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VERGE: Microsoft reveals Xbox Game Pass Friends & Family plan and pricing. Piloting in Ireland/Columbia (€21.99 Ireland, 49,900 COP Columbia,~$25USD)

CeeJay

Member
It's obviously not, especially not with a deal like this. MS's plan is to outspend the competition and destroy it, like they usually do in most fields.

People are celebrating now, and yeah, this is a pretty amazing deal in the short term, but what will the gaming market look like once MS succeeds and they're the only major player remaining?
There are many factors that you're not taking into account such as people buying DLC for a game that they wouldn't have otherwise played, people buying the game with a discount through Gamepass that they wouldn't have otherwise bought. It also hastens the move from physical to digital which eliminates the second hand games market as well. All in all there are a lot of other revenue streams that Gamepass enhances. Also, Gamepass succeeding doesn't mean that other standard game sales models have to die. Everyone loves a cheap "all you can eat" buffet (Gamepass) but that doesn't mean there isn't also a place for a fast food burger chain when you want a quick meal on the go (mobile) or a fancy restaurant that charges a premium for the best quality food (Playstation first party), it's possible for all these to exist.

I think you are looking at this in a binary way when it's way more nuanced and complicated than that.
 

ReBurn

Gold Member
Just a few years ago I would have laughed and called you crazy if you told me I would be buying DLC for games I don't even own! Gamepass was a genius move and to be honest is the first truly disruptive thing to happen in gaming since the Wii.
It is also disruptive in that it provides an answer to the "must sell x million copies at x price to break even" issue a lot of developers experience by addressing it with economy of scale. Theoretically, you don't need to earn as much per player if more people are playing.

One reason cross gen is hanging around so long is that it's been literally impossible to make enough consoles to meet demand. With the traditional console model the maximum number of copies a developer can sell is limited by the number of consoles that have been purchased. Developers have had to leverage the install base of the previous generation to have a big enough install base to justify the risk of even making games. With Cloud gaming people can use the hardware they have and still be able to play the latest games, remediating the install base issue.

If Microsoft can grow the number of people using Gamepass and if developers make their games available across console, PC and cloud streaming then developers have an audience of tens of millions of people willing to pay at least something to play video games. If developers can work a good deal with Microsoft when putting their games on Gamepass it could benefit gamers and developers in the long run. A lot of people are now trying and enjoying games they never would have because the risk of paying 40 - 70 bucks for a bad game you hate and can't refund is gone.
 

SmokedMeat

Gamer™
Damn, I might have to get in on this with some friends.

The Microsoft Reward Points everyone would earn combined, would more then pay to keep the sub going for free.

Has Microsoft even thought about this lol?
 

Stuart360

Member
Damn, I might have to get in on this with some friends.

The Microsoft Reward Points everyone would earn combined, would more then pay to keep the sub going for free.

Has Microsoft even thought about this lol?
You know MS get paid for all those clicks when you do reward points right?. A month of clicks probably generates way more revenue than the $5 or 6 a month of clicks generates for us points wise.
 
Goddamn! This is unquestionably the best deal in gaming

Though for the first time ever, I’ve got to ask how this is sustainable.
How the hell can this gamepass thing be profitable?
I still dont understand that
It's obviously not,


I always laugh at comments like these, especially when we have the data for more engagement and purchases with games on GP over the traditional model, and the fact some people who like GP games and don't want them to rotate out can by the game (sometimes at a discount) which also adds money.

You have 100's of games on gamepass.

You have the sub itself, which costs a certain amount a year, and needs to be renewed for most subscribers. You have games that use Hitman 3's model of DLC, and then you have MTX and other in-game content. You than have those same game pass users doing the same thing for let's say for this example 10 games, using similar prices you see in Sea of thieves and Hitman. And let's say for 5 of those games people actually brought them after experiencing them on gamepass.

Game pass+MTX+MTX+Other_10 games on GP+ 5 brought.

Now let's imagine this formula is for 500,000 game pass users.

That would equal $211 million in cash.

So with 1 million users, that would equal $423 million.

with 10 million users, that would equal $4.23 billion in cash.

With 20 million users, that would equal $8.46 billion.

So with 30 million users, which I suspect Microsoft is at or have already passed in Game Pass Subscribers, that would give MS $12.69 billion in generated sales, not including what other cuts MS gets when partnering with studios, and not taking into account not everyone will have the same patter, some users may engage in more MTX, buy more games, or get more content than others. It's also not considering that some developers charge more for MTX and other game content than others. So for all we know this number is the floor.

$12.69 billion a year as the floor seems perfectly sustainable to me. $600,000 for cooking simulator is a grain of rice, $6 million for that Guardian of the Galaxy is nothing, and as the numbers of Game Pass users rise, so does the money brought in. They can afford to lose a few million every few months when you make this much money and likely much more.

We've also heard from some studios that maybe doing day 1 GP releases isn't the best way for them to recoup their investment, especially for big AAA single player games.

