Wednesday, July 10th 2024
Microsoft Increases the Price for Game Pass on PC and Xbox
By the time you're reading this, it's already too late to sign up for the old price, if you were planning on getting or extending your Game Pass, since as of today, Microsoft has increased the cost for both PC and Xbox owners. On top of that, Microsoft has added a new tier for Xbox owners and made its lower tiers a lot less interesting. However, as TPU is a PC centric site, let's start with the bad news for PC owners. Depending on where you live, the price increase varies, but on average, Microsoft has increased the price by US$/€2/£2. However, some lower income countries are only seeing an increase of US$1, although we're not sure why Switzerland ended up in this group. However, the exchange rate is clearly affecting some other countries either negatively or positively where some countries end up paying a little bit more and others a little bit less.
Now for the really bad news for Xbox console owners. Xbox Game Pass for Console is no longer available to new subscribers, but those already on this tier that have automatic renewal enabled will be able to continue to have access to the same tier and perks that it's been offered with to date. In its place, Microsoft is introducing the Xbox Game Pass Standard tier and the fundamental difference between it and the Xbox Game Pass for Console package is that subscribers no longer have access to day one releases, but they gain access to online multiplayer games and the full back catalogue of games. There's no word on how long those subscribed to the Xbox Game Pass Standard tier will have to wait to gain access to new releases yet, but the new tier isn't available immediately either, so we'll most likely find out in due time.
The Xbox Game Pass Standard tier will set you back US$14.99 a month—Microsoft hasn't released international pricing as yet—an increase of US$4 over the old Xbox Game Pass for Console tier. At the same time, Microsoft is also increasing the price for the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate from US$16.99/€14.99/£12.99 to US$19.99/€17.99/£14.99. On top of that, the Xbox Game Pass Core is seeing an increase in the yearly subscription fee from US$59.99/€59.99/£49.99 to US$74.99/€69.99/£55.99, although the monthly fee isn't changing at this point in time, except for in Argentina, Turkey and South Africa which are all seeing a small increase. Local exchange rates affect the above prices as well and you can find a full list of prices in this PDF file provided by Microsoft.
Source:
Microsoft Game Pass FAQ
Now for the really bad news for Xbox console owners. Xbox Game Pass for Console is no longer available to new subscribers, but those already on this tier that have automatic renewal enabled will be able to continue to have access to the same tier and perks that it's been offered with to date. In its place, Microsoft is introducing the Xbox Game Pass Standard tier and the fundamental difference between it and the Xbox Game Pass for Console package is that subscribers no longer have access to day one releases, but they gain access to online multiplayer games and the full back catalogue of games. There's no word on how long those subscribed to the Xbox Game Pass Standard tier will have to wait to gain access to new releases yet, but the new tier isn't available immediately either, so we'll most likely find out in due time.
58 Comments on Microsoft Increases the Price for Game Pass on PC and Xbox
Besides, I dont have that much free time. Between working, commuting, chores, household maintenance, and a social life, I get maybe 8-10 hours a week, at most, to play vidya. I dont know how people can finish all these AAA slog fests that come out and still have time for everything else. When there is a game I want, like DRG, I wait for a sale. I havent paid over $10 for a game in years, with the rare exception. Game pass, for me, would be an objective waste of money, and tie me into MS's ecosystem which I DONT want.
I did the 3 year thing for super cheap trick, and that expired ironically 3 months ago, after a auto renewal I disabled auto renew to effectively cancel it during May.
Am I gutted given this news? Not really. Although I made use of FF games being on the game pass during the first six months or so, after that, I never really used it once they were pushed out, meaning the value for money likely wasnt great. I still never got round to doing a new run of Fable 2 and Fable 3, but I can just buy them, and given the new prices I will save money on the long run.
Just because someone has a different perspective and things may make sense to them and not you, doesn't mean you need to flame them.
I made a jump from 2019 to Win10 just to use it. That happened. Was NOT worth it. ✖
Having enough local storage isn't even an issue. 240GB M.2 + 120GB sata means I'll have more than enough space but I do NOT want any of this junk on my main drive. There are permission issues with the way content gets loaded, there are scrubbing issues because of it and there's no way to transfer the data around and recover it after some emergency that involves a system wipe. Everything about this garbage screams WASTE OF TIME and probably bandwidth if I wasn't already an archiver.
Gamepass is REALLY good if you're a kid with the right hardware, bandwidth and no anxiety about getting pushed out of rotation.
For those of us that HOARD everything from stupid ZIPs, Win32s, x64 installers, ISOs and RAWs, adding APPX is just another box to tick.
I'm sure you already understand the issue but how do you deal with this sort of thing without iSCSI or some attached disk that is specifically for MS apps (and nothing else)?
The library continues to grow...
Never bought game pass and never will, if a game studio made a good game I will just buy them full price (Steam family share is a great option too)
Lovely deal
There is a new expansion soon so this probably will happen after launch (to avoid boicots) when people is still engange but numbers start to slowly decline.
