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[DJ12]

According to Phil Spencer, Microsoft isn't losing money on Gamepass. Subscriber money is all you need to develop 70 dollar games. Would likely work for Sony too, but Jimbo still believes in retail money.

This again....

No he didn't.

But keep spreading this fallacy if you like, not getting into it again.

 

[Topher]

....By creating a second tier that has more than PS+ and PS Now as it exists?

I dont know what you didn't understand.

They could have taken this third tier and made it the second tier and only other tier while combing PS+ and PS Now as the base tier.

As the tiers are now, its garbage.

And what is this second tier supposed to have if PS+ and PS Now are combined into the base tier?

 

[OmegaSupreme]

According to Phil Spencer, Microsoft isn't losing money on Gamepass. Subscriber money is all you need to develop 70 dollar games. Would likely work for Sony too, but Jimbo still believes in retail money.

Going to need a fact check on that one there.

 

[DaGwaphics]

They added PS1 games and PS5 game trials for the $120/year.

Or ditch the old games and streaming, pay $100/year and still get hundreds of PS4/5 games.

Its nothing that great but its objectively a better deal than before.

I am interested to see what PS1 games they add. I have a harder time playing 3D games prior to ps360 unless there is some nostalgia there (those old games had some jank), hoping for some old favorites.

 

[Synless]

I’ll have to see the emulation on this. Xbox really led the way with its resolution and frame rates on legacy games. Only thing it lacked was overall library of those legacy games.

 

[Papacheeks]

No they don’t. Only shady sites do. They’ve been gone for a while.

Give me those shady sites, i use CD keys a lot and honestly they deliver every time and have no issues with Keys for steam or any other platform including PSN. If its so shady then why have they not been shut down? They get second hand keys but also buy keys, because they do preorders for unreleased games as well. SO they must be getting them legally some how. Regardless if they are buying keys from third party, those keys were put out by publisher/Developer.

Green Man Gaming is legit, so is humble bundle. CD keys i mean I'll ride it out until they are shut down.

 

[jaysius]

Base Plus is already $70 CND there's a $10 VIG that doesn't flex with our dollar improving or weakening so the best tier will probably be like $22 CND/MONTH... !

"Time limited game trials" are now a "perk" of the most expensive tier JESUS SONY so generous with those perks! That used to be something that was included in PLUS a long time ago.

 

[Dr.Morris79]

PlayStation 1 games. Good lord that's all I need! I must see the library of games though! Don't let me down, Jim!

I'd rather they just let me play my fucking PS1 library i've already paid for, the wankers.

 

[Jimmy_liv]

Meh.... What's the point.

 

[ethomaz]

They're definitely heading towards day one releases. I'm ignoring all denials, explanations for why it just can't work for Playstation's "special" games. It's all nonsense.

Sony will adopt the movie theater release followed by digital/streaming availability model that's currently used for movies. They may try to make that window larger at first, but it's coming. Jim Ryan saying he sees live service games as their own subscription is pretty much a tipping of his hand on where they will go.

It is not you can’t have day one releases.

It just you can’t have 4 $200 million releases per year in a service on day one… Sony usually releases at least 4 first-parry titles per year.

Now if you decrease your development budget or the number of releases you can have it.

 

[Knightime_X]

Cool downloadable games behind a paywall.

It's a good thing you can't buy these games individually.

*yawn*

 

[DaGwaphics]

Give me those shady sites, i use CD keys a lot and honestly they deliver every time and have no issues with Keys for steam or any other platform including PSN. If its so shady then why have they not been shut down? They get second hand keys but also buy keys, because they do preorders for unreleased games as well. SO they must be getting them legally some how. Regardless if they are buying keys from third party, those keys were put out by publisher/Developer.

Green Man Gaming is legit, so is humble bundle. CD keys i mean I'll ride it out until they are shut down.

There can be some issues sometimes with stolen keys from impoverished markets, but overall I've never had a problem with it either.

Most of the keys are just people buying the keys when they are on sale and reselling after the sale expires. Like how everybody grabbed those free Fallen Order keys and then dumped them on the key sites for $2.

