Support NeoGAF

[Gambit2483]

As I think more and more about Gamepass I find myself questioning if this system is truly sustainable moving forward, making enough money to continue such a service...

As gaming technology advances, It is likely that game development costs will also increase, meaning the more subscriptions they MUST have. If they don't gain or worse lose subscriptions then the subscription prices will hike, which may cause further subscription lost.

Then you have some 3rd parties that have or will lose faith in putting games on Xbox (due to anemic software sales) unless they are guaranteed a Gamepass deal, e.g. the Persona games from Atlus most likely only arrived because they got paid a LOT of money. That's even MORE costs adding to the Red.

So, to mitgate this you can cut development budgets to help slow financial bleeding but then you have more Mid-tier "Gamepass games" that, while nice to have, are ultimately not the ones driving up subscription numbers or keeping subscribers on board.

This simply does not feel like a sustainable model for anyone other than a multi billion dollar company that's able to lose millions upon millions in the hopes that things will someday becoming stable and eventually profitable.

How do you accomplish this? Possibly by giving the market little to no choice. Make as many popular IPs entirely exclusive to the service...basically by making an IP as huge as COD exclusively tied to the service.

As we've seen even giants like Netflix have struggled with the subscription service and maintaining profitability. Can this model really work in the AAA home console gaming space?

 

[FoxMcChief]

Yes.

 

[feynoob]

Yes. Long term revenue is better, since it can protect you from low sales.
Especially on this current market.

The downside is that you need contents. If you can manage to provide that consistently, then you would enjoy that slice of pie.

Just don't make it only exclusive on subscription. Diverse your revenue (mtx, dlc sales, game sales, and subs).

 

[MarkMe2525]

I'm sure you are going to get great insight from an online gaming forum.

 

[pqueue]

Yes, for specific games.

But not for the majority of them.

 

[ZehDon]

In terms of economies of scale, absolutely. The question of feasibility becomes a question of critical mass: can you get enough subscribers to pay for everything? Looking at Game Pass, right now, Microsoft has declared that its profitable. So, the immediate answer is yes: the subscription model is sustainable, and Microsoft have achieved that.

Long term, however, a few questions begin to pop up. Does being on Game Pass influence creators to design their games in certain ways, or, does it do as Spencer claims, and frees up creators to make whatever they want? If the former is true, then the question of sustainability becomes harder to answer. If games are designed around the subscription model, to optimise their success, does that create the games that people wanted to play when they first subscribed? If not, they'll likely stop subscribing. In this scenario, the answer is no, the service wouldn't sustainable, because it'll eventually lead to games people don't want to subscribe for, killing the service.

Right now, with the evidence at hand, I voted yes.

 

[aclar00]

As the only option i dont think so. It may work well for GaaS games but I just dont see it long term fo single player/couch co-op, partically for high budget games.

Not counting cell phone games, the audience is much smaller than movies or music and the barrier to entry also cost more. Movies and music can make their money and cover losses for studios via ticket sales followed by long term streaming deals..... Games though, particulary higher budget games need that initial ticket sale, if you will, of $40-70 per person to recoup cost. They cant rely up 10 million people buying it the same way 10 mil people may see a movie.

Subscription cost as they ate now just arent sustainable in my opinion, i think it would be harder for a game service to spread the cost around when a game fails to live up to its purchase price. Im no expert though, maybe its cheaper for studios given console manufacturers take a huge cut? But then whats stopping larger studios from creating their own service so not to share the profits.

 

[geary]

Arent your bored with these type of topics?Its so redundant.

 

[Rykan]

No, it is not sustainable, and I fully expect both Playstation's model and Xbox model to downscale over time. Gamepass more so than Playstation Plus.

You cannot be profitable for 120$ a year with a subscriber base of like 20 - 40m people while also financing the development costs of all your first party content AND pay out publishers who publish their game through gamepass. Those numbers simply don't add up.

