It’s official: Microsoft has announced that the price of future games exclusive to Xbox Series X/S will drop from €70 to €80 in 2023. A way to encourage players to subscribe to Xbox Game Pass while increasing its margins.

It’s official: Microsoft has announced that the price of future games exclusive to Xbox Series X/S will drop from €70 to €80 in 2023. A way to encourage players to subscribe to Xbox Game Pass while increasing its margins.

We strongly suspected it, but the bad news ended up falling for players on Xbox Xbox Series X / S: the price of exclusive games will increase from 2023. An increase prepared gently for several months and which has been made official by Microsoft on IGN. For the moment, the firm has only communicated on American prices, which will go from $60 to $70. There is no doubt that those of France should soon follow and align themselves with the others in force, namely 80 €. The games that will be affected first are Forza Motorsport, red fall and the long awaited Starfieldthree headlines planned for the year. “This award reflects the content, breadth and technical complexity of these titles”explains Microsoft, before adding that, “like all games developed by our teams at Xbox, they will also be available with Game Pass on the day of their launch”. The message couldn’t be clearer! In any case, the company comes out a winner, since it increases its margins on physical games while encouraging players to subscribe to its subscription.

Xbox Series consoles and games: rising prices from 2023

So far, in the war against its major competitor Sony, Microsoft has a significant advantage: its prices. Indeed, the Japanese manufacturer recently increased the prices of its PS5 by 50 € : now, theclassic edition is at 550 € and the digital edition at €450. In comparison, the Xbox Series X is at 500 € and the Xbox Series S at €300. A big difference for video game enthusiasts. And the observation is the same on the Xbox Game Pass side! Already in 2020, when Sony had decided to move its games to its latest generation of consoles from 70 to 80 € – as well as Take-Two, Activision-Blizzard and Ubisoft –, Microsoft had maintained the original price. The firm finally ended up following the trend. Hoping that the prices of the consoles and the Xbox Game Pass do not follow…

In fact, if Microsoft had ensured that no increase in the prices of the Xbox Series X or Xbox Series S was planned, the firm may well review its judgment even further. Already at the end of October, Phil Spencer, the executive of Xbox Game Studios, had declared in a live interview with the Wall Street Journal that “we’ve held the price of our console, we’ve held the price of the games… and our subscription. I don’t think we can do that forever. I think at some point we’re going to have to raise the prices on some things…” To continue to make profits despite market trends and inflation, the firm must therefore raise its prices. Phil Specer added that “at With the end of the year holidays approaching, we thought it was important to maintain prices.” Microsoft therefore intends to keep the competitive advantage of its prices for the Christmas period – where a large part of the annual sales are made – to increase them from the beginning of 2023. A strategic announcement which implicitly encourages players and future players to rush on products and offers before the fateful increase arrives, while ensuring that many of them subsequently subscribe to the Xbox Game Pass, on which the firm is betting a lot.

Xbox Keystone: the abandoned cloud gaming console?

The weather is also spoiling on the side of Microsoft’s Cloud Gaming, an area that is very important for the American giant. Thus, the Xbox KeyStone, a small console designed solely for Xbox Cloud Gaming that was unveiled in June, was left out. She was notably spotted in a photo of Phil Spencer’s office. It was supposed to be devoid of a storage system and not to require a powerful processor, all the calculations and graphic processing being carried out by the powerful dedicated servers of Microsoft which are responsible for sending the images in real time, like simple videos.

the Xbox Game Studios executive said that while the prototype does exist, the firm has shelved the project for the time being. “Keystone is a project that we are working on internally. Last summer we changed course to work with Samsung. I still have the prototype… will we make a dedicated streaming terminal one day? We will, but not for years.” Microsoft therefore seems to be concentrating for the moment on partnerships, with the idea of ​​rolling out the software to as many non-Microsoft products as possible, such as with Samsung. A smart way to sell Xbox Game Pass subscriptions to a wider audience who might not necessarily have the console.

