cross-posted from: https://piefed.ca/c/games@lemmy.world/p/869515/game-pass-was-supposed-to-save-xbox-instead-its-killing-the-company
“Netflix for games” has proven to be far from the ideal solution.
I can’t be the only one who actively tries to reduce the number of subscriptions I have. It’s terrible for the monthly budget. Gamepass lasted only a few months for me before I decided that I didn’t get sufficient value out of it. Something about paying monthly to retain access to a game that I can otherwise buy rubbed me the wrong way.
oh ok how’s that price hike going?
tl;dr: Rent seeking cancer of a company got too greedy and screwed themselves.
I’m actually really surprised this didn’t work. They had acquired such a large amount of quality studios, IPs and a huge back catalogue. They had enough money to keep the subscription low indefinitely. Getting added to the Game Pass was a huge deal for indie devs at one point, but I think those who did were disapointed with returns.
Granted the article says they dropped 300 million on Jedi Survivor and Suicide Squad… which gets to the point of how unsustainable subscription models are. It’s like a smaller version of the Ai market. Just like how you can’t break even on 300 million selling a $10 a month subscription, you can’t break even on $30 billion investments with the same $10 subscription.
Still, how could you possibly mess this up. lol
It was great when I first got it, but I ended but getting fatigued with it. New releases wanted time investment, but the rising costs meant I felt I should play more stuff. In the end everything I wanted to play required time and I felt that I was no longer getting value out of it. It would have cost less to not have it and just buy the game for some titles.
I think that’s how it went down for most people.
I remember getting free games with Gold back on the 360 and One. Eventually they became unplayable without the subscription. Kinda enshitified.
There’s just something about your progression being tied to a subscription that makes you want to invest less in the game.
GamePass is killing Microsoft? I don’t think so. And Xbox is not a company. The company that own Xbox is Microsoft.
Xbox has its own CEO, it is its own company, wholly owned by Microsoft. Xbox then also owns other companies like Mojang, Zenimax Media, Activision Blizzard … They own companies too… Its companies all the way down. This way if one fails, it’s bankruptcy doesn’t take down the whole chain.
it is its own company,
No that was exactly the point, Xbox is NOT its own company, it is a division within Microsoft. Something you could have easily looked up before posting false information.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xbox_(division)
formerly Microsoft Gaming, is the video game and digital entertainment division of Microsoft,
Soo, what does Microsoft do well these days?
Advertise for Linux
