Microsoft Claims Xbox Game Pass Price Will Not Increase

Xbox head Phil Spencer has revealed Microsoft has no plans to increase the price of an Xbox Game Pass subscription. He dropped the information on Wednesday’s episode of the Dropped Frames podcast.

Despite the fact that some developers have questioned the service’s business model, it seems like Microsoft is quite confident in the reliability of their position.

“I’ll be honest, there are developers that have some concerns, and my inbox is there, and I have conversations with a lot of those developers asking what are our real long-term goals?” Spencer said.

“You know we get questions about ‘hey, is this just some kind of go secure a bunch of players and then rack the price up to a new level?’ I say there’s no plan for us to do anything like that. We like the value that Game Pass is today and from a business model it’s completely sustainable the way it is and I mean that.”

Spencer pointed out he cannot predict what Game Pass may become in five years. “What I can say is our motivation is not to turn everybody into a subscriber – we think it’s an option for people.”

He also pointed out that Game Pass allows Microsoft to be more creative in its game development. “The upside is, we can take more creative chances than a pure retail model allows,” Spencer said.

“We can go and greenlight games because we know we’ll get millions of Game Pass players to engage and play the game, where if it was purely driven of greenlight based on how many units or revenue you might gain just from that title, it can be more challenging, and that’s I think the positive side of it. It allows us to take more creative risks and I think the portfolio shows that, but we have to prove that over time as well.”

Currently, an Xbox Game Pass subscription costs $9.99 per month for console and PC (the first month for PC is $1). Meanwhile, an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription, which includes Game Pass PC and Xbox Live Gold, is $14.99 per month. The first month of Ultimate is also just $1.

In September, Microsoft reported that the number of Game Pass subscribers surpassed 15 million.