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[chadskin]

Wait, WHAT? So XBox ONE digital are effectively available at Amazon Prime/GCU prices?

Okay, this is officially massive. Microsoft is going to make a fucking killing on this service.

On the games that are part of the Game Pass, not all games in the Xbox Store.

 

[mrklaw]

The potential negative for this is you might subscribe to this and EA access (and Gold I guess) and then just decide to not actually buy anything, presuming it to be arriving on the service soon enough. I suppose they've done the maths and calculated that enthusiasts will still buy new games day 1..

 

[7DollarHagane]

Notice before purchase of DLC: If you purchase DLC for a game that is later removed from Xbox Game Pass, or you terminate your Xbox Game Pass subscription, you will need to purchase the game separately to continue using the DLC.

Womp womp.

Depends how quickly they rotate out games I guess.

 

[Wereroku]

Wait, WHAT? So XBox ONE digital are effectively available at Amazon Prime/GCU prices?

Okay, this is officially massive. Microsoft is going to make a fucking killing on this service.

The discount only applies to games currently on the cycle.

 

[Duxxy3]

Good, but this ain't coming to PC, right?

Play anywhere titles would naturally come to PC.

I'm guessing it's a netflix model. Games come and games go. Nothing will stay forever. And removed games that get a lot of requests will come back.

 

[ManUnkindH]

Interesting. I am not sure there is a market for this among the hardcore crowd but it could be great for casuals.

so much this.

 

[ryushe]

Do I have to be a Gold member for this?

 

[facetheslayer92]

Wow nice! I hope they market the hell out of this service.

 

[JaffeLion]

Damn, as an Xbox One Owner, I'm SO HAPPY that Sony is dominating this gen. Seriously. First BC, then 4K Blu Ray and now this... this is amazing!

The potential negative for this is you might subscribe to this and EA access (and Gold I guess) and then just decide to not actually buy anything, presuming it to be arriving on the service soon enough.

how is this negative for the gamer? my backlog is so HUGE, I can wait. Can we stop the spinning please and just let microsoft have this, please?!

 

[JakR]

Good move, but I think new games will be an rarity. I mean conditioning your userbase to expect dirt cheap games could be a problem in the long term for new releases and all publishers.

 

[cackhyena]

But my question is will a game that cycles out of the subscription still be playable?

I'd imagine it has to be. Either that or they have a generous countdown timer when you boot up saying this has so many days left...wanna purchase?

 

[Theorry]

Do I have to be a Gold member for this?

Nope.

 

[LukasTaves]

And alpha testers will be able to test for free?

OMG, I love this company.

 

[watdaeff4]

So when the games cycle out, you can no longer play them.

Thanks but no thanks.

Well, that's shocking that you aren't for it

 

[dracula_x]

My problem is time not money, already have a backlog and so many great new games coming out every month. So it's not really for me, but this would have been amazing when I was a kid. I can see it being popular as long as the selection is good with regular new additions.

Yep, same.
And agreed, service like that could be good for youth audience, who don't have enough disposable income.

 

[Midas]

I'm looking forward to see Xbox Game Pass metrics in the NPD PR from MS.

 

[ironcreed]

There's a reason they mention a 20% discount on buying the games. You only can play them while they are part of the library, downloaded or not.

That is for when your sub lapses.

$9.99 a month, launching in the spring. You download the games to your system, and can purchase them outright for a discounted price to use even after your subscription lapses.

As is clearly stated. They will sell the game to you at a discount if you cancel your subscription if you want to keep it. But as long as you are subbed, it's yours. Pretty straight forward.

 

[Angel_DvA]

Why wait when its ready to go soon.

Because people attention will be at maximum capacity in this E3 with Scorpio... announcing Scorpio + Xbox game pass + reveal new AAA exclusive that isn't Halo/Gears or Forza would have been huge.

 

[digoutyoursoul]

Why wait when its ready to go soon.

What about the new games, not a fucking peep

 

[Frostman]

Sounds good. Need to see the library first though, that will make or break it.

 

[ryushe]

Nope.

