Last week, Microsoft announced a fifty percent price increase for their once legendary Game Pass subscription service. Any semblance of incredible consumer value that it held is now nothing but a distant memory.
This is the final step in the wholesale destruction of the Xbox console brand as we know it that began way back in early 2024. It started with the awkward announcement that four of their previously Xbox exclusive games would ship on the other platforms. Since then, the winding path of dismantling Xbox has included multiple console price hardware increases (beyond the scope of any tariffs or their competitors), the announcement that “everything is an Xbox” accompanied by some super expensive Asus handheld PCs that won’t play any Xbox games (out later this month), and the full-on closure of many celebrated development studios. That last one stings incredibly hard and is quite shocking in light of how much money Microsoft still brings in as a company.
But through it all, at least they still had Game Pass. It was supposed to be the “best deal in gaming,” offering Xbox and PC players an ever-growing library of third-party games alongside all of Microsoft’s first party development available “on day one.” That last feature was the first one to go, thanks to the arrival of premium “early access” editions that require an additional purchase for true day one play, even…
