The Xbox Live Gold yearly sub has apparently disappeared on the official Microsoft Store and some are speculating there could be some big changes coming.
It's only fair because they were the ones who have been charging the longest. Sony offered it free on PS3 but no company will simply give up on free revenue when their competetion gets away with charging
I will still take the wait and see approach I do hope you are right and we get free online play on next gen consoles. It's just better to keep expectations low just in case they decide to stay as is or even raise their price
Plus and live generate billions so if either company decides to do away with it than higher ups have to be on board because that's multi billions in revenue(that both companies don't have to put a lot of effort into generate) on top of that what about those who have paid for years in advance how will companies handle these situations. To do away with it is one thing that means stopping the revenue but to than possibly having to issue refunds worth up to hundreds of millions(if not billions)
We as gamers shouldn't have to pay just to play online when we purchased the hardware, software and we pay for seperate Internet companies on monthly basis
No... they will most likely give you the option to convert your existing subscription to Game Pass, just like they did when Game Pass was initially announced. That's why I have Game Pass until 2022.
Did you mean making free-to-play games actually free to play and not behing a paywall, just like wht Sony does. Meaning you don't need any membership to play them? Or making online play free in general? Doubt that will happen.
Mariquino - MS news gets hardly any traction when you compare to any PS5 news. That's a fact. Lets hope MS big event will be massive. I'm hoping for new IP AAA game or 2. I'm already buying PS5 but I would love to see a real reason to buy XSX for me personally.
Could also be that they're moving everything over to game pass and xCloud given the recent xcloud announcement and their ultimate subscription.
You may be right and the online requirement will be removed though. I'd imagine if that's the case, then any remaining XBLG subs will be converted into game pass subs.
Not a bad move really, and it helps keep online players engaged without fragmenting the user base.
There was heavy speculation that MS is axing Gold. As far as I'm concerned it was just very good speculation from gamers, analyst, journo's but not an actual rumor. It seems MS really is getting rid of gold.
Maybe consolidating services as well. If they kept XBLG, it would end up being 2 major sub services, and a third supplemental service, which is apparently being bundled with Game Pass going forward. It does get to be quite a bit for the consumer.
Assuming MS is going to still continue to charge for online play, then it means they might be bundling it into game pass, which would be pretty good if they have to keep charging. The consumer gets a lot more for their money, has the option to pay more if they want the ultimate package, and MS still gets the sub revenue as the paywall still exists.
If they just remove the MP paywall, then that's also good for everyone, and some people may use that money to go with game pass instead, so MS probably isn't losing out either way.
If this isn't just a fluke, then it'll probably be clarified next week, likely at their pre-show event.
I called this a month ago. The label "Xbox Live" will be phased out entirely. All gamers in the Xbox ecosystem will no longer have a paywall to access the online portion of their $60 game purchase because it's UNETHICAL.
It doesn't make sense for Microsoft to claim to be pro-consumer and still charge to play online.
I assume Sony and Nintendo will follow suit....which is great for gamers.
Office 365 and Xbox Live have been Microsofts bread and butter for years. Theyve pioneered subscription services. You'll forgive someone for being sceptical they've turned all good guy all of a sudden
Possible... MS bas been burning a lot of cash off late... Then again, it's not like their servers are being put to a lot of use... Pretty great move, if you ask me... One of the major reasons why I don't do multiplayer on consoles...
I'll come back on July 24th. I will apologize if you are right. If they come up with Xbox 365 services or something with a similar concept please apologize to the community :p
Aren't PSNow games free to play online without PS+? I think this is similar and MS will just include XBLive Gold as a freebie in the Game Pass Ultimate (yearly only - big maybe?) sub.
You are a fool if you think MS will get rid of pay to play online. If they get rid of live they will just tie it to gamepass making any one who wants to play multiplayer buy a gamepass sub
What does sense have to do with it? MS charges for online because it's a revenue stream. Pro-consumer or not, they don't want to lose that revenue. Companies generally don't like to move backwards in revenue....their investors don't care so much about the pro-consumer side of things.
You may indeed be right, but claiming you were right now is premature.