We also heard from AAA developers of SP games that it does. You're being selective.
 
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I always laugh at comments like these, especially when we have the data for more engagement and purchases with games on GP over the traditional model, and the fact some people who like GP games and don't want them to rotate out can by the game (sometimes at a discount) which also adds money.

You have 100's of games on gamepass.

You have the sub itself, which costs a certain amount a year, and needs to be renewed for most subscribers. You have games that use Hitman 3's model of DLC, and then you have MTX and other in-game content. You than have those same game pass users doing the same thing for let's say for this example 10 games, using similar prices you see in Sea of thieves and Hitman. And let's say for 5 of those games people actually brought them after experiencing them on gamepass.

Game pass+MTX+MTX+Other_10 games on GP+ 5 brought.

Now let's imagine this formula is for 500,000 game pass users.

That would equal $211 million in cash.

So with 1 million users, that would equal $423 million.

with 10 million users, that would equal $4.23 billion in cash.

With 20 million users, that would equal $8.46 billion.

So with 30 million users, which I suspect Microsoft is at or have already passed in Game Pass Subscribers, that would give MS $12.69 billion in generated sales, not including what other cuts MS gets when partnering with studios, and not taking into account not everyone will have the same patter, some users may engage in more MTX, buy more games, or get more content than others. It's also not considering that some developers charge more for MTX and other game content than others. So for all we know this number is the floor.

$12.69 billion a year as the floor seems perfectly sustainable to me. $600,000 for cooking simulator is a grain of rice, $6 million for that Guardian of the Galaxy is nothing, and as the numbers of Game Pass users rise, so does the money brought in. They can afford to lose a few million every few months when you make this much money and likely much more.



We also heard from AAA developers of SP games that it does. You're being selective.
Fucking lol if you think people buy half the fucking games they play on gamepass, literally stopped reading there.

I've had game pass for around 4 years if not longer, and I've literally never bought a game I've played on there, which is literally dozens of them. MUCH more people are like me, than they are your hypothetical example of users buying fucking HALF of the games they play on there.
 

Ozriel

M$FT
I always laugh at comments like these, especially when we have the data for more engagement and purchases with games on GP over the traditional model, and the fact some people who like GP games and don't want them to rotate out can by the game (sometimes at a discount) which also adds money.

You have 100's of games on gamepass.

You have the sub itself, which costs a certain amount a year, and needs to be renewed for most subscribers. You have games that use Hitman 3's model of DLC, and then you have MTX and other in-game content. You than have those same game pass users doing the same thing for let's say for this example 10 games, using similar prices you see in Sea of thieves and Hitman. And let's say for 5 of those games people actually brought them after experiencing them on gamepass.

Game pass+MTX+MTX+Other_10 games on GP+ 5 brought.

Now let's imagine this formula is for 500,000 game pass users.

That would equal $211 million in cash.

So with 1 million users, that would equal $423 million.

with 10 million users, that would equal $4.23 billion in cash.

With 20 million users, that would equal $8.46 billion.

So with 30 million users, which I suspect Microsoft is at or have already passed in Game Pass Subscribers, that would give MS $12.69 billion in generated sales, not including what other cuts MS gets when partnering with studios, and not taking into account not everyone will have the same patter, some users may engage in more MTX, buy more games, or get more content than others. It's also not considering that some developers charge more for MTX and other game content than others. So for all we know this number is the floor.

$12.69 billion a year as the floor seems perfectly sustainable to me. $600,000 for cooking simulator is a grain of rice, $6 million for that Guardian of the Galaxy is nothing, and as the numbers of Game Pass users rise, so does the money brought in. They can afford to lose a few million every few months when you make this much money and likely much more.

Oh, you misunderstand. I’ve done this math before and I’ve pretty much come to the same conclusion as you have. Sub revenue is sufficient to easily cover cost of content.

But that was assuming an average sub fee of around $10 per user per month. Family plans will bring down the ARPU (average revenue per user) further, so it could narrow margins.

On the flip side, this could likely drive up sub numbers
 
Fucking lol if you think people buy half the fucking games they play on gamepass, literally stopped reading there.

I was only using 10 games for an example. There are hundreds of games on gamepass, never said half would buy games.

Oh, you misunderstand. I’ve done this math before and I’ve pretty much come to the same conclusion as you have. Sub revenue is sufficient to easily cover cost of content.

But that was assuming an average sub fee of around $10 per user per month. Family plans will bring down the ARPU (average revenue per user) further, so it could narrow margins.

On the flip side, this could likely drive up sub numbers

But you have more money being spend with more people which off-sets any narrowlization of the revenue.
 

CeeJay

Member
Oh, you misunderstand. I’ve done this math before and I’ve pretty much come to the same conclusion as you have. Sub revenue is sufficient to easily cover cost of content.

