Business aspects of Subscription Game Libraries [Xbox GamePass, PSNow]

[Silent_Buddha]

Why get rid of xbox ?

View attachment 9633

MS is just now entering a postion to really drive sales for xbox

Interesting to look at that, Microsoft's greater reliance on PC income mitigates the sunk hardware cost of having to have a console for each gamer that buys a console. IE - the larger the share of PC gamers, the greater the profit margin. Additionally anyone that buys a console is more likely to buy 3rd party games there (no PC player needs to get a console for the exclusives) which further helps to offset the cost to provide console hardware.

For Nintendo it's even better as they make the largest profit margin off of their hardware of the 3 console makers. IE - hardware sales don't impact profit margins nearly as much as it does for Sony or even MS. So it doesn't hurt them much if someone only buys their hardware for the exclusives because the hardware is also generating a large profit margin.

For Sony, PC gamers who only buy a PS5 for exclusives and nothing else, really hurt their profit margins as there is no additional high margin revenue generation from 3rd party game sales to offset the high cost of having to provide hardware with little to no profit margin.

Regards,
SB

 

[pharma]

Crunchyroll brings console games to mobile with new subscription service - KitGuru

The mobile gaming market has been an increasing focus for many companies in recent years, in particu

www.kitguru.net

Making the announcement on their blog, the Crunchyroll team said “Your Crunchyroll membership just leveled up! Announced today, Crunchyroll is officially opening its Crunchyroll Game Vault for Mega and Ultimate Fan members, delivery (sic) unlimited access to a constantly growing library of mobile games, kicking off today with River City Girls, inbento, Wolfstride and more.”
...
As we have seen with Netflix, Crunchyroll is actually bringing full-blown console games to the service, with a mobile port of the popular side-scrolling arcade-styled beat ‘em up River City Girls being included from launch.

While a small list of titles, it is exciting to see that more console games are finding their way onto mobile platforms – even if it is through a subscription service.

 

[pharma]

Xbox spends over $1 Billion a year to bring titles to Game Pass - KitGuru

Ever since Xbox Game Pass was first introduced, the game subscription service has become Microsoft’s

www.kitguru.net

“We have a service that is financially viable, meaning it makes money, in Game Pass. We've put a lot of money into the market, over a billion dollars a year supporting third-party games coming into Game Pass. What we see in Game Pass is a service that supports all kinds of games, from the biggest games, to the unknown indie games that you didn't know you would love until you played it. If you're an individual publisher, you really have to think about ‘how do you get everybody playing my game.'”
...
Spencer continued, “I think a lot of the publishers are naturally drawn to making games that are big hit games, as big as possible. We want to do that as well, of course. But because we have a platform, and we have a subscription service, having people play more and stay engaged on the platform, frankly, regardless of the types of games they're playing, is a very viable part of our strategy.”

While we have been privy to some details surrounding the cost of bringing 3rd party titles to Game Pass in the past (thanks to leaks as part of the aforementioned ABK acquisition), this statement seems to be the first time that Spencer has given a direct and official figure regarding the money spent for such deals.

 

[Johnny Awesome]

Well over time I expect they'll be able to get $200 per year per subscriber (ie. $15 per month plus MTX) so $6 billion with just 30 million users. If they spend $1 billion on 3rd party and have 30 dev teams each working on a $200 million AAA game and one $100 million AA game every 6 years or so, that's another $1.5 billion. Then $1.5 billion on delivery/cloud infrastructure maybe. $2 billion profit from 30 million users and a plan to grow to 60 million or even a 100 million users, especially with 5 AAA and 5 AA 1st party games coming every year once they get going.

 

[pharma]

Baldur’s Gate 3 Won’t Come to Game Pass as Larian Believes They Charge a “Fair Price” For It

Baldur's Gate 3 is now on Xbox Series X/S, but does that mean a Game Pass release is in the cards? Not so fast, says Larian.

wccftech.com

 

[Johnny Awesome]

It'll be interesting to see if they stick to that.

 

[AlphaWolf]

It'll be interesting to see if they stick to that.

At some point the math will probably make sense for them.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Well, MS finally made it happen.

