Xbox Game Pass - Harold Halibut, Botany Manor, LEGO 2K Drive, Diablo 4, Evil West, Control:UE, Dead Island 2 out now

Jenuall wrote:As a Game Pass noob who only picked the service up recently what kind of length of time do individual games tend to stick around on here? Am I right in thinking that Microsoft Game Studios games that are on the service will stay there permanently whilst third party stuff is only available for a set period?

Somebody Else's Problem wrote:In a weird way, it's kind of a blessing that the Xbox has underperformed in sales, because it's pushed Microsoft to put immense amounts of effort and value into Game Pass.

ABZÛ (PC & XB1)
Below (XB1)
Strange Brigade (XB1)
GRID 2 (XB1)
Kingdom Two Crowns (XB1)
Football Manager 2019 (PC)

Also spotted by community member Tveilor and not listed in the Xbox Wire post, but listed on the Leaving Soon section on the Game Pass app is LEGO Batman 3: Beyond Gotham. We aren't sure when this one will be leaving as it doesn't specifically have a leaving soon date like the other games.

Game Pass is clearly a big deal for you. What are you most interested in when you try to measure the success of a title on Game Pass? Is it engagement? Is it downloads? Are you just looking at pure subs? How do you work out if a thing that is on Game Pass that you've put there is successful?

Phil Spencer: Players. How many people play a game. But I think we'll get more sophisticated than that over time. As Game Pass continues to grow, I don't want us to think that every game has to reach every subscriber. Because the subscriber base is already too big for that. What I love is when creators can understand that in a base of players that's that large, there are sub-communities inside of Game Pass where you can say, hey, I'm gonna go do a black and white puzzle game because I know there are a few million people there who will go play that game. Somebody else can say, I'm gonna do a turn-based strategy game because I know there are enough people.

I really want to foster diversity, not every game trying to reach every player from now until the end of time, which so many games I see that are pure retail today, their model is, here's how I bring people in and here's how I keep them playing forever and ever. That's great for some games, but I don't want every game to be that kind of game, because it's just not true that the creative lends itself to every game being that game.

You touched on this in your opening remarks, where you said this enables games with a beginning, middle and end. I found myself marvelling that I'm cheering that games can be games again, that this is the world we live in.

Phil Spencer: The number of single-player games being built has gone down as an overall percentage of the games being built. I say that and people throw Sony's first-party at me or something, and they've done a great job building single-player games. It's not really about that. I see all of the games all of the publishers are building. I have - not because I'm smart - I have insight into what's coming and what the publishers are thinking. The thing I saw a couple of years ago was, everybody is kind of chasing this perpetual, how do I keep everybody into all of my franchises all of the time? This is when I said, Game Pass can actually enable great single-player games and stories to be told.

There was a little bit of conflict when I said that. But it was nice to see something like Outer Worlds. Yes, it's from one of our studios, but to boot that game and know that if I want to be done in 20 hours from now I can be. And if I want to play it for longer I can. There are certain games where that's what they should be, and I love that.

In that context, how do you view the success of a title like Gears 5? It's obviously not about sales for you. So how do you justify the investment in a big project like that? How do you measure its success when you've got this game that's coming out on Game Pass day and date with retail?

Phil Spencer: Gears 5 sold well for us. It sold better than Gears 4. And we feel good about it. If people want to make the choice of buying Gears, that's an option we want to give them. I'm not trying to funnel everybody who wants to play Gears into the subscription. It's about giving gamers choice. Certain players will make the decision as part of Game Pass that they'll either want to start to subscribe, or they're already a subscriber and they stay subscribed.

Right now the easiest metric to talk to Rod or anybody about the success is, how many players did we find with this game? And let the gamers choose how they actually want to get the entitlement for the game. It is an evolution, there's no doubt. Studios have been trained that, what I look at is what are my day one sales, what are my week one sales? And as an industry, the press wants to know. Hey, how do I judge if Gears 5 has been a success? What I will say is we're incredibly happy with Gears 5. It did review well. It has a tonne of players. We're taking feedback on certain things. The economy - I see the feedback on the game as well. But I thought it was a great release in the Gears franchise and it drove a tonne of players who wanted to go play, and that's awesome.

You've committed to having your first-party games launch on Game Pass day and date with retail. In fact you put all of them on there. This is in stark contrast to Sony's approach. Sony does not put its big first-party games, the God of Wars, the Spider-Mans on PlayStation Now day and date. There is a really interesting quote from Jim Ryan in a recent interview with our sister site GamesIndustry.biz, where he talked about why Sony does this, and I'd love to get your take on it.

He said, and I quote: "... given how some of our first party IP is incredibly special and valuable, we just want to treat them with amazing care and respect, and have those launches be clean and pure."

What I think he's saying there is, our big first-party games are too good to give away on a subscription. That's such a different approach to what you guys are doing. How do you apply that thinking to Gears 5, for example? Does putting it on a subscription platform day and date detract from the sense of it being this big, great first-party title?

Phil Spencer: It hasn't in any other form of media. I don't think people look at Game of Thrones and say somehow it wasn't quality because it shipped inside of a subscription. I think most people would look at the amount of investment and the quality of execution that happens in TV at least in the subscriptions as being incredibly high.

What I'll say for us - and I'm trying to figure out how much I want to dive into this because it could get messy - giving developers a business model that's already working at scale inside of a subscription - and I think there's some confusion out there whether Game Pass works. Game Pass works as a business model. There's no doubt about that. Even today. It works. It works incredibly well - allows us to go and invest in the studio acquisitions we've done and the quality of content we're building over the next two or three years that's gonna show up. It's an integral part of the business model that allows that. And we also do retail.

