Xbox Reportedly 'Exploring Potential' For Various New Game Pass Tiers

Ugh, what a mess!

Please make it stop 😭

It shouldn't be this hard to pick ONE pricing structure and stick with it. The FTC was right.

They need a cheap cloud only tier but it should also give you access to everything on the cloud and not a select few.

Give me back Game Pass Console with Day 1 games, Microsoft.

Just add a “random” tier where every day the cost and benefits change.

How can we complicate GP tiers even further? I know…🙄

We've needed a family and friends tier for years now, come MS! I'd buy it!

@CutchuSlow Agreed. A cloud only teir makes sense given the recent Fire Stick support, but beyond that, the incessant tinkering just makes it look like they don't have confidence in thier product, and don't know what they're doing with it.

And I’m sure that whatever they do somehow will end up with us console users getting screwed over again.

@WhiteRabbit Nope. "Tears" is 110% correct.

@WhiteRabbit Take my upvote and get outta here! Ha

Speaking of confusion. Why does PC get its own tier?

If it was up to me Gamepass would have two options:
Exclusive (with only first party titles) and Ultimate (as is today).
Both tiers would get games on day 1 and the same discounts in the store.

I could consider a third tier for cloud gaming only (both 1st and 3rd party)...

Oh, and online play should be free.

They can stick cloud based right up there a****.
and the same goes for ad based as well.

3 different tiers is the absolute max they can do. I'm actually surprised a cloud only tier hasn't been introduced thus far, I'd definitely consider it if it included day one releases

Can't wait to see the lunacy of the FTC respond to these cheaper tiers.

Or you know, maybe put that time and effort into getting some of those games not coming to XBox a reality.

Not into this at all next new tier will have a complimentary enema so your nice and clean for them to screw you harder next time nice of them wouldn't you say?

They’ve need a cloud tier since like forever. I would gladly subbed to that to play games on my iPhone and iPad. Buying ultimate has always been a waste of money for me since I don’t have an Xbox and I don’t use the Xbox app on PC (Steam forever!!!!)

Game Pass tears. We all have many, many Game Pass tears. Far too many now....

Much as I'm against too many price packages, I think they actually DO need to break out cloud. Right now it serves no one. Ultimate customers aren't really the target customer for cloud streaming, if you're buying Ultimate you probably have console, or PC, or most likely console AND PC. You're probably not too interested in cloud. If you're interested in cloud, you probably don't have a console, OR a gaming PC, and aren't interested in any of what it offers, you just want cloud. This isn't hard. Cloud should have been its own sub and always should have. Additionally, console full day 1 game pass without PC and without cloud should have been available - not having that is a huge signal that console doesn't matter.

PC should be PC.
Cloud should be cloud.
Console should be console.

If they want ultimate then they can have ultimate with all 3 and no sane person should buy it because realistically who's playing on all 3 regularly?

It's all reminiscent of Windows Vista Home, Pro, and Ultimate. If you want media features you buy Home. If you want security features, large RAM support, or quad core CPU support you buy Pro. If you want meda AND large ram quad core you need Ultimate. Basically everyone needs Ultimate and the other options exist just to make the single all in one flat price look like a "bargain."

@WhiteRabbit Ah. Didn't think about that. I know free online play wont happen but I'd just love to see it.

Ughhhhh. I'm so tired of Xbox. I just want to play my games, but like an addict I keep coming back to see what other lame ideas MS has.

@WhiteRabbit I think it's doable in a Microsoft way.

So you can have a cloud only tier, that you must buy ultimate, then go into the settings, disable cloud and console, then log in on a PC and activate your subscription, then submit a request to change to cloud only. After you confirm the change on both PC and console (you must own an Xbox Series S or Xbox Series X linked to your account to approve this request) you can then convert from Game Pass Ultimate to Game Pass Cloud, the price change will appear on your statement as of the next monthly billing cycle.

Is that better and much more practical for Microsoft to do? Will Phil hire me now?

Microsoft have been confusing us for years. First there was the Xbox 360 which certainly wasn't the 360th Xbox revision. Then the Xbox One. Ahem. You mean 3? Then Kinect. Gaming = watching TV... Game Pass. No it's not just one game, but many. So you mean Games Pass? Cloud gaming. Multi-tiered Games Pass where the goal posts were moved and now they want to not only pull down my undies, but rip them off and eat them in front of me. Nom Nom

This is exactly why I stopped subscribing to Ultimate. I literally do not care about the games, but love playing the cloud on my Steam Deck. I will jump on this day one!

Make better 1st party games, and release them in a timely manner. That is literally all we EVER asked for. No one asked for ANY of this, and let's be honest: they still haven't given us what we did.

