One thing I read (a lot, oddly) is that GamePass is ‘really popular’/the most popular ‘subscription’ service, but I have never met anyone who uses it.
I checked the numbers of people using GamePass, and it seems the numbers have gone:
2021 - 23 million
2022 - 25 million
2023 - there was a brief post on linkedin saying 30 million, but it was removed.
If even the most popular service is struggling to pass 30 million users, how exactly is Ubisoft going to compete? There’s what, 120 million people with Xbox subscriptions, and they can barely get 1/4 of them to use GamePass?
It’s interesting to watch ‘AAA’ studios absolutely faceplanting every year now, hopefully we can make a full indie-sweep soon.
The reason people I know tend to give for not using GamePass is you’re essentially paying for demos (which still exist on PC pretty often. I just bought Roboquest because of the demo.)
EDIT: Also, $12/month is a huge amount of money for me to spend on something like that. Just shy of 150/year for games that aren’t good enough to own, but are good enough to play, doesn’t strike me as valuable.
2 other people play on my account from sub accounts on the console. They each play multiple games per month. $12 is less than $60, so even a single new game each month saves me money.
Paying for demos? I’m not sure why you think there aren’t any good games on there. Halo, Starfield, Fallout, Cities Skylines, Forza, Mass Effect, Tomb Raider, Far Cry, Assassins Creed, Yakuza, Dead Space, blah blah blah.
And that’s not including all the smaller games my kids have found. Human Fall Flat, Rubber Bandits, Donut County, Frog Detective are all games we found that we otherwise would never have spent money on.
I don’t support subscription only models, but that doesn’t mean some aspects aren’t a good value.
If the games stayed I’d check it out, but having a game for a few months isn’t something I find value in, which tends to be what people I’ve spoken with about it. Especially since you don’t choose the games.
Also, seriously the PC app is absolutely awful. The games work worse on it than on steam. It crashes, has terrible performance, and break installs constantly.
You also can’t mod a lot of these games, which particularly on PC is a pretty large missing piece.
That’s also not to mention the cost has doubled in two years.
You’re allowed to enjoy it, but I think it’s also clear why it isn’t taking off.
My issue with getting into indie gaming is I have no idea where to start. I always end up with some frantic platformer that doesn’t do anything for me. But I just want games that aren’t a mess on release and everyone says to go indie.
I just go by reviews, usually from people I know. The only real difference between AA/A and Indie titles now really is marketing budget and size of team. Not much else is different. You also run into issues about what counts as indie now: it used to mean without a publisher, but it seems to have morphed into ‘a smaller company.’
But yeah, just look up reviews. Games like FTL, Hades, and so on tend to become known by word of mouth.
One thing I read (a lot, oddly) is that GamePass is ‘really popular’/the most popular ‘subscription’ service, but I have never met anyone who uses it.
I checked the numbers of people using GamePass, and it seems the numbers have gone:
2021 - 23 million
2022 - 25 million
2023 - there was a brief post on linkedin saying 30 million, but it was removed.
If even the most popular service is struggling to pass 30 million users, how exactly is Ubisoft going to compete? There’s what, 120 million people with Xbox subscriptions, and they can barely get 1/4 of them to use GamePass?
It’s interesting to watch ‘AAA’ studios absolutely faceplanting every year now, hopefully we can make a full indie-sweep soon.
I use gamepass. I’ve definitely saved money with the amount of games my household has played.
I buy games I really like and just try them on gamepass.
The reason people I know tend to give for not using GamePass is you’re essentially paying for demos (which still exist on PC pretty often. I just bought Roboquest because of the demo.)
EDIT: Also, $12/month is a huge amount of money for me to spend on something like that. Just shy of 150/year for games that aren’t good enough to own, but are good enough to play, doesn’t strike me as valuable.
2 other people play on my account from sub accounts on the console. They each play multiple games per month. $12 is less than $60, so even a single new game each month saves me money.
Paying for demos? I’m not sure why you think there aren’t any good games on there. Halo, Starfield, Fallout, Cities Skylines, Forza, Mass Effect, Tomb Raider, Far Cry, Assassins Creed, Yakuza, Dead Space, blah blah blah.
And that’s not including all the smaller games my kids have found. Human Fall Flat, Rubber Bandits, Donut County, Frog Detective are all games we found that we otherwise would never have spent money on.
I don’t support subscription only models, but that doesn’t mean some aspects aren’t a good value.
If the games stayed I’d check it out, but having a game for a few months isn’t something I find value in, which tends to be what people I’ve spoken with about it. Especially since you don’t choose the games.
Also, seriously the PC app is absolutely awful. The games work worse on it than on steam. It crashes, has terrible performance, and break installs constantly.
You also can’t mod a lot of these games, which particularly on PC is a pretty large missing piece.
That’s also not to mention the cost has doubled in two years.
You’re allowed to enjoy it, but I think it’s also clear why it isn’t taking off.
My issue with getting into indie gaming is I have no idea where to start. I always end up with some frantic platformer that doesn’t do anything for me. But I just want games that aren’t a mess on release and everyone says to go indie.
I just go by reviews, usually from people I know. The only real difference between AA/A and Indie titles now really is marketing budget and size of team. Not much else is different. You also run into issues about what counts as indie now: it used to mean without a publisher, but it seems to have morphed into ‘a smaller company.’
But yeah, just look up reviews. Games like FTL, Hades, and so on tend to become known by word of mouth.
All my friends have it. They just want to play the game once and move on
All of my cousins and friends have this, becaude they don’t care if they own the games.
I think.that most peple like it, I don’t have ultimate, because I.like to own my games.