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Forza Horizon 5 director Mike Brown says Xbox Game Pass simply hasn't taken off enough to be viable.
Speaking to MinnMax (via Eurogamer), Brown – who departed Playground Games in 2023 and is now directing open-world racer Clutch at Maverick Games – was asked about the current wave of layoffs facing Xbox studios. Brown singles out Xbox Game Pass and says Microsoft "invested a fortune in the concept," which led to teams being acquired, games being funded, and jobs being created. However, he adds, "The reality is not enough people have subscribed to it at the prices that they needed to pay in order to make that business viable."
Brown explains, "We’re now going to see studios getting shut down or spun off. Loads of people are going to lose their jobs. And that is honestly just a result of a well-meaning player-focused concept of Xbox Game Pass not quite landing."
Bloomberg's Jason Schreier talked about Xbox Game Pass on the Triple Click podcast, where he claims, "there are a lot of people out there in studio leadership within Xbox who absolutely detest Game Pass and think it has destroyed the value of their games, think it has taken away from the value of all games in general just as a service" He adds, that some of those people believe "It's been a detriment to the games industry."
Brown has a bit more of a favorable view of the service, however, saying, "It's a good idea. Let's have a subscription, make it affordable, try and get games to more people. We'll have a really diverse selection of games on there. We'll get a load of studios involved. We'll make some games that probably couldn't exist otherwise."
Last year, Xbox Game Pass Ultimate reached $30 per month, which led to subscriber loss according to Xbox CEO Asha Sharma, who promptly took the price down to $23 per month.
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