Same with OVW2, "paid" battle pass could be granted if you're under game pass umbrella, f.e. for the lowest tier. And "premium" for next tier and so on.
After all 75.000.000.000 USD are lots of game pass new subscriptions... I don't think Candy Crush and CoD can pay that bill.
And then you get those all you can eat fans saying they've made a smart move. Lol. Apparently people forget that ownership represents value, too. Quite simply because ownership means independence and independence means you can do things without touching on yet another commercial clusterfuck to get somewhere or do something.
See, I can just reinstall any game I own and play it. Cost? Zero. It means I can go a full year paying nothing, instead, to still have entertainment.
Its as simple as those AirBnB's you visit: those home owners are making money off their property by renting you that room, and you're pissing it away by renting it.If you buy games new, sure. But why would you? Consider the different kinds of games that get released:
- Single player oriented games: there is no need to play them at launch, there is no online community for it, and you'll miss the DLCs that inevitably flesh out the main content further. Waiting allows you to get the complete experience in one go, and obviously at a much lower price than launch prices. More often than not when games get a big DLC/expansion, the vanilla game goes on a deep discount, losing an easy 50% - 75% of the cost. They're also bug free, which they are not at launch.
And what if you're the type to play a SP game once, and then again when all the DLC have arrived? Sucks to figure out that by the time the game's feature complete, it somehow isn't on the Pass anymore. Or that you're not done with it yet, and it vanishing. Or it announcing to get removed in a couple of months, forcing you to play what you didn't intend to play.
- Live service games: a big part of live service games is MTX and other such stuff, and a lot of them are low cost of entry or free. There is literally no reason to pay a separate subscription for it, and if you would, you're still better off buying the game yourself so you don't have to go through several online portals to get going. Also, live service games often take a lot of your time, which you won't be using to play anything else, further reducing the advantage of playing live service within a service with a separately paid subscription fee.
So sure it might make sense to you, but its not sensible in any way financially, or objectively. Its like getting fast food instead of real dinner. Its easy, its lazy, and gets you fed. But it isn't healthy or a great choice, ever. The path for on demand service models is to be like fast food: presented as the cheaper alternative to real food, getting a whole society fat and lazy. We already have a live example in the world of that society, now turning to expensive pills to fight obesity. I refuse that reality, and you should too.
And then I haven't touched on other issues with an on demand service, such as the complete lack of control over what content you get offered, while there are stores full of discounted content around you offering full flexibility, and the result of that lack of control as it removes consumer power because you're no longer buying the games you really want, but rather what you get served. You've basically killed off your own ability to vote for stuff you like and get more of it. Microsoft decides what you vote on, now. That's a comforting thought, isn't it, a near monopolist deciding what you like.
Last year I spent some 300 bucks on games, of which two were new-ish at launch price, and the rest was deeply discounted, indie, or just cheap; some I haven't played yet, others I've finished, and still others are ongoing or things I might return to periodically. But we're not talking 4 games here, or 6. Its more something to the tune of 30 games right there. Owned. Forever mine. Accessible any time for zero. And a collection of games I had full freedom in choosing. Not the ones MS happened to manage to strike a deal with; in fact, overwhelmingly not those.
If you don't have proper directory permissions to the game, you can't tamper with anything.
If you lose access to the Windows install itself, you can't move the data or remove it either.
Developers that are very anti-modder would benefit immensely from shipping their product in the Microsoft ecosystem yet for some reason they don't do that.
I think something about it must be just as insufferable on the development side for shipping out updates.
Steam does a good enough job with it and they're basically on the hook for the services forever. Makes you think.
Retail(Full price) for that list is
Gears of War (Windows 10 Edition) 20
Atomic Heart 60
Eiyuden Chronicles: Hundred Heroes 50
Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising 15
Astria Ascending 35
Sea of Stars 35
Redfall 40
Total: $255 or $21.25/Mo.
You saved a whopping $51 ($15 with current pricing) to end up with nothing. You might say well $50 bucks is $50 bucks but that isn't counting when the games go on sale! Then it's avg discount of 20% to break even at $17/Month.
Running the numbers just put it into perspective how much of a bad deal the hike is.
Second, there is not a guarantee that games will go on sale and for how much. There are those that don't exclusively use Steam.
And you didn't read the first post apparently. I don't go back and play through games again; it is one and done for me on single player games. Over half of my existing Steam Library was only installed once, and then when finished, it is removed and not installed again. I don't really care for DLC these days.... I remember when Expansion Packs were a thing.
Also, it seems people have forgotten about Sega Channel. That a precursor to modern game streaming. In my area back then it was like $15/month. So the existing price and even the hike are not all that unreasonable. Game Pass doesn't rotate the games around every month like Sega Channel did. There are games that literally have been available for 4+ years without being removed.
I get it, I am in the minority, but the resulting flaming is ridiculous. I get a lot of use out of it.