But that was assuming an average sub fee of around $10 per user per month. Family plans will bring down the ARPU (average revenue per user) further, so it could narrow margins.

On the flip side, this could likely drive up sub numbers
The f and f sub might bring down the arpu from the sub alone but what happens when you consider the revenue from dlc? Five potential buyers of dlc instead of one single potential buyer.

Would you rather have 5 lottery scratch cards or one card which has a much larger jackpot? 5 chances to win has better odds of paying our more over the chance of a single larger jackpot.
 

Barlow

Member
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TLZ

Banned
Just to confirm, this can't be used with people overseas right?

Edit: Yea just read the same region part. Oh well.
 
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elliot5

Member
Just to confirm, this can't be used with people overseas right?

Edit: Yea just read the same region part. Oh well.
Technically it can be if you change the region to match the billing of the main account holder but that could impact other things like game pass/store/purchasing support or whatever.
 
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DaGwaphics

Member
Technically it can be if you change the region to match the billing of the main account holder but that could impact other things like game pass/store/purchasing support or whatever.

They might enforce this via ISP or IP information too.
 
I got two family members, and two buddies of mine who are already on board for cutting me $60 checks for a year of GPU.

Day one baby!

Edit- The thought of GPU for $60 per year feels like I'm stealing from MS. It's wild.
 
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Kataploom

Gold Member
I'm in Colombia, I've never been able to make it work, whenever I click the Xbox app option to switch my plan it sends me an unknown error, same in the web page in the browser, I have 4 friends I wanted to use it with, they tried and it's the same... In our opinion it's not working AT ALL, we don't even know why it's being advertised in first place
 
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reksveks

Member
That's funny because you were supposed to be able to share it without having to pay extra before, no?
There always was a 'trick' or workaround for consoles that covered two devices but it wasn't even really highlighted by Microsoft as a way to share GP.

So guess it depends on how you look at it.
 
There always was a 'trick' or workaround for consoles that covered two devices but it wasn't even really highlighted by Microsoft as a way to share GP.

So guess it depends on how you look at it.
If they close a loophole as a way to generate revenue from it... Well, it's a way to bump the price of the service.

This reminds me of a place that I worked at, they would not count sick days, nor would they track vacation (we didn't even have time sheets, we just got the money). Anyway, one day we received a letter from the HR team telling us that the company generously gave us 5 paid sick days! ( We had "none" before)... Layer they gave us vacation time too, such nice people!
 

reksveks

Member
If they close a loophole as a way to generate revenue from it... Well, it's a way to bump the price of the service.
As far I know they haven't closed the loophole but ehh, you don't have to pay more if you want to.

It's like complaining about password sharing personally.
 

AJUMP23

Member
You know MS get paid for all those clicks when you do reward points right?. A month of clicks probably generates way more revenue than the $5 or 6 a month of clicks generates for us points wise.
I'm satisfied and so is MS.....what do I care if they make money off my clicks. They are giving me something in return. GamePass.
 

Lasha

Member
How the hell can this gamepass thing be profitable?
I still dont understand that

Scale makes it profitable. Costco offers low prices because it starts the year profitable. Amazon Prime offers so many crazy benefits because it's guaranteed x$ from each member before selling anything else. Gamepass follows a similar business model. A family plan at $20 nets Microsoft revenue equivalent to 100% of 4 full priced games where previously Microsoft only received %30-%100 of 1-2 games per year based on previously observed attach rates. Microsoft wins when it converts light gamers into gamepass subscriptions since it more than doubles the revenue it would have previously received.
 

adamsapple

Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
Now is this locked down to 1 household or is it spread to multiple houses?

Not locked to a household, not sure how that's even possible lol. It's basically an expanded version of account sharing. It can be any 5 people, hence 'friends' too, not just family.
 

DaGwaphics

Member
I thought the $25 for 5 accounts seemed optimistic for an official price. That is still quite a discount though at almost half off.
 

reinking

Gold Member
Sign they are about to close the conversion loophole? Even without going to a different region the last time I converted it came to about $5 per month. I think this plan is great for those with a group of friends that will be commited and never think of dropping but damn.... ..that price is not what I was expecting. I was thinking of $29.95 tops.
 

Lasha

Member
The price is pretty reasonable and seems to take into account that most families will be from mixed households. GPU benefits are already shared with all users on the subscriber's main console anyways. I have my kids xbox set as my "home" console and play with them on PC. It's basically like 2 GP accounts and 3 XBL accounts.
 

JackMcGunns

Member
8 bucks per person not too bad will save a few bucks around here.
Is it as simple as canceling subscription and adding gamer tags to new account?


$8 x 5 = $40 isn't it less than $40? unless you can only get 3 people on board. I would find 2 more people friends or family and split 5 ways making it less than 5 each. 🕺💃
 

adamsapple

Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
FYI since this thread has been updated.

The screenshot I posted above turned out to be from the New Zealand store. Not the US store.
 
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