Gamepass price increase and rework, new tier

[Legend]

@JeffGrubb @DestinLegarie @Wario64 Just received this email. I'm in Canada.

Xbox Gamepass Ultimate is increasing for me. pic.twitter.com/emQ450o4h5

— Andrew (@DrewM987) July 9, 2024

Might just be Canada. I might rush out and buy some cards from Costco cause I'm an idiot.

[the-pi-guy]

https://www.windowscentral.com/gaming/xbox/xbox-game-pass-is-getting-major-changes-with-a-new-tier-without-day-one-games-and-a-range-of-price-increases

Soon, Xbox Game Pass for console will be shuttered for new users only.
Users currently on Xbox Game Pass for console will be allowed to maintain their subscription, as well as day one games, and the hundreds of titles in the back catalogue.
New users on Xbox Game Pass in the near future will be greeted by a new Xbox Game Pass "Standard." This is more like EA Access, which includes Xbox's back catalogue, and doesn't include day one games. This will be priced at $14.99 per month, and will also include Xbox Live Gold for multiplayer (now known as Game Pass Core, confusingly). It doesn't include Xbox Cloud gaming. Game Pass Standard is supposedly launching in September.
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate will not be changed, but it will get a price increase. It will still include PC Game Pass, day one games, and hundreds of back catalogue titles, as well as cloud gaming. But, it is getting a price increase. The new price will be $19.99 per month.
PC Game Pass is also getting a price increase, from $9.99 per month to $11.99.
PC Game Pass will also continue to get day one games.
Xbox Game Pass Core (Xbox Live Gold multiplayer) gets an annual price increase to $74.99 from $59.99, but it will remain $9.99 per month.
The price increases for recurring billing will take effect on September 12, 2024.

[Legend]

So many angry xbots were adamant this was Canada thing, I almost didn't post.

Wow lots of changes. I just bought 3 years of Core through costco. Can convert into 2 years of ultimate for free. Much much cheaper.


https://support.xbox.com/en-US/help/subscriptions-billing/manage-subscriptions/game-pass-updates-july-2024

[Legend]

Hehehe I got my new subscription loaded up. 2 years for $82 a year, compared to the $240 a year they announced today.

I also still have two 3 month ultimate cards that I bought back on black friday in 2021 so lets see, maybe my subscription will outlive gamepass itself  

[the-pi-guy]

Rumor: "Changes are coming to Gamepass due to CoD"

MS: Don't worry, CoD is coming to Gamepass day 1.

People: ah makes sense, good faith to have the first CoD on Gamepass and then raise prices.

MS: Here's a new tier and new prices just before CoD comes out.

[kitler53]

"standard" at $14.99 will be nearly identical to ps+ and is pretty good price/value imo.

"ultimate" at $19.99 is still too cheap in my opinion.   the inclusion of day-1 games with the output just from MS (let along the collection of 3rd party titles given to date) is too good of a deal still to get xbox gamers to buy games.  i haven't looked yet but i'll guess xbox gamers are complaining to high hell but it's still a lot of value and overall bad for the industry.


ps+ premium looks all the worse given this offer by MS.

[Legend]

"standard" at $14.99 will be nearly identical to ps+ and is pretty good price/value imo.

"ultimate" at $19.99 is still too cheap in my opinion.   the inclusion of day-1 games with the output just from MS (let along the collection of 3rd party titles given to date) is too good of a deal still to get xbox gamers to buy games.  i haven't looked yet but i'll guess xbox gamers are complaining to high hell but it's still a lot of value and overall bad for the industry.


ps+ premium looks all the worse given this offer by MS.

Standard at $14.99 is not a good value when ultimate cost $14.99 just 12 months ago. The devil is in the details and it really depends on how good the game collection is and how long it takes for games to go on it. Microsoft could easily treat it like old xbox live gold/ps+ and keep new big games off for a year or more and even $10 would be a pretty bad deal for that.

[the-pi-guy]

>Some games available with Xbox Game Pass Ultimate on day one will not be immediately available with Xbox Game Pass Standard and may be added to the library at a future date



The support article makes no promises on games coming to Gamepass at a later date.

[kitler53]

love it.   just need to get MS to do a 2nd round of price increase for ultimate year next year.    i want to see it at $25 monthly.

[Legend]

Yeah I wanna know what games it'll actually have. Core was already a downgrade.

love it.   just need to get MS to do a 2nd round of price increase for ultimate year next year.    i want to see it at $25 monthly.

A new gamer could like that. $25 to get every xbox game they've missed out on.

A core gamer could also like that. Play 5 new games a year and it pays for itself.


Is that a large enough market though? People in the middle like me will flee at these prices. So much cheaper to buy games on sale, and then you actually own them.

[the-pi-guy]

Yeah I wanna know what games it'll actually have. Core was already a downgrade.

I was just kind of assuming it'd be what they currently have, plus delayed additions.

