Failed to reach target isn't a sign gamepass is failing. They have 30 million subscribers. In only 4 years they've gone from 10 to 30 million and seem to still be growing.

[–] inclementimmigrant 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Didn't imply it was failing, hell they've announced they're making profit off of the service, I'm pointing out that your hypothesis that people are trending toward game subscriptions is weak.

Let's look at it this way, there are 132 million active steam users and game pass is at 30 million with new game pass subscribers are beginning are slowing down and seeming like it's reaching a plateau.

Here have another article that goes a little more in depth at the current situation with game pass subscribers.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2023/10/24/why-has-microsoft-put-xbox-game-pass-subscription-numbers-in-a-black-box/?sh=249605a47167

I think that game pass is a fine product, heck I had it for three years, I just think your hypothesis is wrong.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

That article is only speculating that the gamepass user growth has slowed or reached a plateau. Even if we say that gamepass has reached its peak thats 30million people subscribing monthly. Platstation plus is at 50million monthly subscribers. BG3 is estimated to have sold 7m copies so they aren't exactly in a position to say what the market wants.

Subscribing to gamepass is better value than buying the games outright. The up and coming generations are far less opposed to subscriptions and as they get older and have more money I see them just paying $10-15 a month for an endless supply of games. Maybe they buy a few games here and there the ones they know they will play a lot of.

I obviously havent thought much about it and am just kneejerk reacting to the headline. While I do think the apatite for full priced, fully developed, content rich games is there and BG3 proves to developers that its viable. I also think that subscription bundles and games that release with only core content and use microtransactions or subsciptions to fund developement of more content are easier to make, easier to get investors and overall safer to pull off and that is why I believe the market is trending towards games as a service.