Wow... that's pretty incredible then.

 

[LordBaztion]

I'm looking forward to see Xbox Game Pass metrics in the NPD PR from MS.

that NPD thing is getting obsolete.

 

[The Big N]

So what happens with Games with Gold now? Because this service is devalued if MS is handing out 4 free games a month. Also, does this service require a Xbox Live subscription? Because its not really $9.99 per month, instead its $15-18.

It sounds great, but if most of these games are older or were handed out with GwG then the service is all for nothing in my mind. It might be good if you haven't played some of their exclusives this generation. But, I doubt you'll see Sea of Thieves or other new releases part of this service at release.

 

[KainXVIII]

Good, but this ain't coming to PC, right?

What point releasing it on pc, if there is only handful (~10?) pc games in ms store?

 

[Danneee]

Awesome. Now Sony will have to get their PS+ crap together.

 

[bonchooski]

As someone who is now all digital this is perfect, i have no problem paying 10 bucks a month for this to try a game before i make a full purchase on it.

 

[NightShift]

Microsoft is certainly pushing me more and more to get a Scorpio when that comes out and I have never even been slightly interested in the Xbox brand before. Now all they need is something to replace Scalebound as a big first party game I want.

 

[TS-08]

Because people attention will be at maximum capacity in this E3 with Scorpio... announcing Scorpio + Xbox game pass + reveal new AAA exclusive that isn't Halo/Gears or Forza would have been huge.

But it looks like it's releasing before E3.

 

[gofreak]

Seems like the only way Sony can counter this is to either roll it into PS+ for no extra charge (and mug off PS3/Vita games) or add PS Now to PS+ (again, without a price increase). Can't imagine they'll ever do a programme like it considering it's similarity to PS+.

Well the obvious way to counter this would be to add a premium option to PS+ that gives a larger Instant Game Collection. That wouldn't exactly be earth-shatteringly difficult to do if there was demand for it. That's basically what this is, a tweak on GwG/PS+ - an extra sub but a bigger starter game collection.

 

[Mushroomer25]

On the games that are part of the Game Pass, not all games in the Xbox Store.

Yep, misread. I've also been waiting for one of the console manufacturers to embrace the new $48 (with subscription) price point for major games for awhile. Jumped the gun when I heard 20% off.

 

[Snaku]

F5ing the nonexistent Scorpio preorder page on Amazon.

 

[7DollarHagane]

That is for when your sub lapses.



As is clearly stated. They will sell the game to you at a discount if you cancel your subscription if you want to keep it. But as long as you are subbed, it's yours. Pretty straight forward.

Notice before purchase of DLC: If you purchase DLC for a game that is later removed from Xbox Game Pass, or you terminate your Xbox Game Pass subscription, you will need to purchase the game separately to continue using the DLC.

This clearly states that games removed from game pass need to be purchased to use their dlc.

 

[hardcastlemccormick]

Heh, I was just wondering to myself which of the big platforms would do a subscription service first. Microsoft wins.

 

[Jonboy]

They are not going to do that. If you download it, it will be yours until you cancel your subscription. Then you will be given a discount if you want to keep it. Wait and see.

You think they'll let you download 100 games every month to keep as long you have the service? No way. I'd be pretty shocked if that's how it works.

 

[Capella]

Seems obvious to me, but sure. We will wait and see.

I don't know, would be nice but I feel like they would specify that like they do with gold and ps+. Like you said though, we'll see.

 

[GinoFelino]

That's the sort of consumer-friendly moves you have to make when you're so far behind. A similar situation gave us PS+.

 

[Defect]

And alpha testers will be able to test for free?

OMG, I love this company.

Really?

I am so in!

 

[Okami Haundo]

Sony's move was Plus years ago, it lets you keep access to every game as long as you have Plus and "bought" it when it was the monthly game. The only difference is this isn't spread across multiple platforms sowill be all available in one place and just adds and removes in bigger bulks.
Are these posts serious?

What? Microsoft's answer to PS+ was Games with Gold, which is basically the same thing but you get to keep the Xbox 360 games for forever. This is more comparable to PSNow.