The fact of the matter is that subscription models are trying to imitate video content models such as Netflix without taking into account just how different video and video game entertainment really are.

A model like Netflix works because you want access to a lot of video content because video content is short. An episode of a show is like 30 minutes or one hour. A movie is like 1 - 3 hours at most.

Video games do not work that way. An RPG can easily run you 40 hours+. You have a default go to multiplayer game? That might make up most of your playtime. Heck for a lot of people, it makes up all of it. What's the point of having access to so many games if you can only finish one or two of them a month? It really is only worth it for hardcore gamers who play and finish a lot of games. There's also the issue that a lot of the games added are older games. Yeah it's great to have a 60$ - 70$ game added to the subscription service. But if that game has already dropped to 30$, then suddenly its way less valuable.

At one point, you're simply going to be done with all the games you're actually interested in, and the drip of new games is typically not worth keeping subscribed to. If I see "Now coming to Gamepass!" there might be one game I might be interested in and at that point I might as well just buy the game. I can also just take advantage of the system. I simply wait until a game I care about comes out (Gears, Halo, Forza, etc) ,subscribe for 10$, finish the game and then unsubscribe. I've now played and finished a game that I would normally spend 60$ for just 10$ and I doubt I'm alone in this.

 

[Iced Arcade]

The bi-weekly anti gamepass thread.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

As I think more and more about Gamepass I find myself questioning if this system is truly sustainable moving forward, making enough money to continue such a service...

You are not asking the correct questions.

Subscription services like game pass are here to say.

The actual important and more relevant questions are:

1.Does traditional AAA games Day One on Game Pass are sustainable/feseable?

2. How these kind of services are going to influence game design?

To answer your questions:

First and foremost:

All this conversation around GP is rooted in this idea (that MS and Influencers have sold to the public ) that GP is going to replace everything, that GP is going to become the only way to engage with the industry as a Dev and as a consumer.

If the above is your frame of mind. The answer is: No.

If you are able to see how things can actually work, you will see that GP is just and evolution.

The promise of AAA Day One games on that service is something MS is going to regret or/and find sneaky ways to circumvent that promise (The Negative Days release window).

 

[Topher]

I voted yes, but not as a standalone service. Sales still matter.

 

[ergem]

It is sustainable. The reason being is that it will only be a fraction of the overall revenue stream for everyone. As Phil has predicted, gamepass will only be 10-15% of the overall revenue going forward. Overwhelming majority of gamers don't have an apetite to play several random games. They just want to play their favorite game. And for most, these are GaaS games.

The problem is that for MS, their sub model of day 1 release will eat into the potential sales of their 1st party games. So that's a cut into potential profits. Is that compensated by the revenue from the subscription service? That's the question.

For Sony, although they will not release their 1st party games day 1 to their service, the hundreds of games available for only $99/year will also have an effect on the overall sales of individual games depending on how many are subscribed. But then again, only a subset of gamers are interested in these kind of all-you-can-play subscription service.

The simple formula is:

Sony: The more people subscribe, the more potential loss in the overall individual sales of games in their store
MS: The more people subscribe, the more potential loss in the sales of their first party games and the overall sales of games in their store.

 

[adamsapple]

Subscription is sustainable if it is presented as *one* of the core pillars. I don't think a purely subscription based model alone will work at this time.

 

[Robb]

I voted yes. We’re slowly but surely getting to the point where you’ll be able to just have an app on your TV for this stuff so I could see various streaming services down the line in the same way we have lots of launchers for various stuff today. One from Ubisoft, one from EA etc. etc.

I’d also expect a lot of price hikes once/if popularity increases.

 

[ReBurn]

Yes. It won't be the only way people play games, though.

 

[Mattyp]

I'm sure you are going to get great insight from an online gaming forum.

Silence. We all know better that the Microsoft and PlayStation accountants turning YoY record growth every quarter.

 

[baphomet]

Sure, at a certain amount of subscribers it will make money.

