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[GHG]

Lol, don't raise the price until you have seen most subscribers pay the full price.

Based on the numbers in my previous post:

Going off the mid point of those numbers (451.25 million) and an average subscriber paying $10 a month that indicates roughly 15 million subscribers which seems a bit on the low side.

If we are to believe they have subscriber numbers in excess of 20 million then the average subscriber is paying less than $10 per month (most likely closer to $7 per month on average which nets ~21.5 million subs).

Which begs the question, is the Brazil document true?
They reported 2.9b. But with your math, that means it only does 1.4b to 2.1b.

Could be TTM numbers.

From an accuracy point of view we only have a single quarter to go off. Phil is saying it's 10-15% of total revenue now, so it would only make sense to apply those percentages to the most recently reported quarters data. Extrapolating across previous and future quarters will lead to inaccuracies as those percentage figures stated by Phil will ebb and flow over time.

 

[adamsapple]

Very easy to claim a service is "profitable" without accounting for all the actual costs (like ongoing game development for all their studios).

I'll let Topher answer why what you said makes no sense:

Why would Game Pass pay for the production costs of games like Halo? Spencer said Game Pass is around 10-15% of revenue. That leaves a lot of revenue from other sources so why would Game Pass be the one source of revenue that has to play for dev costs? That doesn't make sense.

 

[freefornow]

Spenser says the sky is blue.

Have just leaked that to Tom Warren. Expecting a breaking tweet soon
Thread should pop up here soon (could become a "live" thread that spits out GafGold).

 

[NickFire]

I'll let Topher answer why what you said makes no sense:

I don’t see Phil lying about it being profitable. No way. He’s too high up in a publicly traded company. Cannot mislead shareholders and the company is trying to pass a major deal through.

But I do wonder if his company considers present tense profitability the same way small businesses would. I honestly have no idea how a company like MS records development costs for a new title on their books. Do they record development expenses as a loss month by month, or all at once when the project launches And revenue starts coming in?

 

[Ozriel]

Microsoft has some of the best experience spinning financial numbers to make them appear better than they really are, so I'm not going to take this statement at face value until he actually shows the receipts which we know they won't do. Very easy to claim a service is "profitable" without accounting for all the actual costs (like ongoing game development for all their studios).

I’m not sure any spin they do can compare to you putting the entirety of the development cost on Gamepass. As if they don’t sell games at retail, or on Steam.

 

[reinking]

‘Growth is slowing’ doesn’t translate to ‘there’s no growth’.

Yes, but you would think if the Series S is selling as well as we are to believe, adding half of those users to the eco system we would expect to see a boost in GP subs and not a slowdown.

 

[feynoob]

Yes, I get that, but you would think if the Series S is selling as well as we are to believe introducing half of those users to the echo system, I would expect to see a boost in GP subs, not a slowdown.

Consoles arent selling that much. 25m to 30 is hard to achieve with low userbase.

For example, PS plus is at 47+m on 115+m console.

PC gamepass is what would raise the sub count at this point. Consoles wont be able to do higher than 40m, until Xbox is like 60+m.

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

I'll let Topher answer why what you said makes no sense:

Of course it makes sense. Because if GamePass is profitable, but their retail games are massively unprofitable (and they count for ALL the operating expenses of these titles), it's just a number fudging accounting trick to make GamePass look better than it is

A huge portion of their revenue is just selling hardware, which is done at cost or a slight loss.

 

[gothmog]

Profits are profits. Even if it's small or large.

What Matters is that the service puts out a profit at early stage, and not losing money.

So it's technically not a lie.

If I make 1$ profit, instead of 10$, it's a a profit for me, since I am not under -1$.

I think we're in agreement. I was not implying that Phil and Satya were committing crimes. Just puffing up their product.

 

[feynoob]

I think we're in agreement. I was not implying that Phil and Satya were committing crimes. Just puffing up their product.

Its a standard PR. Phil is good at this.

