happily let ms give me expensive games for cheap.
in saying that though, i care more about my hobby than i do saving a bit of extra cash, if the position of power stays as is between the 3 console manufacturers than fantastic, we all win.
only ms can sustain the losses of there model, unless numbers grown massively we will just see a drop in quality or ton of live service and MTX.
what happens if sony falls behind MS in the market and is struggling so has no choice but to do the same expect they will need to lower the quality of there games and increase MTX cause they cant afford to offer what ms is.
right now its perfect for me, sony giving me bangers and ms playing catch up providing us with value and hopefully bangers with the pockets to continually do so while coming last.
if the positions of power change, it will not be good, and you saving a few dollars every yr could potentially ruin a hobby you love.
its like the acti deal, great for me as GP subscriber if it goes through but bad for gaming if ms gain the upper hand at any point, so id rather that deal didn't go through even if that means i spend a few extra 100 a year.
Subs are the future like it or not. Digital is the future like it or not. I’m not concerned about conspiracy theories regarding what may or may not happen with gaming. I’m taking full advantage of saving money where I can when it comes to gaming. I’ve probably spent more money on gaming than anything else in my life besides buying my home so I think I deserve a break now.
We know ms always pull out something deems to fail when trying to change how people do gaming. Its Russian roulette 50/50 it might actually work out or it could fire back at them and everyone else. We already seeing the effects but there are some like you and others only see your own benefits and dont see the consequences
Short term it’s a cheap deal . Long term if they get what they want be sure it’s going to be 30$+ a month . Either that or the quality of games will lessen . Something has to give . They were short 20 million subs from their estimated expected subs .
So because of my OPINION and because I enjoy game pass which are BOTH THE TRUTH for me my name doesn’t fit? Where exactly did I lie? I’ll wait for a response…
But what you are doing is enjoying cheap as dirt gaming now in exchange for a relative lack of future quality titles as a function of that near term benefit.
So now you’re telling me what I should and shouldn’t enjoy? Lol boy you people need therapy. I’m enjoying GP and NOTHING you haters and fake analysis will change that. Amazing how all you guys have insight into the future. Care to share the winning lottery numbers?
I dont really have any major complaints with ps plus extra/premium. I still prefer to buy my games physical over digital as i have always loved building a collection of games, and ps plus premium/ the games of the month help compliment gaming for me.
Say a mid game sold a million copies at an average $40 a piece. 40 million dollars. Microsoft could afford 60 abverage games. 3.7 is pennys to the whole scope of the industry. Don’t grab a calculator just go back to school and learn how to use one first. Remember logic goes a long way.
I feel nothing for a $2 trillion company, I feel sorry moreso for the developers and Microsoft's desire to swallow the whole market if it gets the chance.
What is funny with some die hard fans of MS and GP, is that they don’t see the correlation between the business model and the complete absence of AAA exclusives on their system.
Why spent multi million dollar on a game development if it does not increase significantly the subscriber base? Same for independant developers, the game development budget will for sure be aligned with the revenue they get for GP, and I am pretty sure return on investments does not favor high development costs.
Sure, the quality of a game does not revolve only around its development budget, but sure also with no investment for innovation and breakthroughs, any industry will collapse and the game industry is no exception.
Their is no miracle in life, if we pay less for something, at the end the quality of the product will be alignment with what we pay for.
The problem I see with GP is that it erase financial benefit of critical acclaim: an exceptional game will not see any financial bonus of its quality vs an average game that anyway GP subscribers will also download and try for a couple of hours as it is « free ».
Well, kind of nothing since several years apparently given factual exclusive status for Xbox. Ah yes one achievement they were able to kill they main franchise with Halo Infinite. Yeah, yeah, I know « big things are coming », as every year since Spencer manage the brand …
Don’t think gamepass is sustainable - if the devs aren’t making as much money as they could without it on gamepass then it will fail. Let’s be honest the games are poop on gamepass- just a few good ones which weren’t even great… halo was a flop. Horizon 5 was a clone of 4. And hi fi rush is an indie game
Do these people have a calculator? multiply $10 by 30 million per month now multiply that by 12. That's how much they make a year. If that's not sustainable Idk what is.... This is what happens when copium run rampant
You clearly never analyzed P&L. **GP is more expensive than that. It’s like $15. Your example would show sales/subscription dollars roughly. That is cool and all, but there’s a reason some types of business like grocery stores are called a penny business. First we should break down your $15 sub. How much goes to each game/Dev that got downloaded and played over a certain amount of time in the pay period. (We will assume it’s monthly lump sums) That $15 gets split up between ALL games that met the criteria. A portion will go to wages, benefits, any marketing deals for the period, day one games get a bigger share I’m sure, reinvesting, and whatever other things that go into the expenses column. This is all summed up as “paying the bills”. Once all that is done, what’s left of that $15 is the actual income from one sub. NOW you can multiply that wildly varying number from day to day and you can estimate a take home/gross profit. I’ve never seen a gamespass P&L but I’m sure it breaks down to FAR less than the sub cost.