That amount of subscribers is a massive amount though. Adding up all the subscribers from both services isn't going to cover the multiple 100+ million dollar dev costs required to put the games on the service people are subscribing for. Not too mention the costs for those big third party content contracts.

 

[feynoob]

The promise of AAA Day One games on that service is something MS is going to regret or/and find sneaky ways to circumvent that promise

I dont understand why people have this garbage notion.

This shit narrative would continue, just like the 1$ sub.

MS is selling those games on their service, and day1 on steam.
As Long as they do those, it won't hurt them a bit.

 

[feynoob]

Subscription is sustainable if it is presented as *one* of the core pillars. I don't think a purely subscription based model alone will work at this time.

It's why, it's important to allow consumers to buy games, dlc or even allow mtx games on your service.

Just sub alone is not feasible.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

I dont understand why people have this garbage notion.

MS promised Fisrt Party Games Day One. And what people want are AAA games.

This shit narrative would continue, just like the 1$ sub.

The narrative was staged by MS itself.

MS is selling those games on their service, and day1 on steam.

And the Negative Day release Window premium price.Just like Forza Horizon.

As Long as they do those, it won't hurt them a bit.

A bit? Factually untrue.

If you give the option of pay 70USD to play the next GOTY or just 15USD....guess what option is going to be more popular?

That is for MS to deal with.

 

[coffinbirth]

Seems simple enough to me...25 million or so subs + $10 a month = profit. Considering they are doing this with 75% indie and/or shovelware and a severe lack of steady 1st party output at the moment, this probably the calm before the proverbial storm. Once they start carpet bombing 1st party games and get Call of Duty in there, those numbers will hopefully end the need for threads like this.

 

[Lasha]

Your third option is odd considering the "playstation model" was Sony's attempt to copy the gamepass model.

 

[freefornow]

 

[Fredrik]

Not really. I never buy games on Xbox, haven’t bought a single one since the Series X launch. And I’ve only bought one DLC, FH5 Hot Wheels.

How can that be sustainable?

I think the release strategy will change, I think we’ll still have day 1 releases but also early releases if you preorder.

Sony’s strategy won’t work either. The sub count will drop, The delays are too long. If people has already bought the big 1st party releases because they don’t want to wait 1-2 years there won’t be as interesting to subscribe to PS+, what’s left to be excited about are rare lowkey 3rd party day 1 releases, like Stray, and more late releases.

Late PC releases will disappear too because there will be negativity around every release, people with both console and PC will end up double dipping or, again, waiting too long, and PC-only gamers will be angry and negative because they can’t play yet and will have everything spoiled.

In the end it’ll all keep on evolving. Best strategy will win.
And I think that’ll be:
* Day 1 PC releases
* Day 1 subscrption releases
* Early release for preorders
* Big physical collector’s editions
* More DLC
* More expansions

 

[reksveks]

Someone might have to define between yes and yes as an added feature (like playstation) for me.

Then tell me where Gamepass fits into that hierarchy

 

[reksveks]

Not really. I never buy games on Xbox, haven’t bought a single one since the Series X launch. And I’ve only bought one DLC, FH5 Hot Wheels.

How can that be sustainable?

Because we don't know if you are the average user

 

[Fredrik]

Because we don't know if you are the average user

What has happened to movies and music?
Do the average user subscribe to Spotify and buy music CDs or iTunes albums?
I don’t think so, those who do do it for the quality difference and we’ve seen vinyl come back as well.
And for movies we’ve seen the number of subscription services explode and for the big studios we’ve seen delayed releases on streaming services.

 

[balls of snow]

Yes. Long term revenue is better, since it can protect you from low sales.
Especially on this current market.

The downside is that you need contents. If you can manage to provide that consistently, then you would enjoy that slice of pie.

Just don't make it only exclusive on subscription. Diverse your revenue (mtx, dlc sales, game sales, and subs).

