Game Pass will kill Xbox if Xbox CEO doesn't kill service first, warns leaker
Under Phil Spencer, Game Pass was at the center of the Xbox ecosystem. All the acquisitions Microsoft made were to increase the pace of content landing on Game Pass to drive more subscribers. However, Game Pass has often been criticized as unsustainable by many in the industry. The recent Xbox “reset” laid bare the actual condition of Game Pass, and many are now questioning whether the service is the root cause of Xbox’s recent problems. Moore’s Law Is Dead thinks so.
An unconfirmed report recently emerged that Xbox studio heads aren’t too keen on Game Pass, as, according to the said studio heads, the service reduces the value of their games. Responding to this report, MLID rips into Game Pass as a “grossly anti-consumer initiative” that was never defensible. The leaker claims that, for Game Pass to work, Microsoft needed to become a “monopoly in gaming”. These concerns were raised by many when Microsoft was buying studios, both big and small. The US Federal Trade Commission even sued Microsoft for its $69 billion acquisition of Activision/Blizzard.
As we now know, Game Pass has missed its subscriber target. Instead of the 70+ million that Microsoft hoped for, the service has around 30 million subscribers. Microsoft needs to keep securing high-profile Day 1 game launches and maintain an appealing catalogue on the service to keep it afloat, which is a huge financial burden. So, MLID thinks that Game Pass “will eventually kill Xbox” if Xbox CEO Asha Sharma doesn’t kill the service first.
Game Pass makes Microsoft a lot of money
We can’t dismiss that Game Pass is a huge source of revenue for Xbox. 30 million is not a small number. Taking into account the Game Pass subscription pricing, which ranges from $9.99 Game Pass Core to $22.99 Game Pass Ultimate, the service brings in between $300 million and $690 million of revenue every month.
So, it is unlikely that Microsoft will completely kill the service. If that were the goal, we would've already seen moves in that direction. Rather, we saw Ash Sharma decrease the price of Game Pass to make it more appealing. If we had to guess, we could see fewer Day 1 launches on Game Pass and fewer overall games on the service to make it less resource-hungry. We could see these changes debut with the next-gen Xbox Project Helix.
That said, only time will tell what Asha Sharm does with Game Pass. Xbox CEO’s recent decisions have taught us that she is not afraid to make bold moves with the potential of intense backlash. So, we might end up seeing Game Pass gutted like MLID wants.
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