It's also very possible that they're bundling MP paywall with game pass, which isn't a bad deal for the consumer at all, and still keeps people paying to play online, so MS isn't losing revenue.
This is a sign how badly they are hurting . I get the feeling this is their last hurrah. They are throwing everything in and if it doesn't get them out of last place MS is done with this level of game space commitment.
Like I said in the past I fully expect MS to replace Xbox live with simply game-pass or remove pay to play online completely. MS new philosophy is to have your game available on all systems so its starting to be a bit of a problem to have some user pays like console and free for PC and mobile if they only use xcloud.
I don't think they will remove pay to play online completely since they make a lot of money from it. I think they will roll up all their services into one sub and get rid of the paywall for free to play games.
The one who loses the gen is always the one who innovates next gen
Sony leading in hardware design but xbox is gonna change the online model again? Same as 360 era. If it's going free I hope sony copies again here. Also really need a game pass service we don't need 4 years playing catch up like psn in ps3 era
Problem with Sony copying is that they lose a revenue stream that they're reliant upon. Sony has a $92 billion market cap while Microsoft has a $1.5 TRILLION market cap. MS can afford to eat the cost of giving up a reliable revenue stream...Sony, not so much.
I expect Sony will recoup the loss by launching PS5 console exclusive games on PC with greater frequency.
Some of these guys are going to down vote you, just because you know what your talking about. I knew the way Microsoft Lost this generation that they were going to start spending a whole bunch of money to change the direction of Gaming.
I'm having a tough time seeing Sony following suit myself. PSN subscriptions make them allot of money. A me to reaction is not likely at least not right away anyway.
I'm curious though. Wouldn't that mean the quality of live will diminish? I'm a little worried about that.
@TheGamingEffect Microsoft is the biggest software company in the world. We knew that if they actually started giving a damn about gaming again that they would eventually take over the market given their resources.
Microsoft just killed Google Stadia with one announcement.
Isn't MS going to lose that revenue stream as well? Unless they consolidate the MP requirement into game pass(the likely candidate if they are), why assume that people will just sign up for game pass because they don't have the MP sub anymore?
But, if they can replace that revenue stream with game pass, and get people to sub to it by keeping the MP requirement, then they don't really lose a revenue stream, and they can work the numbers better, and people feel they're getting a much better deal out of the whole thing....which honestly, they would be since game pass is a good value. They can still try to promote the ultimate sub to make more money, which helps promote their xCloud service as well.
Yeah, it's true that MS can afford to eat the cost of anything. Many times over. But the point of business in the long term is not to supplement the consumer and sell your products at a loss. The point of business is to make a profit. Investors don't want to see MS paying to get people to use their products, they want people to pay to use MS products.
XBLG makes a lot of money for them for basically doing very little. It was a drop in the bucket for MS overall value, and all of Xbox revenue is a drop in the bucket for MS as a whole, but that minor drop in the bucket was enough to make investors push to spin off the Xbox brand near the end of last gen as it wasn't performing as well as the rest of MS.
That's not exactly a sustainable business model unless they have an end goal which isn't as golden as their current actions make it appear. MS isn't going to suppliment this stuff over the long haul. That just doesn't make sense.
So, it's one of those things, especially with MS, where you have to look at it and ask, "what's their goal". That goal may be 10-20 years away....10 being a general goal time that MS likes to work with in most things....but MS as a whole is, and always has been about control.
Probably not something to worry about for the time being, but there is always some reason that MS gives things away seemingly for free, and not all those things end up in the consumer's favor.
With how pro-consumer they've become over the past couple years I wouldn't be surprised to see Xbox Live go free. They've got Game Pass and xCloud now to make money. And it wouldn't make sense to charge for multiplayer on SX, but have multiplayer be free on PC or through Game Pass/xCloud on PC/mobile.
If they drop the XBL sub then holy flipping shite. Or perhaps they plan on dropping XBL for Gamepass since they both essentially offer up games. People are more willing to pay for acccess to games than for access to multiplayer.
They'll find a way to relabel it and combine it with gamepass as a single sub. Two subs for parents and families can seem like to much. Merging them into one feels like less outgoing.