Therein lies the issue for ms especially this year, games (content) get delayed all the time and people will cancel your sub if its not attractive. Luckily for Plague Tale Requiem, Persona 5 and Sommervile, I dont feel ripped off for paying a year of gamepass hoping to play starfield this month.

 

[reksveks]

What has happened to movies and music?
Do the average user subscribe to Spotify and buy music CDs or iTunes albums?
I don’t think so, those who do do it for the quality difference and we’ve seen vinyl come back as well.
And for movies we’ve seen the number of subscription services explode and for the big studios we’ve seen delayed releases on streaming services.

How much has the total music industry revenue changed or movies?

Global music back to where it was https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-60837880

Trying to split correlation and causation is a pain in the arse, either way.

The issue with these comparison is that unfortunately for those mediums, it's harder to monetize engagement in those industry's. Disney is one of the very few companies that does it well.

P. S. I think subscription makes sense as a partial revenue stream for platform holders cause you can monetize engagement much more easily and profitably

 

[Fredrik]

How much has the total music industry revenue changed or movies?

The issue with these comparison is that unfortunately for those mediums, it's harder to monetize engagement in those industry's. Disney is one of the very few companies that does it well.

I think they’re close enough, the eqvivalent of the rise of TV series will happen in gaming through more episodic games and expansions. And the explosion of streaming services will arrive in the firm of more subscription services besides Gamepass and PS+.
With music there is still a quality difference, gaming might opt to do something similar, maybe lock out subscription services from 4K or performance modes.

Day 1 releases without any downsides that may push people to buy instead is not going to be sustainable. Guaranteed. It’s why I instantly prepaid for years on both Gamepass and PS+ because I don’t think the current prices will stand.

 

[Mr Reasonable]

The last threads were:

Gamepass didn't gain as many subscribers as targeted

Gamepass only represents 10-15% of Xbox revenue

Gamepass is profitable .

So, just make a thread about why it feels like it's probably a bad thing because your favorite company aren't doing it?

 

[reksveks]

I think they’re close enough, the eqvivalent of the rise of TV series will happen in gaming through more episodic games and expansions.

Yes but I also think there are multiple reasons that we are going to get this from the rising cost of development and then additional risk adversity of publishers.

The issue that you didnt talk about is how TV/Movie is different re monetizing engagement. Disney has a whole massive merchandising arm but historical Netflix has struggled. Its not a uniform strength in TV/Movie and won't be the case in Gaming.

And the explosion of streaming services will arrive in the firm of more subscription services besides Gamepass and PS+.

I expect so and also expect alot to go out of business like video streaming services or to fold into platform holders subscriptions

With music there is still a quality difference, gaming might opt to do something similar, maybe lock out subscription services from 4K or performance modes.

Maybe for streaming services but no chance on services that allow you to download a game imo.

Day 1 releases without any downsides that may push people to buy instead is not going to be sustainable. Guaranteed. It’s why I instantly prepaid for years on both Gamepass and PS+ because I don’t think the current prices will stand.

Prices will change for multiple reasons, one will be rising costs and one will be companies trying to get more profits. Again figuring out the difference is impossible for external parties. Again Day One releases may only make sense for a few number of market players.

 

[Dr.brain64]

Yes but only when everything is a service.

 

[Phil_the_goat]

Gamepass proves its not only sustainable but also profitable

 

[TonyK]

I would have need another poll option: Yes, but no for AAA games

 

[mxbison]

Sure it's sustainable, by stuffing most games with DLC and MTX.

 

[Ozriel]

As I think more and more about Gamepass I find myself questioning if this system is truly sustainable moving forward, making enough money to continue such a service...

As gaming technology advances, It is likely that game development costs will also increase, meaning the more subscriptions they MUST have. If they don't gain or worse lose subscriptions then the subscription prices will hike, which may cause further subscription lost.

Not this poorly thought out point again.

MS sells their games at retail and on Steam. Putting all the development costs on GP makes no iota of sense.