Apple is finally allowing Xbox Game Pass streaming on the App Store — this is a huge deal

Get ready to stream games inside iOS and iPadOS apps

www.tomsguide.com

Game Pass Streaming coming to the iOS app store.

Regards,
SB

 

[Johnny Awesome]

Interesting. Will you just be able to use xCloud on your iPhone? How does Apple get paid? Does MS have a separate GP for Apple where Apple gets a 30% cut?

 

[cheapchips]

Sarah Bond announced on their business update that they've reached 34 Gamepass subscribers. After that they've said that not every Gamepass subscriber is getting Diablo 4, so it sounds like they've bundled Core in with those 34m. That's technically correct then, but a bit misleading with regards to growth since they last gave a figure.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Xbox Game Pass now has 34 million ‘fully paid’ subscribers | VGC

Phil Spencer says the most growth is being seen on PC…

www.videogameschronicle.com

However, in an interview for journalist Stephen Totilo’s Game File newsletter, Xbox head Phil Spencer elaborated more on the figure, noting that it isn’t simply counting players on free trials or other promotional deals.

“That’s fully paid,” Spencer explained. “So those are not promotional players. Those are people, fully paid subs.”

“...So we’re seeing really significant growth on PC, which is great, and cloud.”

Sarah Bond announced on their business update that they've reached 34 Gamepass subscribers. After that they've said that not every Gamepass subscriber is getting Diablo 4, so it sounds like they've bundled Core in with those 34m. That's technically correct then, but a bit misleading with regards to growth since they last gave a figure.

What was the last figure counting?

Edit: From EG commenter:

"It’s important to note this 34m includes Game Pass Core members so it’s not directly comparable to the previous 25m number which didn’t include those Xbox live Gold subs under the previous system."

So when XBL Gold became GPCore, those XBL subscribers became GP subscribers and increased this number, making growth very difficult to discern?

 

[cheapchips]

Xbox Game Pass now has 34 million ‘fully paid’ subscribers | VGC

Phil Spencer says the most growth is being seen on PC…

www.videogameschronicle.com

What was the last figure counting?

Core was still Gold when they reported the they reported the 25m figure, back in 2022. That would have been GP, GP PC and GPU.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

What are the actual comparable numbers then? Is the 25 and 34 broadly comparable?

 

[cheapchips]

What are the actual comparable numbers then? Is the 25 and 34 broadly comparable?

You'd have to know how many Gold subscribers there were left back in 2022. They'd have converted a good chunk of them to GP already by then. If it was more than 9m still on Gold then they're not doing so well!

 

[Nesh]

I was having a discussion with a friend lately who owns an XBOX and he told me it is not at all a good deal for him and if you are someone who's only activity in life is NOT videogames.

And he has a point. Let's say you are someone who is interested in normal to big size games in longevity to finish and you only have a few hours to play a day.

A game like Starfield for example requires hundreds of hours to finish. By the time someone like him finishes this game and wants to start and finish another, the price he paid for GP is like paying for the game itself if not more, with the catch that he doesn't own it at all compared to, if he bought it and could finish it whenever he wanted.

With Netflix, the content can be viewed in a matter of few hours before you consume another. Videogames on the other hand are different.

He went through the list of available games, picking the ones he was interested in, calculating the time to finish, how much he would have paid for them if bought vs the GP installments and renting vs owning them, he just couldn't see it as a good value proposal.

By the time he finishes with a game he started, the newer game he was interested in is not as new anymore and he can get it discounted anyways and finish it at his leisure without being pressured by GP monthly periods

GP is a good value proposal if
a) you play many many hours
b) you play smaller scale games and/or many many games per year
c)Once a new game you are interested in is day 1 on game pass, you aren't in the middle of another game, therefore you can start playing it at a smaller entry point level compared to paying full price at launch.

Edit: A good statistic would have been to collect how many games each subscribers played, which games and how many did they finish during their subscription.

 

[pharma]

Not sure if applicable but involves Sony subscription service ...