 

[Killer8]

Seems pretty worthless to me. No day one first party games like on Game Pass. I already played all the games they are hyping like Death Stranding and God of War. My Xbox Series X will play PSP and PS1 games better via emulation. The PS3 games are fucking streaming, even though PS5 could likely handle emulation if RPCS3 is anything to go by. About the only thing i'm interested in is how well it runs PS2 games, and whether our old purchases in the PS3 gen will be playable and not locked behind a paywall (doubt it).

 

[tusharngf]

its a rework i guess...

 

[DJ12]

Going to need a fact check on that one there.

He thinks because Phil said gamepass is sustainable, it means its not losing money.

 

[adamsapple]

Going to need a fact check on that one there.

“I know there's a lot of people that like to write [that] we're burning cash right now for some future pot of gold at the end,” Spencer said. “No. Game Pass is very, very sustainable right now as it sits. And it continues to grow.”

Microsoft's Phil Spencer reflects on 20 years of Xbox

Phil Spencer talks highs, lows and where Xbox goes next.

www.axios.com

He thinks because Phil said gamepass is sustainable, it means its not losing money.

The sustainable line comes right after he says no to burning cash like people like to write online.

 

[Saucy Papi]

So are the PS3 games the native version or are they at least being touched up through emulation, albeit via the cloud? I can't find any answers on this. I would hope it's like NSO where the games are improved.

 

[ethomaz]

Cool downloadable games behind a paywall.

It's a good think you can't buy these games individually.

*yawn*

You will probably can buy them standalone without paywall.
All PSNow games can be brought individually.

That means that PS5 emulation for PS1 and PS2 will be released in few months.

 

[CosmicComet]

Im 100% sure of what I’m saying. You believing me or not doesn’t change what is going to happen and I couldn’t care less. It is what it is.

I will certainly quote you later when this doesn't happen.

You didn't understand the tiers at all and jumped to make a claim that was completely false. Probably based on a hope of what would happen.

Middle tier will only have a 15-20% upgrade rate from base. Count on it.

And what is this second tier supposed to have if PS+ and PS Now are combined into the base tier?

...What the third tier has now. Seriously can you read what I'm saying?

 

[Diddy X]

I see PS already has its Gamepass but why they don't advertise it as much, or it seems like nobody cares.

 

[OmegaSupreme]

Microsoft's Phil Spencer reflects on 20 years of Xbox

Phil Spencer talks highs, lows and where Xbox goes next.

www.axios.com

The sustainable line comes right after he says no to burning cash like people like to write online.

Sustainable is not the same as profitable. Of course, it's sustainable. It's MS. If they were making any money they would say so.

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

It was up 7 million in one year, it's growing faster every year, not at the same rate.

But normalized it has been 5 million per year; growth exploded in 2020 due to C19 lockdowns but slowed in 2021.

That's before we even think about Activision and all the stuff we know is coming in the future (Bethesda games, Fable etc).

TBH I'm not 100% convinced many of the big Activision games (COD, WoW potentially) or even some of the big Zenimax sequels will go to GamePass Day 1. For COD in particular there's no business reason to do so. They would be giving up guaranteed sales revenue & profit and potentially compromise sales on other platforms like PS and Nintendo for a possibly modest growth in GP subs (particularly those who stay subbed the whole year) and less money, would that be best for them as a company to do?

They'll probably definitely do exclusive maps, skins, weapons etc. with COD through GP subs, stuff like that. Add the older games to the service, too. But Day 1 for new CODs is not happening.

Elden Scrolls VI alone will be enough to bring a lot of people into the fold. 100m is just a sample figure anyway, nobody here knows what they have to reach to be happy and that equation will be unfathomably complicated with every factor at play. But that will naturally include things like (as an example, may not happen) rolling WoW subscriptions into Game Pass. They're all-in on it, they've made that very clear by now.

TES6 will definitely bring in some attention, but it could also have a more mute effect like Halo Infinite is having now, really depends on how Starfield hits. Halo should be doing a lot better than it is right now, they'd be seeing steady big monthly growth if it was. But, 343i have completely dropped the ball (again), hopefully there are some massive changes going forward because they need to be much better at keeping a consistent update pipeline of content & features.