lol I majored in accounting, GP is a single revenue stream just one it's not responsible for paying for Xbox as a brand to function. So for whatever GP expense is that's what it needs to pay for after all of that we have P&L. That's why I said revenue i'm not calculating expenses at all. IDK how much it costs to run GP but I know $3.7B is a crap ton of money that even a simple calculation can't show the value of the business to fanboys.
That is an incredibly simplistic look at their financials, and I can guarantee that it's nothing like you think it is, you could have added in the expenses too, or at least tried.
Am not looking at their financials am looking exactly at one aspect of their financials it's called revenue. IDK what their expenses is to run Gamepass. but $3.7B is a lot of money.
You're presuming that A. There's 30m paying subscribers, and B. They're all paying $10 a month, every month, for a year.
First of all, there isn't 30m subs. They stopped shouting out the numbers at around 25m, since then they've gone very quiet - why? The presumption is that the number of subs has gone down due to them finally allowing f2p games to actually be Free to Play - this alone will have resulted in a vast number of people cancelling their payments as they only play games such as Warzone, Fortnite and Roblox. As such, it's probably sub-20m at this point - nobody knows the actual figures because Xbox is keeping this a mystery - so we'll say 20m.
Next, you can't presume even half of the people subscribed are paying a full year, let alone full price. There's a large percentage of people that have abused the loophole and grabed up to three years of GPU for one dollar - that's one dollar divided by 36 months. Even if we say about 20% have done this, that's a lot of reduction.
Then you have to factor in the large percentage of people that brag about getting the service 'free' due to doing MS rewards every month. Those people literally pay nothing by performing tasks, this is another big reduction to the predicted revenue.
Let's not also forget those that sign up for 1-3 months to try out the service, they get deals for a dollar which they'll cancel before the actual payments start. These people also rotate through multiple accounts so they get multiple 'new user' discounts. Also, even if the number of people playing the system isn't huge, the number of rotating people who are signing up for the odd month here and there, for the one dollar deal, is a lot - only a small percentage of these will actually sign up and agree to pay each month.
So, after you take all the above into consideration (we can't talk about actual numbers due to Xbox being very secretive), you can clearly see why we can't 'simply' say $10 x 12 x 30m. The reality is, the actual revenue will be much, much lower than that on a monthly basis - then you have to reduce the final revenue figure by the amount MS is paying every single publisher and developer to lock their game into the service for a set period.
I'd be very surprised if they're even making a profit at this stage - this is why they're out there trying to buy studios and publishers, not just to own the IPs but so they can 'fill up' Game Pass with games yet not paying a penny to put them in there.
So yeah, it's not a simple calculation, nobody knows the actual figures, and they're most likely losing money with the subscription every single month.
I've always said that this was a losing game that only Microsoft could play in due to having a much larger war chest. Sony could never eat such costs to lost game sales. And even then, Microsoft needs an exit strategy or something to make it more profitable, it can't continue forever.
It just means that Sony is smarter with their decisions any money. Irrelevant who can “eat” the cost. After this many hens in this business, they shouldn’t be bleeding like that anyway.
Does anyone of you have access to Microsoft’s figures, contracts with developers, and can take me through a step by step process of how game pass is handled from a business prospective? It’s the same rhetoric day in and day out. I understand a lot of people here hate Microsoft, and it’s understandable, but how can we have a clear understanding of sustainability if no one truly knows how it all works, and we get bits, pieces, and opinionated prejudices about the subject?
This piece makes no sense and is piggybacking on the 'Cannibalization' topic that was so quickly misinterpreted. This is clear that so-called gaming Journalism will always be a point of ridicule.
If you spend £120 a year on gamepass
£120 * 30 Million subscribers = £3.6 Billion a year from gamepass *Some people will say that people are still paying £1 for the service. Don't take your practice and act as if the whole gaming world acts on it the same way. It is a small fraction that did so. let's say it's 1 in 100 people are exploiting the £1 service, out 30 Million that would be 300000 people taking advantage of the service which is a small fraction of subs. Let's say for the sake of argument you remove those that still £3.5 Billion in revenue every year. Those exploiters are not even having a small bent on the revenue. Most of the people that get into the gamepass service and play games are extremely likely to stay due to their commitment to the games and the inclusion of additional games that spark their interest. And its exactly that which keeps people subscribed.