Well I personally took advantage of loading 3 years of Xbox Gold and waiting for the offer and for $1 it was converted to 2 years of Game Pass Ultimate. So I have Ultimate until 2025. Still might grab a Xbox Gold 1 year which should extend my Ultimate, not sure now long but it might be worth it.

Ads tier to eventually push the prices up of bigger tiers or to give cheaper options?

All I hear on Reddit is that the cloud based isn't the best regardless of what connection you have so would it not be beneficial to not get the cloud based one?

They put ad tiers in most streaming services now and tbh it will probably go to all services one day one way or the other.

@WhiteRabbit But 5 purified souls of sacrificed maidens, 3 putrefied imp hearts specifically from the banks of the river Styx, 7 truths from gaming executives, and 1 MSRP 4090 are almost IMPOSSIBLE to gather! I can get the souls and hearts easy enough but the rest, I don't think that's even possible! And I STILL can't find the corrupted soil on which to build the summoning circle. I'm sure it's somewhere on the MSDN. Surely there must be another way!

@Mustoe not once have I "shilled" for microsoft on an ftc related post. Being critical of the incompetence of the FTC and us gov is a completely different thing.

You seem to be confusing my disdain for the ftc as praise for MS.

How about an option to pay the same as before but without the Activision games.

They literally have nothing that interests me that I hadn't already bought.

People ask for more content, value, and options then we all complain when we get it. We’re all getting what we asked for with more premium content, more subscription options, and easier barrier to entry…

People really want to start an uproar in these comments over having multiple options which should be the consumer friendly method?

@Stormrage995 Nobody asked for a 25%-50% price increase in a year. Value was not added

I miss Xbox Live.

@Mustoe Some of us actually don't mind Microsoft trying new things. Go figure. It's like the comment sections on here actively wants Microsoft's gaming division to put itself out of business.

I mean if we really want ways to screw ourselves as customers over.

Ad tier, Retro tier, modern tier, online tier, game genre tiers, themed tiers (like they have for their different sales of anime, publisher, movie games, different settings, etc.), cloud tier, resolution 720p to 8K tiers, I could come up with any stupid ones and I mean any are possible and ridiculous. XD

A theme park like presentation tier or any other kind of fancy thing but that takes a bit of UI/other developing then probably needed.

I mean if Bethesda Land or whatever the E3 thing or Rare Replay's intro scene was like applying a more fancy way to present a service would be something for all the new games, that or maybe mixing the upcoming type videos in there? Or something like that.

Rather than just me turning on my Xbox One X, getting a notification, ignoring it and as not a subscriber doesn't benefit me. Keep it to subscribers or those that look up the service/need an ad to show them on their dashboard than people not interested.

Whichever are practical I don't know for sure. Anything could be as complicated as TV packages of family, documentary, sci-fi, sports, whatever and apply it to a gaming subscription service. Or a TV/movie streaming service.

@Mustoe
Same here.
I got my PS5 for all my online gaming needs with ps essentials.
The S/X is for some of the offline and single player games, plus B/C gaming.
Works great for me.

A cloud-only tier seems a good idea. The only way to have Cloud Gaming today is subscribing to ultimate.

Ad-based might interest some people too.

PureXbox comment sections is becoming worse each day filled with Xbox Haters with fake concerns and 'confusion'.

@VoidPunk thanks for the laugh that was pretty funny!

Its like they said well we paid all these lawyers tons of cash for the abk merger but the ftc was comically inept. Time to make em earn their money somewhere else just keep adding small print and exclusions until those billable hours we prepaid for are used up.

I dont really see the family plan as a "new tier" that should be lumped in with cloud only or ad supported, which are clearly new tiers. It's just more of an existing tier, discounted.

That said I'd explore the family plan down the road when my kids are older, however it needs to be cheaper than 2 gamepass ultimate subs, which can currently be game shared into a DIY 4 person family plan. My wife have been game sharing Xbox subs forever. Or of course if they ever nuke game sharing...

Absolutely amazing. You mean they released that Amazon Firestick addition without a plan? Incredible. And do they plan on giving Cloud gamers Day One games, do you think? Us console owners who spent ~$500 for a Series X are second class to them, so I wouldn't be surprised if Cloud gamers get better benefits.

Meanwhile they're also letting their lead marketer cry about no budget, while still creating special edition consoles and controllers they refuse to sell. Instead they keep doing sweepstakes and it doesn't seem like any winners really come out and announce they won anywhere. So I'm not sure what the point is for them. Fantastic. And after spending $70B for a major group of studios? Brilliant job.

It's almost fascinating to watch a gaming console company that's been in the game this long fumble and mess up every step of the way, this gen. I may buy their games (I can't say no to Doom) but I will never trust Xbox enough to buy another console from them. They've completely burnt their brand to the ground, imo. Go third party or go PC.

Just release a family and friends plan already!