 

[adamsapple]

Of course it makes sense. Because if GamePass is profitable, but their retail games are massively unprofitable (and they count for ALL the operating expenses of these titles), it's just a number fudging accounting trick to make GamePass look better than it is

A huge portion of their revenue is just selling hardware, which is done at cost or a slight loss.

1/ Where are you getting the "retail games are massively unprofitable" from ?

2/ It literally makes no sense why the cost of development needs to be put solely on game pass revenue when it is 15~ % of the total gaming revenue. Is the rest of the revenue there just to look pretty and not factor in for any kind of development ?

3/ Games are not made exclusively for game pass, all content is sold on retail and digital on not just the Xbox platform, but PC/Steam and multiple prominent IP on other console as well. Which further adds another giant asterisk to your ridiculous comment.

 

[feynoob]

Of course it makes sense. Because if GamePass is profitable, but their retail games are massively unprofitable (and they count for ALL the operating expenses of these titles), it's just a number fudging accounting trick to make GamePass look better than it is

A huge portion of their revenue is just selling hardware, which is done at cost or a slight loss.

Kids, this is why you need to go outside more.

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

1/ Where are you getting the "retail games are massively unprofitable" from ?

2/ It literally makes no sense why the cost of development needs to be put solely on game pass revenue when it is 15~ % of the total gaming revenue. Is the rest of the revenue there just to look pretty and not account for any kind of development ?

3/ Games are not made exclusively for game pass, all content is sold on retail and digital on not just the Xbox platform, but PC/Steam and multiple prominent IP on other console as well. Which further adds another giant asterisk to your ridiculous comment.

I am saying if a game sells far worse at retail due to GamePass, and all the operating expenses are against the retail sales and not GamePass, then it obviously makes GP look profitable when it's truly not. GameDev cost should be some (significant) part of the equation for GP profitability.

Anyone claiming otherwise is being intellectually dishonest.

 

[feynoob]

1/ Where are you getting the "retail games are massively unprofitable" from ?

2/ It literally makes no sense why the cost of development needs to be put solely on game pass revenue when it is 15~ % of the total gaming revenue. Is the rest of the revenue there just to look pretty and not account for any kind of development ?

Because logic is dead

3/ Games are not made exclusively for game pass, all content is sold on retail and digital on not just the Xbox platform, but PC/Steam and multiple prominent IP on other console as well. Which further adds another giant asterisk to your ridiculous comment.

He doesnt care about that. If he paid attention to what he typed, he wouldnt have reached to that conclusion.

Prime example as to why you need to do more research. Not just type it.

 

[feynoob]

I am saying if a game sells far worse at retail due to GamePass, and all the operating expenses are against the retail sales and not GamePass, then it obviously makes GP look profitable when it's truly not. GameDev cost should be some (significant) part of the equation for GP profitability.

The problem with your statement, is that you are assuming it.

Xbox has 3 revenue. Day1 steam, Xbox store and gamepass. That is 3 revenue, which is there to increase the sales of their products.

Also Steam is a long term revenue, and it doesnt stop it there.

Look at Forza 4, and Sea of theives. They still got strong legs on steam.

 

[Stuart360]

I am saying if a game sells far worse at retail due to GamePass, and all the operating expenses are against the retail sales and not GamePass, then it obviously makes GP look profitable when it's truly not. GameDev cost should be some (significant) part of the equation for GP profitability.

Anyone claiming otherwise is being intellectually dishonest.

Gamepass made 2.9bil last year, how much do you think a sub service needs to make to be profitable?.

Also game sales being down represents first party games, and as the havent realeased much this year, it goes without saying game sales are down.

 

[feynoob]

Why are people ignoring 2022 pitiful state of AAA games? Tons of games have moved to 2023. This year is just bad for game sales.

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

The problem with your statement, is that you are assuming it.

Xbox has 3 revenue. Day1 steam, Xbox store and gamepass. That is 3 revenue, which is there to increase the sales of their products.

Also Steam is a long term revenue, and it doesnt stop it there.