Xbox Game Pass: Microsoft’s winning formula

For now, Microsoft therefore seems to want to focus all its efforts on its Xbox Game Pass. With already more than 25 million users, Microsoft’s new service is very profitable since it represents nearly 15% of revenue for gaming content and services. As a reminder, this is a service launched in 2017 which provides access to an unlimited catalog of games for a monthly payment. Once the games are downloaded and installed, the player can enjoy them even offline. A particularly interesting offer when you know the prices of boxed games, especially since the Xbox catalog offers hundreds of titles, including blockbusters. But games are regularly added and removed from the catalog, with some titles then becoming inaccessible. This is the major drawback of this system, which is similar to rental. It is then necessary to buy them “in hard” to continue to play there. And, of course, as soon as the player unsubscribes, he no longer has access to any game!

Microsoft currently offers three plans for Xbox Game Pass:

• Xbox Game Pass for console : it offers access to a well-stocked catalog of games on console (on Xbox One and on Xbox Series S or Series X) as well as discounts and access to Xbox Game Studios games on the day of their release, all for a price of €9.99 per month.
• Xbox Game Pass for PC : it’s exactly the same offer, but for PC games, again for €9.99 per month.
• Xbox Game Pass Ultimate : it allows access to the multiplayer of paid games and offers special advantages – including in-game content and offers from partners – as well as access to the entire catalog on all platforms, including hundreds of games available for streaming from the cloud – the famous Cloud Gaming – for €12.99 per month.

Thus, the different subscriptions will satisfy players who have an Xbox console and/or a PC running Windows 10 or 11. But the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate also offers Cloud Gaming play on other platforms. A technology that could well be the future of video games, but still needs to be developed…

Xbox Cloud Gaming: Microsoft’s streaming game

The streaming game, offered in the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, takes up several principles of video or music on demand services – such as Netflix, Disney+, Amazon Prime, Deezer, Spotify, etc. – since, for a monthly subscription, the player has access to a catalog of video games. Then – and this is where it gets interesting –, as for VOD services, he can enjoy the games on different devices: game console, computer, but also smartphone, tablet or television! He can thus start a game on a fixed device, at home, and continue it on a mobile, on the train or the bus. Magical !

The device that supports the game – computer, console, TV, mobile… – calculates almost nothing: it is practically only used to display the images of the game which are calculated remotely, by specialized servers, and sent in real time. To simplify, the device serves only as a screen and as a control device. All heavy processing, which requires powerful processors, especially for graphics, is carried out remotely on the servers. To take advantage of Cloud Gaming, all you need is a fast Internet connection and a screen with controls: a computer, a box, a connected television, a smartphone or a tablet. No more waiting hours to download a new game! But even if it’s the server that does everything, you still have to limit the latency between the server and the player as much as possible since games are by nature interactive, unlike movies or music. This is why Cloud Gaming requires exemplary responsiveness since it is impossible to preload data, especially for online multiplayer games.

Microsoft Cloud Gaming: a blurry future

What to expect from Microsoft about game streaming? The firm continues to add titles to its catalog and relies heavily on its service. The meteoric growth of Xbox Game Pass is starting to slow on the console side. But the service is still experiencing strong growth on the PC supply side, with growth of 159%. On the Xbox Cloud Gaming side, it is currently limited only to the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate games catalog and access to Fortnite without subscription. Nevertheless, as announced at the What’s Next for Gaming event in 2022, Microsoft wants to further expand its Cloud Gaming. The firm notably has partnerships with various manufacturers of portable consoles – which are coming back into fashion –, such as the Logitech G Cloud and the Razer Edge. Note that since June, recent models of connected TVs sold by Samsung, as well as the Korean brand’s Neo QLED models – released in 2022 – have integrated an Xbox application. Other brands should receive it in the coming months. Be careful though, not all Xbox Store games are available to be played via the cloud. There is currently only a “selection” of compatible games.

On the competition side for streaming video games, Amazon’s Luna offer is accessible via its box, but Google has had to abandon Stadia. Compared to them, Microsoft has the advantage on its catalog of games, which is much richer. As for Sony, its PlayStation Plus offer is rather extensive for PS Plus Extra and Premium subscriptions. On the other hand, the PlayStation Plus Premium is too expensive for what it offers, because the retro gaming offer is too limited and Cloud Gaming only gives access to a limited selection of console or PC games, and no to smartphones, unlike Microsoft.