I think those games can be and will be very special. I think Gears 5 can be a game of the year award winner. I think Outer Worlds can be a game of the year award winner. The fact it shipped inside of Game Pass and found more players does not take away from the experience. In fact it's more inviting to more people.

Gamers in general, there is sometimes a tendency that the more walls we put up around things, the more valuable it is. But if we're focused on growing the games industry, we should not be less accessible. We should be more accessible. We had this argument for years over cross-play. Should we allow people to play across different platforms? Or does that somehow diminish the value of an individual platform?

The thing at the highest level, which will probably get me in trouble, is as gamers you should focus on what you want, not focus on, like, my P&L [profit and loss statement], or the P&L of the console you chose to invest in. I see this dialogue about somebody worried that somehow Xbox is gonna make less money, or their console is gonna make less money if they tell me a game is going to be on a different platform before it actually comes out, or it's gonna be in a subscription, which is really what I want, but somehow that's gonna mean less money for them so I don't want them to do that because I'd rather pay more money so...

You should focus on you as a gamer and the things that matter to you. We as the people running the business - I am incented to run a good business inside of Microsoft and in the long term. I've been here for 31 years. I don't know that I'll make 31 more, but I'm not going anywhere tomorrow. We're building an Xbox business for the long run. I'll tell you, Game Pass today is a strong part of that, and it continues to get stronger, and it supports the building of great IP.

Xbox Game Pass is an antidote to everything needing to be a live service game, Phil Spencer says

"It wraps a game inside of a service."

Xbox Game Pass provides a space for games which do not try and be the only thing you play, forever. Games which you can finish in a week, or even in a single afternoon.

That's according to Xbox boss Phil Spencer, speaking during a briefing to press at X019 earlier today attended by Eurogamer.

As game budgets increase, Spencer said he had seen many developers try and turn to the live service model in order to recruit profits.

Xbox Game Pass, he argued, was one way to combat that need - as its subscription service let people try and play a wider menu of games, and developers receive revenue for this.

"We see Game Pass as a really critical way to bring new games to new players with a business model that just has more approachability to more players," Spencer said. "We see players ready to take risks on new games and genres because when you're already in the subscription it's as easy as clicking on something, downloading and starting to play."

Xbox Game Pass subscriptions have doubled year on year, Spencer noted, likely aided by the addition of a PC version of the service.

"One of the things I was watching over the last few years is you saw many games and studios chasing service-based games that felt perpetual and felt like they had to last forever to recoup the investment big publishers and studios were making.

"The nice thing about Game Pass is that it wraps a game inside of a service itself. So a game can just be a game, and it's nice to play games with a beginning, middle and end.

"And as a subscription we can support those kinds of games, and in fact a lot of the games our first and third-party partners are working on take advantage of the fact they don't have to carry the service themselves. They can just live within it."

rinks wrote:

Monkey Man wrote:The EA Access month is available for non-current members as well. I assume you can play the start of Jedi Fallen Order right now with it.

God damn, I hadn’t thought of that. Starting to wonder if I’ll ever buy games again.

KjGarly wrote:Any PC gamers had any luck getting the Halo MCC to install/preload? Just won't download at all for me.

Xbox Game Pass Quests (Preview) Starts Today

Test out the new Xbox Game Pass Quest features
We’re excited to bring you into the next chapter of Xbox Game Pass Quests, where members get rewarded with Microsoft Rewards points for playing the games they love. There are more than 80 Quests available that repeat daily, weekly and monthly!

If you’re an Xbox Insider, you can now try a preview of our new Xbox Game Pass Quest features through December 19, 2019. See below for further details.



How does it work?
Head to the Xbox Game Pass tab on your Xbox One console to check out your Quests (see screenshot below). You can start completing Quests by following the tasks outlined for each one, track your progress and claim points on your console. Later this week, you will be able to view quests, track progress and claim points for Quests via the Xbox Game Pass mobile app.

What’s new?
We’re always listening to our Xbox Game Pass members and, as a result of your feedback, have implemented many new features and Quest types to make this a great experience for Xbox Game Pass members.

More Quest Types
Historically, Xbox Game Pass Quests have been Achievement-based. We have added more new, fun ways to earn points and would love to hear what you think! Your feedback drives us keep making Xbox Game Pass great.

Members can now play any Xbox Game Pass titles for Xbox One to earn points.
For gaming completionists, new Quests can be achieved by completing multiple Quests!
As a new feature, there are also quests where members can complete one or more steps of a Quest to earn points.
We now have daily, weekly and monthly Quests, ensuring there’s always something new to play.
Members can complete Quests that are based on hero stats, allowing greater variety and more unique Quests.

Claim Rewards points wherever you are
Instant notifications. Once you complete a Quest, you will receive a notification on console prompting you to claim your points.
Claim on console. Submit your Quests for Microsoft Rewards points from multiple surfaces across dash – the Quest details dialog, My Profile, and the twist channel.
Claim on mobile. Submit your Quests for Microsoft Rewards points from the Xbox Game Pass mobile app.
In addition to above, you can claim your points until December 19th, even if that Quest is no longer active.



How to Participate

To participate in the Game Pass Quest (Preview), you must be…

A member of Xbox Game Pass for Console or Xbox Game Pass Ultimate
Enrolled in an insider ring and opted into the Xbox Insider program. If you’re interested in joining the Xbox Insider program, you can find more information here.
In one of these markets: US, CA, UK, BR, AU, IE, NZ, SG, FR, DE, MX, BE, IT, NL, NO, ES, SE, HK, TW

If you don’t have Xbox Game Pass for Console or Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, you can still browse Quests on your console.