Look at Forza 4, and Sea of theives. They still got strong legs on steam.

I am not claiming there AREN'T other sources of revenue from their games. But a significant amount of the Xbox userbase has shifted over to GP. The ongoing operating expenses need to be in some portion accounted for against all of the sources to determine true profitability, to remove them from the equation for GamePass is dishonest. It's saying GamePass only needs to pay for procuring third party content deals alone, which we know is only part of the equation.

Gamepass made 2.9bil last year, how much do you think a sub service needs to make to be profitable?.

Also game sales being down represents first party games, and as the havent realeased much this year, it goes without saying game sales are down.

I don't believe you can accurately account for profitability anymore using one portion of sales/subs alone. You need to assess it more at a higher level.

If you are simply judging GamePass as profitable by the cost of procuring outside content, and not including the cost of ongoing development, it's just simple number fudging.

2.9B may seem like a lot in revenue, but Microsoft owns a massive number of studios, headcount, and payroll now. That ain't cheap.

 

[gothmog]

I am saying if a game sells far worse at retail due to GamePass, and all the operating expenses are against the retail sales and not GamePass, then it obviously makes GP look profitable when it's truly not. GameDev cost should be some (significant) part of the equation for GP profitability.

I'm surprised they haven't consulted the film industry. They are/were masters at hiding any profits by "reinvesting" in other projects. Everyone gets paid (except for those who get royalties off of net rather than gross receipts) and I'm sure the taxes looked really good on paper.

 

[Stuart360]

I don't believe you can accurately account for profitability anymore using one portion of sales/subs alone. You need to assess it more at a higher level.

If you are simply judging GamePass as profitable by the cost of procuring outside content, and not including the cost of ongoing development, it's just simple number fudging.

2.9B may seem like a lot in revenue, but Microsoft owns a massive number of studios, headcount, and payroll now. That ain't cheap.

But overheads like staff, devs, etc, that is measured against the Xbox division as a whole. You can have seperate 'entities' so to speak in divisions that has its own budget and expectations etc. Gamepass is being judged buy the amount it costs to run the service, servers etc, and of course fees for games. Thats how Ms are judging Gamepass.

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

But overheads like staff, devs, etc, that is measured against the Xbox division as a whole. You can have seperate 'entities' so to speak in divisions that has its own budget and expectations etc. Gamepass is being judged buy the amount it costs to run the service, servers etc, and of course fees for games. Thats how Ms are judging Gamepass.

You can split it up however you like. I don't think it's an honest assessment to exclude some portion of dev cost against GamePass, which is very likely what Phil is doing.

 

[adamsapple]

You can split it up however you like. I don't think it's an honest assessment to exclude some portion of dev cost against GamePass, which is very likely what Phil is doing.

If MS's entire gaming division was only game pass then you'd have a point, but it isn't so you're probably not gonna find many people besides Ezekiel_ liking it.

 

[SenjutsuSage]

Is an exec allowed to publicly say something is profitable if it isn't?

I don’t see Phil lying about it being profitable. No way. He’s too high up in a publicly traded company. Cannot mislead shareholders and the company is trying to pass a major deal through.

But I do wonder if his company considers present tense profitability the same way small businesses would. I honestly have no idea how a company like MS records development costs for a new title on their books. Do they record development expenses as a loss month by month, or all at once when the project launches And revenue starts coming in?

And he isn't just any exec; he's a member of the Microsoft leadership group, and the CEO of a newly created segment at Microsoft, Microsoft Gaming. He's definitely intentionally off about game pass being 15% of revenue, though. No way Game Pass with over 25 million subscribers is JUST 15% of $3.61 billion for the quarter. It has to be at minimum 20%, but it's certainly higher than that.

Luckily, being off about the number in an interview is NOT something he or the company get in trouble for. Also don't know what timeframe he's referencing. Could easily be 2020, early to mid 2021 percentages.

 

[Stuart360]

You can split it up however you like. I don't think it's an honest assessment to exclude some portion of dev cost against GamePass, which is very likely what Phil is doing.