I don't see how they roll over WoW subs without an extra tier; that game already brings in 4 million - 6 million a month at $15. That's 1/4 the number of GamePass subs paying $15 a month for a single game. Do you sacrifice that by rolling them into GamePass at no extra cost, or would it be better to add a $20/month tier that includes WoW or a cut-down version of WoW?

Point is whether it takes 5 years, 10 years, 20 years, it will be sustainable, and video games aren't going anywhere fast.

No, they aren't going anywhere you're right about that. But the industry will keep evolving. What if things trend away from everything being driven by subscription services? What if the subscription services market collapses due to fragmentation and eventually offering no real value savings for people who might need to sub to multiple services to get the content they could've simply purchased individually before? What if that collapse is spurred by less incentive to put games on discount sales prices at traditional intervals, offering net negative value to users who might've purchased multiple games at a discount a little ways after launch, because those publishers then want people to sub to their service for those games?

A lot of companies want to genuinely believe game subscription/streaming services are the future but they might be surprised if the core market ultimately rejects it due to things like those I just mentioned above. And these companies still need the hardcore/core market to support this stuff for it to actually work, or at least get off the ground in a stable way.

 

[Knightime_X]

You will probably can buy them standalone without paywall.
All PSNow games can be brought individually.

That means that PS5 emulation for PS1 and PS2 will be released in few months.

But its still psnow
No thanks.
I want to be able to download w/o needing to stream.

 

[adamsapple]

Sustainable is not the same as profitable. Of course, it's sustainable. It's MS. If they were making any money they would say so.

Sustainable probably doesn't mean they're earning massive profits.

But the whole sentence in context also makes it sound like they're not exactly losing/burning cash purely on GP either.

 

[Fredrik]

Seems pretty worthless to me. No day one first party games like on Game Pass. I already played all the games they are hyping like Death Stranding and God of War. My Xbox Series X will play PSP and PS1 games better via emulation. The PS3 games are fucking streaming, even though PS5 could likely handle emulation if RPCS3 is anything to go by. About the only thing i'm interested in is how well it runs PS2 games, and whether our old purchases in the PS3 gen will be playable and not locked behind a paywall (doubt it).

I have not played Returnal, Spider-Man, Miles Morales, so for me it’ll be interesting to try it out. Hopefully there is a free trial month, but even if there isn’t I’ll get to play three games for €14

 

[DJ12]

Microsoft's Phil Spencer reflects on 20 years of Xbox

Phil Spencer talks highs, lows and where Xbox goes next.

www.axios.com

The sustainable line comes right after he says no to burning cash like people like to write online.

Yet he didn't say its profitable which is you first indicator he's not telling the whole truth.

It's making a loss.

Burning cash is a dramatic interpretation that would indicate its in dire trouble, I can be making a loss and still be more than manageable.

Self sustaining, profitable, very sustainable we don't consider these a loss as we are trying to build the service right now.

At the end of the day profitable is a very easy word to say, he didn't, case closed.

 

[ethomaz]

But its still psnow
No thanks.
I want to be able to download w/o needing to stream.

Wut?

You can download PSNow games… you can either sign to PSNow or buy them individually on PS4.

That works on PS4 today.
On PS5 is streamed because they did not release the emulator yet.

That will change from the look of it.

You will have two options:

1) Steam or download from PS+++.
2) Buy and download individually.

The exceptions are PS3 games that only have the streaming option via PS+++.

 

[A.Romero]

They did that for the PS4 when it launched. Plus was giving Vita, PS3 and PS4 games from 2013-12 to 2019-02. Now they are doing it a lot earlier than before.
Interested in the mid tier... will depend of the list and how often they will add games that i would be interested to play.

But they weren't selling PS3 anymore. They are still PS4...

I hope they don't stop it.

 

[Killer8]

I have not played Returnal, Spider-Man, Miles Morales, so for me it’ll be interesting to try it out. Hopefully there is a free trial month, but even if there isn’t I’ll get to play three games for €14

I imagine if you've not played much of the games, it could be worth hopping on for a couple of months.