Now out of the £3.6 Billion they make a year A fraction of that goes on to funding games for gamepass and its as follows:
Small Indie game: £1-5 Million- Unpacking Medium Indie game: £10-20 Million- High On life AA games: £20-50 Million- A Plague Tale AAA games: £50-100 Million- Assassins Creed/Shadow of war
They probably spend a 1/3(or even more) of the revenue on funding games for gamepass. 1-2 Billion to fund both first-party and thrid party titles to go on Game Pass.
Some people might say that those games have the potential of doing better of they go out on their own without game pass. But let's see how they potentially do with game pass.
Let's take some examples: Small Indie Game: Unpacking *Exclusivity purchase: £1-5 Million *Revenue from steam sales = £ 6 million *With gamepass money= £7 -£11 million
Medium Indie game: High on Life *Exclusivity purchase: £10-20 Million *Revenue from steam sale = £12.5 million (I am sure it made even more than that) *With gamepass money= £20 - £32 million
AA Game: A Plague Tale: Requiem *Exclusivity purchase: £20-50 Million *Revenue from Multiplatform sales = £37.5 Million *With gamepass Money= £47.5 - £ 87.5 Million
Now I have not even taken into consideration a couple of things such as Revenue share or Bonus for reaching a certain Milestone. For example Milestone Bonus: Xbox could say that if their reaches a milestone of 1 million player playing they receive a bonus. Revenue share: For bigger AAA games they may get on game pass if they share a certain percentage of the revenue of gamepass.
The argument of the developer going it alone is much harder and complicates things as now they have to have a marketing budget and fight for the gamers attention. For those games to be successful they need to work hard at showcasing the game. My estimate is that Developers that go on Xbox gamepass make additional profit by 10-20%.
Long term Goal is to reach 100 Million Subscribers. £120* 100million= £12 billion a year
After the Activison eventually deals go through. That will significantly boost the gamepass subscribers as COD, Diablo, and many more games. It might potentially reach 50 Million Subscribers by the end of the year.
Microsoft is reckless with their gamepass model because they do not care about the overall health of the video game market, as gaming is not a big source of their income. They will take almost any risk if it means increased marketshare and damage to the long-term viability of its platform competitors.
All their new options are completely useless to me and just scream money grab. It's stupidity to subscribe to anything but essential and even then I'm not so sure the costs are worth it. You can argue "but you get free stuff", sure, but is that free stuff you would have bought otherwise? In all honesty, no. Not one free PS Plus game has been on my must buy list. So really it was about the online but now that you can't buy cheaper funds from CD Keys and stack it's not really worthwhile anymore. So I think when my stacked services are up in two years, I'mma let it lapse and not re-up, just like after a year of Nintendo Online, I called it quits. I'm pretty much done multiplayer games now and I prefer single player experiences at this point in my life. If it ever just becomes games as a subscription service only, that's the day I call it quits on gaming. Not a new feeling and not upset about it even 1%. Just the way it is and I'm good with that. Lots of other things to do in life! Gaming is just a small part of it for me and if companies don't offer me what I'm looking for, then I just move on.
Horizon Forbidden West not up your alley? Or any of the classics series which is about to end? There's some of the best games from last gen up on there.
I think Sony has the right idea. Sell a new game for retail price and after a year or so add it to PS+. That way your games sell and so does your subscription service.
Microsoft seems to make a deal that would essentially make up a sum of money that they’d lose from being on Gamepass in an effort to not lose potential sales:
“In a statement to GameSpot, a Microsoft spokesperson said Microsoft tries to help game developers make the most money they possibly can through Game Pass. As such, Microsoft cuts deals with developers and publishers on a title-by-title basis, the terms of which are not made public and are presumably not consistent across the board. In its statement, Microsoft didn't comment specifically on any cannibalization effect, but it also didn't say this never happens.”
I guess my question is how much of a loss are really seeing here? Do we know if it’s a 1% loss or a 100% loss?
Sounds like some devs/publishers find more success from Gamepass than others.
Well when you undermine your hardware and software sales by releasing everything day one on Gamepass and PC what in the hell did they think was going to happen?
If MS are fine with trading some game sales revenue for subscription dollars, it's fine - and future proofing, subscriptions are the future and can be more lucrative in the longer term.
GP is definitely 'smarter' for consumers.
I have access to Premium and Ultimate this year, prefer the GP library overall, but sustainability remains to be seen.
Can't wait to see the mental gymnastics the paid journalists will do on the behest of their lord bill gates.
It was smarter from the beginning. Gamepass was a total desperation move from MS
Likely only a sales failure is the cost of the AAAs put on GP day one.