Well thats just how it works in business. If Gamepass failed, they would shut down Gamepass, not Xbox as a whole. Thats why they say stuff like 'Game sales are down but thats offset by growth in Gamepass', its All Xbox gaming division as a whole, but they have seperate services in that division.

 

[SenjutsuSage]

If MS's entire gaming division was only game pass then you'd have a point, but it isn't so you're probably not gonna find many people besides Ezekiel_ liking it.

And Activision will bring with them $8+ billion in yearly revenue, which will almost certainly grow under Microsoft.

 

[tusharngf]

the dollar 1 deal is no more in my region and its only for new people that too 1month. Microsoft is pushing for real prices on service now.

 

[feynoob]

I am not claiming there AREN'T other sources of revenue from their games. But a significant amount of the Xbox userbase has shifted over to GP. The ongoing operating expenses need to be in some portion accounted for against all of the sources to determine true profitability, to remove them from the equation for GamePass is dishonest. It's saying GamePass only needs to pay for procuring third party content deals alone, which we know is only part of the equation.

Last known gamepass numbers is 25m. That is with PC and console combined.
Xbox has around 50m userbase. That is not enough. If majority of xbox users went to gamepass, the numbers would have been 35m+ userbase.

All MS needs is to hit 5m sales for that year. 1.5m from steam, and the rest from xbox store. at average of $45 per copy, that is $225m. That is enough to recoup the cost of developing the game. and if gamepass covers up to $200m, That is enough money for them. The higher the sales, the less gamepass would have to provide.

 

[MarkMe2525]

What is with the Phil Spencer obsession? There are 4 active threads currently on the front page that has Phil's name in the thread title.

Edit: 5 now

Edit Edit: as of 11:52 Central Time, there are now 6.

 

[itshutton]

Profitable…..but this could mean so many things. It is likely to be profitable before acquisitions and 1st party development is taken into account. There is no way he is considering lost sales. And on top of that it would certainly be EBITDA.

So the statement although essentially “good” for Microsoft, basically means nothing.

I personally still see it as unsustainable for the industry as a whole, even if it is sustainable for Microsoft themselves.

 

[Lasha]

You can split it up however you like. I don't think it's an honest assessment to exclude some portion of dev cost against GamePass, which is very likely what Phil is doing.

Why would Microsoft charge the full cost of developing a game to gamepass? Microsoft cross charges for all of it's services internally. Any project which uses Azure has to pay the Azure team based on an internal schedule. This prevents the "number fudging' you are afraid of because every project is responsible for being profitable while bearing it's own costs.

Microsoft has no reason to fudge the numbers because Xbox is judged as division. Playing with numbers like that would only hurt the division since there is no way to hide the overall Xbox numbers from Microsoft.

 

[IFireflyl]

What is with the Phil Spencer obsession? There are 4 active threads currently on the front page that has Phil's name in the thread title.

We have three camps causing this:

One camp is ecstatic that Phil Spencer is the leader of their favorite toy box, and they want people to know about all of the great things Phil Spencer is doing so they feel like their toy box purchase has been validated.

Another camp is angry that Phil Spencer is their leader's rival, and they want people to know about all of the terrible things Phil Spencer is doing so they feel like their toy box purchase has been validated.

The final camp wants to watch the world burn, and it is exceptionally easy to bait the people in the other two camps.

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

If MS's entire gaming division was only game pass then you'd have a point, but it isn't so you're probably not gonna find many people besides Ezekiel_ liking it.

No, you are just missing the point. I think it's better to judge the success or failure by simply account for all the revenue sources and costs, and not spin it as "GamePass is profitable if you exclude all internal development costs".

Well thats just how it works in business. If Gamepass failed, they would shut down Gamepass, not Xbox as a whole. Thats why they say stuff like 'Game sales are down but thats offset by growth in Gamepass', its All Xbox gaming division as a whole, but they have seperate services in that division.