 

[THE DUCK]

Maybe I could go live in cave for 2 years and then get the second tier, will save me tons of money.

 

[Three]

GP on consoles has 447 games
GP on PC has 413 games

GP on console has 430 games. A good chunck (I'd say almost half) of which is 360 or OG xbox games. Xbox one + xbox series games count is much lower.

The guy is talking about 400 PS4 + PS5 games. If you include PS1-PS3 games in PS + Premium it has 740 games. None of the counts matter if both gamepass and PS+ premium are mostly filler but I'm surprised PS+ Extra is giving Miles Morales, Spiderman, Returnal, Death stranding etc. That's a decent offer.

 

[DaGwaphics]

It is not you can’t have day one releases.

It just you can’t have 4 $200 million releases per year in a service on day one… Sony usually releases at least 4 first-parry titles per year.

Now if you decrease your development budget or the number of releases you can have it.

Why can't you have 4 $200m releases a year on the sub? That's like $7m per sub at 10m subs, less than $3/mo at 25m, or $1.33/mo at 50m. The "it's too expensive" thing just doesn't really fly, it's built on the idea of a very small subscriber pool (think PSNow level). Plus, you assume that they'd still have traditional sales and MTX/DLC contributions.

There is a difference between something being financially impossible vs. Sony just thinking they can make more traditionally and going that route with their marketing.

 

[Fredrik]

I imagine if you've not played much of the games, it could be worth hopping on for a couple of months.

Yup. That’s how some do with Gamepass as well, wait until end of the year and sign up for a month or two and play all big releases at a fraction of the original cost.

 

[Chukhopops]

GP on console has 430 games. A good chunck (I'd say almost half) of which is 360 or OG xbox games. Xbox one + xbox series games count is much lower.

The guy is talking about 400 PS4 + PS5 games. If you include PS1-PS3 games in PS + Premium it has 740 games. None of the counts matter if both gamepass and PS+ premium are mostly filler but I'm surprised PS+ Extra is giving Miles Morales, Spiderman, Returnal, Death stranding etc. That's a decent offer.

Bro that’s completely wrong, why even lie about something so obvious? There are less than 15% of GP games which are 360 or OG.

 

[OmegaSupreme]

Sustainable probably doesn't mean they're earning massive profits.

But the whole sentence in context also makes it sound like they're not exactly losing/burning cash purely on GP either.

We don't know. All we can go on is the language they've used. They've never mentioned profits when it comes to gamepass. I think they would if they were. I think Sony is wise to keep first-party titles away for now from a purely business perspective.

 

[GermanZepp]

So, they're locking classic games on last tier?

How nice of them.

Still, tier 2 bought during black friday sounds nice.

you can see from the shadow that he did't hit him

 

[ethomaz]

Why can't you have 4 $200m releases a year on the sub? That's like $7m per sub at 10m subs, less than $3/mo at 25m, or $1.33/mo at $50m. The "it's too expensive" thing just doesn't really fly, it's built on the idea of a very small subscriber pool (think PSNow level). Plus, you assume that they'd still have traditional sales and MTX/DLC contributions.

There is a difference between something being financially impossible vs. Sony just thinking they can make more traditionally and going that route with their marketing.

For you there is no cost to maintain the service or pay royalties to the games already in the service.

Most of the revenue from these services goes to maintaince or with royalties to 3rd-parties… what is left of you have to develop your own game without thinking in have profit.

 

[boomcrab]

Everything in this announcement was expected. That being said, I still want to know more about trophy support for these older games, and upscale potential. I think Sony absolutely has to get these older games running better when the main competition is doing such a great job.
This was never meant to be a gamepass competitor, and that's okay, but not having boosted older titles is a deeper issue beyond service.

 

[IntentionalPun]

I imagine if you've not played much of the games, it could be worth hopping on for a couple of months.

Problem with this is if you have paid for a year of PS+ w/ cheap cards found on CD Keys..

Can you just "hop on" the middle tier for a couple months?

Currently you can do that w/ PSNow to check out some downloadable games w/ it modifying your PS+ sub.

 

[Topher]

...What the third tier has now. Seriously can you read what I'm saying?