Funimation is shutting down — and taking your digital library with it

If you’re a legacy subscriber, your new subscription will increase.

www.theverge.com

To make matters worse, Crunchyroll won’t support the digital copies redeemed through Funimation. This promotion allowed users to redeem digital copies of a Funimation Blu-ray or DVD they purchased, giving them the ability them to store and view the show or movie through the streaming service. Funimation said users could keep the copies “forever” — but that’s clearly not the case now.

According to Funimation’s support page, Crunchyroll “does not currently support Funimation Digital copies, which means that access to previously available digital copies will not be supported.” In other words, all those digital copies are going away, too, which is a massive bummer for anyone who purchased — and later sold — eligible DVDs or Blu-rays, hoping to store the digital copies on Funimation forever.

The writing has been on the wall for Funimation for quite some time. When Sony acquired Crunchyroll in 2021, it made plans to combine Crunchyroll and Funimation into a single streaming service. After that, Crunchyroll inherited a huge library of content from Funimation — but Funimation remained online, while still adding episodes of continuing series. We didn’t know when Funimation was going to shut down until now.

 

[Johnny Awesome]

I was having a discussion with a friend lately who owns an XBOX and he told me it is not at all a good deal for him and if you are someone who's only activity in life is NOT videogames.

That's wrong.

GP is a good value proposal if
a) you play many many hours

Not that many, really. I played 262 hours (around 5 hours a week), which isn't really that much. That's about 5 full length games which would have cost $300 and the service only cost me $120. Great deal even for a casual player.

b) you play smaller scale games and/or many many games per year

Well, last year I played Personal 3, Persona 4, Persona 5, A Plague Tale 2, MLB The Show 23, Forza Motorsport, Sea of Stars, Age of Empires IV, Starfield, and Lies of P. Diablo IV would have been there as well had the merger gone through quicker. Not exactly smaller scale games. Played some smaller ones too like Hi-Fi Rush but won't name them all.

In other words, if you barely game, GP isn't for you. But if you even like 3 major releases per year you'll probably find a lot of value for your $120.

TLDR: If you only game 2 hours per week in one game then GP isn't for you.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

That's wrong.

It's not necessarily wrong.

Or to put it another way, both of you are wrong if either of you are making claims in terms of a blanket absolute...

Obviously his friend is correct in saying it's not good for him as it's his opinion.

The statement that it's not good for "someone who's only activity in life is NOT videogames." is fine as an opinion, but obviously false as a blanket statement. As is claiming that he was false in saying that. It's truth value as an opinion is immaterial as it can be either false or true depending on personal circumstances. That also means it's obviously false as a blanket absolute ... because it can be true or false depending on personal circumstances.

It's a case by case thing. For some people who game infrequently, GP might be bad value. If we look at his example, someone playing the same game for months and months, GPU may not be great value if they don't play any other games while playing that one game.

OTOH - for someone like me (I only game maybe 1-2 hours a day, 2 or 3 days a week), it's fantastic value because I'm not looking to finish a game necessarily (I don't have time to do that). Instead, I'm looking to experience many games. Buying those games would be absolutely horrible value (60-70 USD to play a game for 1-4 hours and then dropping it is not good value). Playing them on GP on the other hand allows me to experience hundreds of dollars worth of games without spending hundreds of dollars. It doesn't matter if I can or can't finish them (I can't due to time constraints).

So, games right now are extremely low priority for me which makes GP absolutely fantastic value because I want to at least get a taste of all of these games coming out.

OTOH, if I was like his friend that plays only one game at a time for months on end, then GP may not be a great value.

Regards,
SB

 

[arandomguy]

It seems like it would also have to be dependent on the types of games you play and how many intersect with Game Pass as well. You could be someone who plays a lot of different games and games a lot, but if those games (or many) don't happen to be on Game Pass then you wouldn't get value either.

But I do think Game Pass value is there also for opportunistic gamers. I know enthusiasts tend to more so think a long the lines of they have specific games in mind they want to play but I'm willing to bet a lot of people are fine being opportunistic gamers. That means Game Pass doesn't need to have all the games people want but they just need enough "good enough" and interesting games to capture attention and be enough gaming for them. Not everyone who games these days are really "gamers" in the traditional sense, gaming is just another form of hobby/entertainment for them and you can game just like you'd in past channel flip/surf on say TV.

 

[Johnny Awesome]