I'm not claiming GamePass is a failure. I am just claiming that we can't claim it's profitable without accounting for some measure of development costs.

Last known gamepass numbers is 25m. That is with PC and console combined.
Xbox has around 50m userbase. That is not enough. If majority of xbox users went to gamepass, the numbers would have been 35m+ userbase.

All MS needs is to hit 5m sales for that year. 1.5m from steam, and the rest from xbox store. at average of $45 per copy, that is $225m. That is enough to recoup the cost of developing the game. and if gamepass covers up to $200m, That is enough money for them. The higher the sales, the less gamepass would have to provide.

The cost to recoup a project like Halo Infinite is not a mere 5M units.

343 employs 450 people directly. There's also the outsourcing/contracting costs. And the overhead costs plus marketing. 6 year dev time x 450 employees x $150k/yr per employee (counting in overhead and benefits, not what the average employee is making) = $405 million alone, which is actually probably vastly understating the direct development cost. Marketing can cost $100M+ per title, so you are looking at $500M just on Halo infinite alone. That's over $10M in retail sales + whatever hard to quantify GamePass equivalent revenue it generated before earning any profit.

It's why these sorts of accounting tricks can't easily be isolated and you need a holistic measure of all sources of revenue minus all sources of expenses to get a feel for how Xbox software is doing.

 

[Neo_game]

Microsoft has some of the best experience spinning financial numbers to make them appear better than they really are, so I'm not going to take this statement at face value until he actually shows the receipts which we know they won't do. Very easy to claim a service is "profitable" without accounting for all the actual costs (like ongoing game development for all their studios).

I agree. They are never straight and do not give numbers. Obviously there is no obligation and his job is only to report to Nadella. But if GP made them billion $ profit last year. He also says it is only 10-15% of their revenue and he also says it is not seeing big growth. Does that mean those 20-25million user is enough for GP to give them those numbers ?

 

[Hugare]

Why would Game Pass pay for the production costs of games like Halo? Spencer said Game Pass is around 10-15% of revenue. That leaves a lot of revenue from other sources so why would Game Pass be the one source of revenue that has to play for dev costs? That doesn't make sense.%

Again, where are the receipts? Do they announce sales numbers for their games? Saying its "10-15% of revenue" is vague as fuck when you dont have the numbers.

It could be 15% of 1 million copies sold. Would that be enough to pay for dev costs? Revenue from sales is what pay for new games. So how is this not relevant?

And I agree, that leaves a lot of revenue from other sources. But are you going to tell me that having 1st party games Day One in Game Pass havent affected their sales much?

"Gears 5 sold more than 4". Ok, how much?

"Horizon 5 had 10 million players". Ok, how much from Game Pass?

The bulk of video game budgets come from salaries paid to developers, costs for travel, licensing etc.

I’ve always been mildly bemused at people who are gullible enough to believe that Halo Infinite cost $500m to make. How do you justify that when you think of it?

For the last time halo didnt cost 500 million

Change Halo Infinity for any other AAA production and you'll still get my point (if you want to)

 

[Ezekiel_]

If MS's entire gaming division was only game pass then you'd have a point, but it isn't so you're probably not gonna find many people besides Ezekiel_ liking it.

Thread is about how supposedly 'GamePass is profitable'. So you think PS is lying, that it's only really profitable if you take into account all the other revenue streams of MS gaming?

Unless he's willing to show receipts, he can say having his ball in your month is profitable, I couldn't care less.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Microsoft has some of the best experience spinning financial numbers to make them appear better than they really are, so I'm not going to take this statement at face value until he actually shows the receipts which we know they won't do. Very easy to claim a service is "profitable" without accounting for all the actual costs (like ongoing game development for all their studios).

Cool.

So your idea of accounting is move around costs to whichever part of the company you want to make things look good or bad. It makes zero sense why dev costs would be buried into the sub plan service. But hey, anything to counter Phil's claim of GP profits.