Then you have some 3rd parties that have or will lose faith in putting games on Xbox (due to anemic software sales) unless they are guaranteed a Gamepass deal, e.g. the Persona games from Atlus most likely only arrived because they got paid a LOT. That's even MORE costs adding to the Red.

It's a JRPG on Xbox, and a port of an old title. I'd be shocked if they paid more than $30 million for Persona 5.

...basically by making an IP as huge as COD exclusively tied to the service.

LOL

As we've seen even giants like Netflix have struggled with the subscription service and maintaining profitability. Can this model really work in the AAA home console gaming space?

Netflix exclusively streams all their content. Microsoft sells Xbox games in stores and on Steam.
Theres really no basis for comparing these two business morels. At all.

 

[SenjutsuSage]

Yes, we are seeing just that with Xbox Game Pass.

April 2020 - Microsoft announces 10 million Game Pass subscribers. https://www.engadget.com/xbox-game-pass-10-million-subscribers-114529988.html

January 2022 - Microsoft announces 25 million Game Pass subscribers. https://www.engadget.com/microsoft-game-pass-25-million-subscribers-151432036.html

15 million subscribers in 21 months, plus it's profitable, looks pretty damn sustainable to me.

EA Play has been around since 2014. Sure doesn't look like it's going anywhere. EA has more players, almost double the number of people playing Activision Blizzard King games. Their revenues, net income, and operating cash flows all look good. Meanwhile, never forget that all their EA Play vault games are available on Game Pass Ultimate.

EA Play subscribers doubled in just 3 months thanks to Game Pass.

https://www.thegamer.com/ea-play-nearing-13-million-players/

“The groundbreaking integration of our EA Play service with Microsoft Game Pass has accelerated our subscription business, with nearly 13 million players now active in our service across four platforms: Xbox, PlayStation, Steam and our EA client,” Wilson told investors.

Countless games have demonstrated they don't need to be in Game Pass to do well on Xbox. Even if by some chance Game Pass is materially impacting sales in some fashion, which is always possible, what would the sales have been if the game were never on Xbox consoles at all? Obviously not good enough to be okay with abandoning Xbox. Cyberpunk sold, Elden Ring sold, Dying Light 2 sold, Far Cry 6 sold, FIFA sells, NBA 2K sells. All kinds of games sell. Yakuza: Like A Dragon sold on Xbox. It didn't come to Game Pass till about 6 months later, and they greatly credit Game Pass with boosting the popularity of the Yakuza franchise. They cite having their best sales ever for the game. FIFA 23 recently just had the most successful launch in franchise history at 10.3 million players after just a week.

Assassin's Creed Valhalla was the fastest-selling game in the entire Assassin's Creed franchise, and it's Ubisoft's second largest profit-generating game in Ubisoft's entire history due to premium sales and DLC sales.



We can more or less put to bed any idea that Game Pass is somehow unsustainable. Call of Duty is not all people play. I always tell people don't let the sales performance of each new Call of Duty game fool them. Same goes for Warzone's popularity. The Call of Duty franchise, while popular, isn't so extremely popular that it will make people suddenly desire to not play or buy all the other worthwhile games out there. And this continues to be proven time and time and time again, but people keep doubting it for some strange reason. How much more proof do people need that Xbox gamers still buy games? Xbox gamers even still buy games that are available in game pass. At the same time that COD Black Ops: Cold War was selling up gangbusters, so did Cyberpunk 2077 right alongside it. 13.7 million copies of Cyberpunk 2077 were sold the month it released. 28% of copies were on Playstation (3.83 million). 17% were on Xbox (2.32 million), and 56% were on PC (7.67 million). Cyberpunk 2077 wasn't on Game Pass.






Game Pass as a model has been sustainable for Microsoft from the start. They're Microsoft. When do I feel it truly became able to stand on its own? When it hit 10 million subscribers. For different companies, it's just going to reach sustainability at different points in time based on all kinds of factors. It's all about building to a certain number of subscribers that, if it never got past that point, you could live with it while continuing to do business in all the other ways, such as free to play and buy to play. As I said, I firmly believe Game Pass hit that stage for Microsoft at 10 million.