Way better than now if I understand it correctly. Mainly cause you don't stream it. No reliance on having a really good internet connection.

Most definitely! That was pretty much my point to a T. Making it so games are downloads and not streamed is a godsend, and so is providing a discount on actually buying a game if you want it. I'd love if this was how they handled demos of first party games going forward. I've wanted a discount on new digital games for quite some time now.

 

[Outrun]

Not a huge fan of what are now essentially 3 different tiers of service

XBL Gold - you get multiplayer, cloud saves, and 4 games a month but now will those games be as good?

EA Access - you get your EA game pass sub service

XBox Game Pass - ok, now you get some different games


I'd frankly rather collapse all 3 into one tier, $10/mo or $70 (?) a year gives you access to all of it. Or at best two tiers - XBL Gold gives you multiplayer/cloud for $20/yr and pass gives you everything for $10/mo.

MS does not like to go bankrupt...

 

[killatopak]

Old news.

Inb4lock or merge.

 

[le.phat]

Microsoft positioning to move away from the appstore walled garden and into the netflix walled garden.

 

[mrklaw]

My problem is time not money, already have a backlog and so many great new games coming out every month. So it's not really for me, but this would have been amazing when I was a kid. I can see it being popular as long as the selection is good with regular new additions.

Stop buying games now and then sub to this in 12 months time when 'now' games start hitting the service. If you're already time-poor and have a backlog you can handle the 12 month gap easily and then just enjoy everything a little later than usual

 

[Doug Heffernan]

Wait, preview testers get a free beta trial?
Sweet, I hope I'm in the first wave of roll outs!

 

[ThatsMytrunks]

This is fantastic. Things I wanna know:
• List of gamez plz
• How much are developers/publishers making for downloaded games?

This is what Nintendo needs to do with Virtual Console.

 

[Yautja_Warrior]

Wow, so this is PlayStation Now, but better in most ways.

Although you still have to download and install the full game. With PSNow it's like buffering a Netflix selection.

Still though, I hope this gives Sony the kick in the pants to lower prices, and expand the library to PS4 games too. If not over Gaikai then locally

Agreed, PS Now isn't a bad service tbh but the pricing is off. If this proves popular, maybe Sony will take note and bring PS Now more in line with this new Game Pass service.

Maybe even give people the option to integrate them into XBL / PS+ for £10 / $10 a month extra if they want too. Having everything together seems a much better / easier option.

 

[c0de]

Marketing cracks me up:

"One of the best things about Xbox Game Pass is that you can discover and download the full titles directly on your Xbox One."

That's like saying, one of the best things about a banana is that it tastes like a banana and you can eat it.

Anyway, awesome stuff. EA Access is a win in my book and I'll subscribe to this probably too.

Given that the competition tries to sell you streamed games it makes sense to say where the difference is.

 

[urge26]

Sounds awesome. Compared to EA Access, this runs a little too high for my blood but I agree with the pricing. Now give me the yearly option for 50-75 and I'm in.

 

[Tigress]

I agree that this is like a wider expansions of PS+/GWG games. Definitely an interesting move if anything. External HDDs bout to be super filled lol. Though I do think a streaming aspect does have its own merits for those that didn't want to download full titles.

It's a little different and closer to how netflix works than ps+ and gwg. It pretty much is like Netflix for games. Difference? You get access to a full library soon as you subscribe where as ps+ and gwg you build your library over time. But... With this you can lose access to a game even if still subscribed (when they decide to remove it from the library) where as with ps+ And gwg long as you are subscribed you should have access to any game you got wih it and gwg you even get to keep the 360 games even after you are no longer subbed.

 

[Midas]

Heh, I was just wondering to myself which of the big platforms would do a subscription service first. Microsoft wins.

It only makes sense. They're a SaaS company now, after all.

 

[jesu]

They should have wait for E3, one more time, Microsoft's marketing is shit.

Dashboard preview members are starting to test it today.
They couldn't keep it a secret till E3.
It will probably release publicly then though.