At least GP is profitable. Looks like PS+ isn't since Sony doesn't tell people if their sub plans are profitable or not. And since they are hiding the numbers, it must mean they are losing.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Of course it makes sense. Because if GamePass is profitable, but their retail games are massively unprofitable (and they count for ALL the operating expenses of these titles), it's just a number fudging accounting trick to make GamePass look better than it is

A huge portion of their revenue is just selling hardware, which is done at cost or a slight loss.

Still at in claiming MS is fudging the numbers with accounting tricks.

Take it easy James. GP being profitable isnt the end of the world.

 

[twilo99]

The only device, which can increase their gamepass userbase.

If they can access china, and india. They are looking around10m-30m userbase increase.

True, PC gamers are a tough crowd but if they keep the price as low as it is now they can have some more success.

 

[Ozzy Onya A2Z]

It didnt take a genius to know that. 2.9bil made last year with probably 500mil-1bil in game fees paid tops (after seeing 6mil for GOTG, 600k for Cooking sim, and the Epic leaks, i think thats a fair estimate, if not on the high side).
I doubt it costs more than 2bil a year to run Gamepass, server costs, etc.

I made a guesstimate in a similar thread. I still reckon it's close enough +/- 25% to back up Phil's claims of profitability and sustainability.

Let us take a stupid guess at costs for GP during 2021 -

• $1 Billion - Royalties and partner/profit sharing e.g. dev/studio/publisher contracts for 30% on say 50% of their sales revenue
• $250Mil - 5 x AAA tentpole games developing (remember these games take years of this cost shared to finish)
• $200Mil - GP staff/development/support e.g. family plan, Xbox dash/store, PC app, backend, test, Azure resources etc.
• $250Mil - Marketing
• $50Mil - 10 AA games @ $5Mil a pop
• $25Mil - 50 A/Indie games @ $500K a pop
• $250Mil Opportunity loss from cheap GP subs/titles e.g. loss leading for market share-
• $500Mil - Taxes, office, equipment, power, computers, food etc.

So, we know it was confirmed as $2.9Bil for 2021 less above costs of $2.525Bil and we guesstimate GP at approx $375Mil in NET profit for 2021. All that in just 1 year, GP is in the black and pushing forward.

 

[adamsapple]

Thread is about how supposedly 'GamePass is profitable'. So you think PS is lying, that it's only really profitable if you take into account all the other revenue streams of MS gaming?

No, Gamepass is profitable realistically for the amount of money put into it for deals, upkeep, distribution and maintenance. The amount of money they put into the service is exceeded by the amount of revenue it generates for them.

Game development for first party studio is something completely different and would naturally come under the entire Gaming segments revenue.

Why on earth would you lump game development for first party content into just a specific ~15% subset of the entire gaming division revenue ? If they were making games exclusively by and for game pass then it would make sense but considering their games are distributed in numerous models besides game pass, it makes 0% sense to put their entire development cost into game pass's revenue stream.

But it is good to see that you also make straight up bad arguments besides just the lol emojis Ezekiel_

I'm not claiming GamePass is a failure. I am just claiming that we can't claim it's profitable without accounting for some measure of development costs.

Sure we can, watch:

Microsoft says Xbox Game Pass is profitable as it sees subscription growth slow

Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer provides rare Xbox insights.

www.theverge.com

 

[StreetsofBeige]

True, PC gamers are a tough crowd but if they keep the price as low as it is now they can have some more success.

Yup.

That's one thing console skewed game companies got to learn selling on PC. While console gamers get hyped up preordering in the millions at full price for easy cash with amped up trailers and TV commercials, game studios got to treat the PC crowd more pragmatic. Offer good games with good settings at a good price. Hell, the PC crowd is known for backlogs of games. So they might buy the game and never even bother playing it. That's got to be the easiest sale ever. Make sure you patch the game and dont look like an ass locking frame rates or settings the console crowd is indifferent to. Dont force modders to got to look into it themselves and adjust for gamers.

You achieve this and you got a user base that will support the games.