And definitely at 15 million, which it managed in less than 6 months from its previously reported 10 million.

Yes, for specific games.

But not for the majority of them.

It works for any type of game. Starfield will be by far the biggest proof of this fact to date when it launches. A pure single-player RPG epic like that will be all the evidence anybody ever needs.

 

[feynoob]

MS promised Fisrt Party Games Day One. And what people want are AAA games.

And they aren't designed for gamepass.

The narrative was staged by MS itself.

That is what people used, to put down gamepass. Not MS.
People took that promotion as everyone subbing to it.

If you give the option of pay 70USD to play the next GOTY or just 15USD....guess what option is going to be more popular?

Goty is only a title for forum kids. Outside of that, no one really cares about it.

Having 70$ tag isn't enough to sell your game. Unless your game is high demanding like mw2, it's tough to sell more than 3m on launch window. Plus not every game sells that much on launch window.

That is what MS is looking at. They aren't looking at halo sales. But their entire 1st party game sales.

It's why gamepass day1 makes sense for them. They can enjoy both sales and gamepass money during launch window.

 

[mdkirby]

Is it sustainable? Probably. But it’s also likely very damaging if it becomes the predominant form, which is the threat posed by COD being “day one”.

COD is the entry point to gaming for many, and many cod gamers will play nothing but cod for many year before playing something else. It being accessed through gamespass, yes they will likely now explore more games. But it will bake in the idea of “games being free” this will also become baked into a generation.

As such it will become increasingly hard for any company to have their game outside of a subscription service. Whether that is a AAA game that cost $300milion to make, and sells for £70, or an indie that cost £10mil to make and is sold at £25. People won’t pay it.

At the moment microsoft is throwing big (and unsustainable) sums to get third party games on the system, and other options to sell the game box on xbox and PlayStation, pc, switch, retail etc are viable. So it’s a good deal. That won’t always be the case. And the result of this race to the bottom already has precedent. It happened in the early days of mobile gaming, and not long after user expectation for the masses became “games should be free”. And we know the end result of that. Everything is a micro transaction hell, not built around engaging narrative, or enjoyment, but around gambling and dopamine.

As a gamer who exclusively plays one and done narrative single player games, the subscription services (in particular gamespass due to the ‘day one’ philosophy and Microsoft’s agressive eating of publishers and major IP) I perceive as a real threat to the continued viability of the types of games I personally enjoy. It will be very sad if all the great games I love rip out the joy of reward and discovery to just sell things to me, and fill their worlds with grind so I can buy more. Just as has happened with assassins creed over the years.

So sustainable. Yes. But I’m not sure that’s a good thing.

 

[feynoob]

Is it sustainable? Probably. But it’s also likely very damaging if it becomes the predominant form, which is the threat posed by COD being “day one”.

COD is the entry point to gaming for many, and many cod gamers will play nothing but cod for many year before playing something else. It being accessed through gamespass, yes they will likely now explore more games. But it will bake in the idea of “games being free” this will also become baked into a generation.

As such it will become increasingly hard for any company to have their game outside of a subscription service. Whether that is a AAA game that cost $300milion to make, and sells for £70, or an indie that cost £10mil to make and is sold at £25. People won’t pay it.

At the moment microsoft is throwing big (and unsustainable) sums to get third party games on the system, and other options to sell the game box on xbox and PlayStation, pc, switch, retail etc are viable. So it’s a good deal. That won’t always be the case. And the result of this race to the bottom already has precedent. It happened in the early days of mobile gaming, and not long after user expectation for the masses became “games should be free”. And we know the end result of that. Everything is a micro transaction hell, not built around engaging narrative, or enjoyment, but around gambling and dopamine.

