MS is the one taking the risks and making the internal calculations of return, not the consumer."It's great for me as a consumer!"
Until you realize your purchasing habits have devalued the fuck out of the entire industry, and Microsoft will no longer take risks on big budget titles because people like you are out here bragging about only spending 1/10th the cost.
You are right about this. Which underscores how bad MS/Xbox leadership has been since the second half of the 360. Game Pass for them just makes the overall business of the division even more difficult. But in terms of game development and publishing... There is no hope for them.
Have you seen the state of Hollywood?
I'm not sure about any numbers, but the argument that the game was cheap was yours, you should have given an easy-to-check number, but you don't have the numbers and you disagree by a very large difference from the rumored numbers.
True. That's why Sony doesn't do Day One first party games even on the premium tier. They did an experiment with Forbidden West by putting it on extra early and determined they lost millions in sales from that.
I believe it was. In the case of Turn 10 I'm convinced it was. They were outputing games every 2 years before without fail. Gamepass comes along and they take near 7 years with delays then put out that crud in the end. Why? Because the studio was no longer fending for itself competing to sell games. It was merely getting a cut from gamepass money month after month and delays were just your scheduled quarter to release to prevent churn. all the past quarters paying subscribers were funding them while they released nothing. You could say "oh but that could have been prevented with better management if they pushed them to release games quicker even without this urgency. That's poor management". Possibly, but then why did they go on to promote the leader of Turn 10 as the new head of Xbox Game Studios? Failing upwards seems to have become a thing at xbox. There is no incentive for the studio heads to release faster because it's all months/engagement based. You wait longer, you get more subscription money. Before if you waited longer you get mounting costs with no sales. This affords them the luxury of being lazy as long as there is at least some game coming that prevents a mass exodus from Gamepass by subscribers.
GP IS day 1.
I said that it looks super cheap compared to all previous games, and it's very obvious when you're playing it, and pay attention to detail. I also said that it feels like the game costs significiantly less to develop than something like Halo 4.
Reality is that unsustainable deals can be great for consumers in the short term but they destroy long term creative viability. It's the exact same logic of cheering on Wal Mart for undercutting local business. You get cheap stuff today at the price of a monopolized hellscape tomorrow. When Microsoft uses its war chest to subsidize below-market rates it creates market distortions. Smaller studios face an impossible choice between accepting unfavorable terms to reach the game pass audience or competing against "free" for mind share. It's a loss leader strategy by MS designed to consolidate power.
Equating developers discussing sustainable pricing with "price collusion" is either disingenuous or economically illiterate. These are competing businesses expressing concern about a platform that effectively commoditizes their work. It's like farmers worrying about a grocery monopoly - not collusion, but collective alarm at systemic risk.
Larian competed on quality within traditional sales models, the exact opposite of a subscription service that trains audiences to value individual games at pennies, if anything at all. Complaining about a competitor making a good game is different from warning about a model that could make premium game development economically unviable.
This ignores basic realities of production costs and the time required to create quality. By this logic, we should celebrate if Amazon starts selling $5 steaks - who cares if it bankrupts ranchers and replaces beef with lab-grown slurry?
So Gamepass incentivizes studios to take their time and release later? Driving up costs?
People really need to get rid of this cancerous "Game pass" mentality, it's a detriment to the entire industry which is dependent on us *buying games*, especially when it comes to smaller devs like this one who aren't Square, CAPCOM, Ubisoft, Activision etc. Now, if it's not feasible to buy the game at the moment due to economic realities then I completely understand that, just say that or don't say anything at all. This isn't the "perfect Game pass game", it's the perfect game to buy right now and support the devs who put their blood, sweat and tears into it. As a bonus it's only $50 on console, I think it's even cheaper on PC
Your argument overlooks some important nuances:
They have problems with creative direction, not getting content made.
Content will be made regardless. the issue is that they are struggling to make a profit
Y'all are getting one guy'd by a single developer worried about his job. There are a litany of developers and studios who have praised Gamepass and what it does for their games.
Not having third parties on your subscription service is the goal. Renting content for your service is not ideal. Its costly and you can lose access to content has become a key part of your service over night.
you are doing what i call: "stepping on shit on purpose"
I think the model itself does encourage a laziness in studios they wouldn't have if their success or failure was more directly connected to their own work, rather than being diluted across the group.
Hasn't it already happened?
Those calculations are based on the behaviour of consumers, so consumers have a huge say in how a given market operates, if/when they care enough to do so.
I know, I was sarcastic there
.
While that helps, if the mass consumer mindset is not about buying games and waiting for games to join subscription service (which kinda makes sense if they are already paying $240 per year), even this strategy will not help.
Your point is completely valid and I respect it. But it is a personal principle, not a responsibility.
And Xbox continues to fail faster and faster each year.
Any day now.
If only it released on a big platform where Gamepass doesnt exist i bet it would have saved the game's sales.
Which is why 2 of the best selling games this year were on GP day 1, and even sold Best on a platform with GP.
I'm not suggesting it's bad for the consumer. Game pass is an amazing deal for anyone that uses it and if that's your preferred way to play then more power to you. I'm always playing catch up with games so I'm never paying full price. Different strokes and all that. What I was referring to were posters calling sour grapes when industry people question the viability of GP. Implying we should ignore them because the only reason they are saying anything is because they're losing their jobs or they should make better games to avoid closure. I believe tango games were held in high regard, even by Phil and co, but they still got the chop.
It doesn't really drive up costs because you have that income regardless based on time and not on studio sales to cover costs. So the costs getting out of hand without a release doesn't happen unless gamepass didn't meet numbers as a whole.
Yep but what has done this is the overall performance of gamepass not being able to sustain it and not incentivised time constraint on individual studios feeling pressure of needing to cover costs with a release and sales.
huh? already happened.
That's a good thing. If you're in Brazil or a third world country, Gamepass allows you to actually afford legally playing games. Otherwise, buying a single game is like 20 percent of the average persons salary.
Netflix has killed movie production... in the form of DVD sales. Cinema/ Box office is going strong because that experience simply cannot be replicated at home. Hence, why blockbusters are healthy as ever. Games do not have that luxury, their profit comes from disc sales/digital sales which is what Gamepass eats up on the platform it releases.
July 03, 2025.July 02, 2025.
Laid of >10% of their workforce.
Game pass for a year is still cheaper than two new releases.