If PS Now were combined into PS+ then it would already have everything that is included in the second and third tiers except for the time trials. You really think they would break out a second tier just for time trials? Come on, dude.

 

[DaGwaphics]

For you there is no cost to maintain the service or pay royalties to the games already in the service.

That's what the rest of the sub fee would be for, go figure.

 

[93xfan]

They added PS1 games and PS5 game trials for the $120/year.

Or ditch the old games and streaming, pay $100/year and still get hundreds of PS4/5 games.

Its nothing that great but its objectively a better deal than before.

Except for 2 less PS+ games a month

 

[adamsapple]

We don't know. All we can go on is the language they've used. They've never mentioned profits when it comes to gamepass. I think they would if they were. I think Sony is wise to keep first-party titles away for now from a purely business perspective.

I think it's a safe bet that MS and Sony have different priorities in terms of their subscription services.

MS seems to see Game Pass as the way forward as the primary means hence they're not hesitant to put all self published games there day 1. Sony probably wants more of a big-release and get more revenue off of retail at launch.

 

[ethomaz]

That's what the rest of the sub fee would be for, go figure.

How that works exactly?

You increase the number of subs your maintaince increases… you need more servers because well your numbers increased.

You have to share revenue with 3rd-parties.

How much from these subs revenue is left to Sony per month? How much they can put on game development? How much they will take for profit?

4 big releases per year costs a lot.

 

[SentientStone]

I got a long subscription of the standard service still so I just hope they don't downgrade the monthly free games even more and reserve the better stuff for the mid-tier service.

EDIT: This better not be all the Sony news this week. I am expecting megatons cause the podcast was delayed; that means Silent Hills, MGS Remakes, Square-Enix Namco Bandai Sega merged and purchased by Sony. Consider me disappointed otherwise.

 

[Topher]

Except for 2 less PS+ games a month

PS+ only advertises two games a month as it is.

"PS Plus is a paid subscription service from PlayStation which gives members two PS4 games to download every month, as well as access to online multiplayer gaming, exclusive discounts from PlayStation Store, 100GB of cloud storage for game saves and bonus content such as skins and in-game items for free-to-play games like Fortnite."

PlayStation®Plus | Hundreds of games to download and play, PlayStation classics, game trials and more

Join PlayStation Plus on an Essential, Extra or Premium membership plan and get hundreds of PS4 and PS5 games, online multiplayer, classics catalog, exclusive discounts and more.

www.playstation.com

 

[DenchDeckard]

To lock people into subscriptions.
I hope I’m wrong, I have lots of purchased ps1 and 2 games on ps3.

Microsoft sells every game thats on game pass so I dont see why Sony wouldnt want to add even more revenue from those that dont want to subscribe but may want to purchase the odd game. Just makes sense IMO. I cant understand why they wouldnt. I have PS plus until end of 2023 so I'm not bothered to go with any other option apart from what I have.

 

[Godot25]

GP on console has 430 games. A good chunck (I'd say almost half) of which is 360 or OG xbox games. Xbox one + xbox series games count is much lower.

The guy is talking about 400 PS4 + PS5 games. If you include PS1-PS3 games in PS + Premium it has 740 games. None of the counts matter if both gamepass and PS+ premium are mostly filler but I'm surprised PS+ Extra is giving Miles Morales, Spiderman, Returnal, Death stranding etc. That's a decent offer.

65 games are from X360 or Xbox generation. And majority of them are either great games from EA (Dead Space, Dante Inferno, Dragon Age) or they are there because of Rare Replay Collection. So let's not pretend that GP is heavily lifted by those. Because most important aspect of GP are day one releases, first party games and AAA third party releases some time after they came out

And Sony first party year and half after they released? So I can subscribe for a same price that I can buy those games at that time? No thanks

 

[skit_data]

At first I was thinking about going with th PS+ Extra subscription, but when I saw that the Premium subscription was only 2
€20 more I reconsidered.

I’ll go with the Premium instead, mostly to play PS2 and PS3 games I’ve missed like the Resistance series.

 

[DenchDeckard]

So is this sustainable for Sony or is it losing them money, if Game Pass is losing money?