As a gamer who exclusively plays one and done narrative single player games, the subscription services (in particular gamespass due to the ‘day one’ philosophy and Microsoft’s agressive eating of publishers and major IP) I perceive as a real threat to the continued viability of the types of games I personally enjoy. It will be very sad if all the great games I love rip out the joy of reward and discovery to just sell things to me, and fill their worlds with grind so I can buy more. Just as has happened with assassins creed over the years.

So sustainable. Yes. But I’m not sure that’s a good thing.

In essence, you are afraid that devs would get the players, who are enjoying their games.

Your worrisome is misguided.

 

[phil_t98]

MS promised Fisrt Party Games Day One. And what people want are AAA games.


The narrative was staged by MS itself.


And the Negative Day release Window premium price.Just like Forza Horizon.


A bit? Factually untrue.

If you give the option of pay 70USD to play the next GOTY or just 15USD....guess what option is going to be more popular?

That is for MS to deal with.

where has Microsoft released a AAA games that's not been on gamepass to back up your claim they won't in the future. games are still available to buy and on gamepass

 

[mdkirby]

In essence, you are afraid that devs would get the players, who are enjoying their games.

Your worrisome is misguided.

Nah, I’m afraid that long terms, the sort of games I personally enjoy will become rarer and/or non viable, and either not be made at all, or become infected with grind and micro transactions to make them viable in a world where the only viable point of game distribution for a business is subscription.

 

[DenchDeckard]

Playstation plus and xbox live have existed for years and offered free games while you use the service.

Game pass has been around for years and is an excellent service.

Do we think Sony is losing money on ps extra and premium? If not...why can't a subscription service exist?

 

[feynoob]

Nah, I’m afraid that long terms, the sort of games I personally enjoy will become rarer and/or non viable, and either not be made at all, or become infected with grind and micro transactions to make them viable in a world where the only viable point of game distribution for a business is subscription.

You should be afraid of current models now.
Alot of good games are dying, because they aren't meeting the sales expectations.

You are just the type of people who only enjoy successful games, and not the unique games. The games which you are talking about, would stay for a long time. While the good games would simply die out, because they dont bring enough money.

Guardian of galaxy is a recent example of a good game, but wasn't a financial hit.

 

[Mr Reasonable]

Nah, I’m afraid that long terms, the sort of games I personally enjoy will become rarer and/or non viable, and either not be made at all, or become infected with grind and micro transactions to make them viable in a world where the only viable point of game distribution for a business is subscription.

I understand your fear but here's how it plays out if all the games are all infected with grind/microtransactions.

Firstly, nobody buys them outright. Revenue down.
Next, if people don't like the games on Gamepass, they cancel and get their games elsewhere.

So, that's why it won't happen.

 

[phil_t98]

I think with the cost of living crisis some people will turn to monthly subs to enjoy gaming, paying 9.99 a month rather than 60-70 on a game and getting more for your money. can see subs spiking again

 

[Mr Reasonable]

Guardian of galaxy is a recent example of a good game, but wasn't a financial hit.

A game with that kind of expensive license probably needs to be a monster hit to be successful enough to be worthwhile. The cost of doing that kind of business is high. If that's the kind of thing that we might see disappear, meh, but those games are going nowhere.

Personally speaking, I think they (expensive movie licenses, etc) are the kinds of games that don't need our support. If you care about games, support the ones that bring their own ideas and aren't constrained by brand managers who will be dictating what you can and can't do with their license. Marvel will be fine either way.

The GOTG team might well have made a better game with their own characters and scenario. It would have probably been more interesting to meet new characters than find a new way to package the Cinematic Universe at least (IMO).

 

[Cyberpunkd]

As we've seen even giants like Netflix have struggled with the subscription service and maintaining profitability. Can this model really work in the AAA home console gaming space?

That is because Netflix spends absurd amount of money on creating content, much more than console platform holders.

Also, the point of all subscription models is for people that do not consume all the time, but they have ongoing subscription being charged each month, and they either forgot or are too bothered to cancel / subscribe each time something that interests them comes along.