People are cheering that Microsoft has axed gold, but can't think straight when it's all but apparent that Microsoft is just doing some financial maneuvering by for 1 removing the limited time offer on game pass, plus raising the price significantly. This is exactly what Netflix did! They started out at $6.99 and now from the last time I had a subscription it was $14.99.
I'm even willing to bet that Microsoft will just change the tier classes or something to that effect.
While I don't want to speculate, another trick would be to offer some version of XBLG, but the price is a point where it's not much more to get a different service which offers the same thing, plus a lot more. In this case, I can see it being game pass, which when you have it, it also includes that "feature" that is in the cheaper services price. If it's only a small amount, most people would just pay slightly more to get a lot more.
Again, lots of possibilities, and I'm sure they'll say something soon. Or, this is just a fluke, and it wasn't meant to be taken down. Wouldn't be the first time where something just disappears, then comes back a day or two later.
Xbox live will simply be incorporated into Game Pass or something. At this rate xbox will have 3 subscription models. Goodness!
Why is the notion of free online play getting down votes? At this point Microsoft makes so much money on their cloud service that it can afford free online play. It’s free on PC anyway and they are trying to bridge consoles and pc into an xbox services.
Also Games With Gold have been trash lately. Why even have that paywall? Getting rid of a paywall will get rid of Games With Gold. Want games? Get Game Pass.
GP Ultimate is $180 per year, $60 Live plus $10 per month for GP is also $180/year. They might get rid of Live but I have no interest in Game Pass and I'm not going to pay $15/month. Is rather buy the games that interest me
Sounds to me like Xbox Live Ultimate is becoming the sole subscription method for all Xbox services. Microsoft will probably replace Gold Yearly with Ultimate Yearly.
If this is free online, kudos, but given that has been a huge revenue for Xbox I can't see them getting rid of it. I can see more of a restructure so that PC games and Xbox games have different gold memberships.
Not a chance. The consoles sell at a loss, if people only buy used games or play F2P titles, MS would never recoup the cost. If they are willing to take a significant loss on console price, they'll want to make it up somehow. I think they'll still have Live
F2P games usually still have revenue streams, and they'd make money off them that way.
Plus, when it comes to overall revenue, there are multiple avenues that make money. Licensing fees, storefront frees(which all F2P games use the store front), game sales, services, etc. Allowing for F2P games to be played without a sub wouldn't have any effect on their revenue stream, or it'd be so minimal, it's probably not even worth considering.
I know the devs would probably prefer that this requirement be taken away for these games. Means more people could play, which means more customers to potentially sell those MT to.
Probably is included on gamepass for next generation, so if you have game pass then u dont need to buy a separate xbox live. What they are doing us very clever as they will be charging you (gamepass) but for the consumer would be like getting live for free and to those that were already paying for gamepass and also for live (me included) is still a saving and a great deal.
I doubt they'll make online free. I think they just want people to purchase monthly (more like Netflix) with all the investments and Game Pass and what have you. It's better for their business to go for monthly subscriptions rather than people paying a lot less for 12 months.
It's probably so people stop buying 3 years of Gold and then converting it to Gamepass for 1$. If nobody actually pay for Gamepass, it's not viable in the long term. It's simple math.
This could be a move to free online play like the PS3 days. If so, then i'm going to get an Xbox on month one. If this is somehow an attempt to force all of their other serives onto their customer base, then I'm out, and it's PC only. I would go PS5, but felt like I got burned big with my PS3 digital purchases, and I don't forgive easily.
What’s going on
They'll redo the pricing somehow.
Like I said in the past I fully expect MS to replace Xbox live with simply game-pass or remove pay to play online completely.
MS new philosophy is to have your game available on all systems so its starting to be a bit of a problem to have some user pays like console and free for PC and mobile if they only use xcloud.
They need a restructure if they going to have so many services.
The one who loses the gen is always the one who innovates next gen
Sony leading in hardware design but xbox is gonna change the online model again? Same as 360 era. If it's going free I hope sony copies again here. Also really need a game pass service we don't need 4 years playing catch up like psn in ps3 era