But this was making me think of how screwed up this is.

Sony has 3 tiers for their service, and it's pretty much obvious what you get with each one. PS+ Essentials will have a couple titles every month, PS+ Extra will have the PS4/PS5 titles, and PS+ Premium will have the PS1/PS2/PSP and probably PS3 titles to boot.

MS will have:
- Game Pass PC
- Game Pass Core
- Game Pass Standard
- Game Pass Console
- Game Pass Ultimate

It's pretty obvious what you'll get for most of these, but it isn't with Standard and Console

[kitler53]

A new gamer could like that. $25 to get every xbox game they've missed out on.

A core gamer could also like that. Play 5 new games a year and it pays for itself.


Is that a large enough market though? People in the middle like me will flee at these prices. So much cheaper to buy games on sale, and then you actually own them.

i want gamepass to die though so it would serve my needs.    ..at least the version of gamepass with day-1 releases.

this is just a random chart i found on the internet but it serves as a visual for my argument:


Consider the Y-axis the # of people and the x-axis the number of full priced games that person buys in a year.   Most people by 2 or less games.   ...but a few will buy 10+ games a year.  right now gamepass "breaks even" if you buy about 3 full priced games a year.   

most casuals won't buy gamepass regardless because the value isn't there for them.   even if the service has "value" it's not valuable to them.   they don't want dozens of games a year and the games they do want are likely not on the service.   


..but on the other end of the spectrum the whales of the video game industry are getting an amazing value.   instead of buying 10+ full priced games a year they pay less than a third of that.   


that's unsustainable for the industry.   they need to be paying more.   the service is too big of a value and it's wrecking the industry.   burn baby burn.

[Legend]

i want gamepass to die though so it would serve my needs.    ..at least the version of gamepass with day-1 releases.

this is just a random chart i found on the internet but it serves as a visual for my argument:


Consider the Y-axis the # of people and the x-axis the number of full priced games that person buys in a year.   Most people by 2 or less games.   ...but a few will buy 10+ games a year.  right now gamepass "breaks even" if you buy about 3 full priced games a year.  

most casuals won't buy gamepass regardless because the value isn't there for them.   even if the service has "value" it's not valuable to them.   they don't want dozens of games a year and the games they do want are likely not on the service.    


..but on the other end of the spectrum the whales of the video game industry are getting an amazing value.   instead of buying 10+ full priced games a year they pay less than a third of that.    


that's unsustainable for the industry.   they need to be paying more.   the service is too big of a value and it's wrecking the industry.   burn baby burn.

Gamepass in its current form needs to die for sure.

I think these new moves ensure that will happen. It's an all you can eat buffet that is pricing out everyone but the whales. Microsoft is pushing this new tier so that in a few years they can get rid of ultimate.

I was just kind of assuming it'd be what they currently have, plus delayed additions.

But this was making me think of how screwed up this is.

Sony has 3 tiers for their service, and it's pretty much obvious what you get with each one. PS+ Essentials will have a couple titles every month, PS+ Extra will have the PS4/PS5 titles, and PS+ Premium will have the PS1/PS2/PSP and probably PS3 titles to boot.

MS will have:
- Game Pass PC
- Game Pass Core
- Game Pass Standard
- Game Pass Console
- Game Pass Ultimate

It's pretty obvious what you'll get for most of these, but it isn't with Standard and Console

Gamepass console is dead. They killed it yesterday.

Gamepass core is also really confusing. What is it compared to Gamepass standard?

[kitler53]

Gamepass in its current form needs to die for sure.

I think these new moves ensure that will happen. It's an all you can eat buffet that is pricing out everyone but the whales. Microsoft is pushing this new tier so that in a few years they can get rid of ultimate.

doubt.

soo many people proclaimed how ps+ was dead after the price increase and how they were going to unsub.    several quarters laters the number of subs remains unchanged.

i don't see growth in gamepass but i really doubt anyone is leaving gamepass due to these changes.   it will chug along as is for the rest of the gen at least.   that or if things go south it will be more about MS giving all their exclusives to competing platforms and people abandoning xbox.   this price increase seems like a lot in terms of % but in actual dollars it isn't that much especially context of how inflation everything else in the world increased in price.

[Legend]

doubt.

soo many people proclaimed how ps+ was dead after the price increase and how they were going to unsub.    several quarters laters the number of subs remains unchanged.

i don't see growth in gamepass but i really doubt anyone is leaving gamepass due to these changes.   it will chug along as is for the rest of the gen at least.   that or if things go south it will be more about MS giving all their exclusives to competing platforms and people abandoning xbox.   this price increase seems like a lot in terms of % but in actual dollars it isn't that much especially context of how inflation everything else in the world increased in price.

It'll be interesting to see. I've never paid even $10 a month for gamepass so for me this is a huge price increase with them removing the cheaper ways to get it.

Also I unsubbed from ps+