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

Sure we can, watch:

So just blindly believe everything a gaming exec tells you with no deeper dive or analysis

If you’re going to not count any dev costs, you shouldn’t include any sub revenue that depended on those games to entice subscribers

 

[adamsapple]

So just blindly believe everything a gaming exec tells you with no deeper dive or analysis

A lot of people are doing that in the other 'prices may increase' thread, it shouldn't just be relegated to specific arguments, no ?

If you’re going to not count any dev costs, you shouldn’t include any sub revenue that depended on those games to entice subscribers

what ?

no seriously, what ?

you don't want to include sub revenue from people paying for the subscription because others are saying it's asinine to link game development cost to it ? you know it's not just first party games that are on the service that entice subscribers right ?

do you also want to add the development cost for every single third party day 1 game on game pass's revenue as well?

christ on a stick

 

[octiny]

Where is everyone who said it fail? (you know, there was a bunch of you) Come speak up now and admit defeat!!

They are either hiding or having fun in the other three Phil Spenser threads to make up for having lost the narrative that Gamepass isn't profitable. There are a few stragglers left in here holding on to hopes & dreams of GP's demise but it's been pretty tame after the gauntlet was dropped on them.

that is until they start moving goal posts & it looks like that's already begun

I think the biggest L belongs to Shawn Layden. Not only from a sustainability standpoint but also profitability. It's baffling how absurd his comments were then & even more so now.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

A lot of people are doing that in the other 'prices may increase' thread, it shouldn't just be relegated to specific arguments, no ?




what ?

no seriously, what ?

you don't want to include sub revenue from people paying for the subscription because others are saying it's asinine to link game development cost to it ? you know it's not just first party games that are on the service that entice subscribers right ?

do you also want to add the development cost for every single third party day 1 game on game pass's revenue as well?

christ on a stick

Give credit to James Sawyer. I think GAF should be blessed with his exceptional accounting skills. It looks like Phil's profit statement is stake in his heart. So to counter, Phil is a liar and dev costs should be baked in.

Sub plan profitability (of course for GP and not for PS plans) have game development cost built in standard, combined with accounting tricks done by MS to then strip away dev costs to make sub plans look more profitable.

Who knew.

If console makers want to make their sub plans even more profitable, don't forget to strip out janitorial services and the guy in the pick up truck in winter who salts the parking lot at 6 am. lol

 

[Moses85]

Phillyboy

 

[adamsapple]

Give credit to James Sawyer. I think GAF should be blessed with his exceptional accounting skills. It looks like Phil's profit statement is stake in his heart. So to counter, Phil is a liar and dev costs should be baked in.

Sub plan profitability (of course for GP and not for PS plans) have game development cost built in standard, combined with accounting tricks done by MS to then strip away dev costs to make sub plans look more profitable.

Who knew.

If console makers want to make their sub plans even more profitable, don't forget to strip out janitorial services and the guy in the pick up truck in winter who salts the parking lot at 6 am. lol

I'm legitimately surprised he, or others, haven't tried to link the MS lay offs earlier this month into game pass's profitability yet.

Phil is a sneak fuck.

 

[StreetsofBeige]

I'm legitimately surprised he, or others, haven't tried to link the MS lay offs earlier this month into game pass's profitability yet.

Phil is a sneak fuck.

At least MS says GP is profitable. So that solves that uncertainty.

Cant say the same for Sony sub plans. They've never stated profitability for PS+ or PS Now. And Sony historically dissects gaming data for the public more than MS does. So for them to not say if their sub plans are profitable means they really are losing big time on it. If it was a big money maker they'd say it by now showing receipts.

 

[Shubh_C63]

To be profitable at this stage, this is only going to get easier and easier.

 

[DenchDeckard]

So just blindly believe everything a gaming exec tells you with no deeper dive or analysis

If you’re going to not count any dev costs, you shouldn’t include any sub revenue that depended on those games to entice subscribers

Does anyone in the history of gaming break any of this down? I've never seen anyone request receipts to this level with any other aspect of gaming. Ita a bit extreme imo.