Game Pass Sees Price Hike, Name Changes, More Games

Microsoft has announced a massive change to Game Pass, with at least one change ruffling many feathers.

Game Pass is following suit with other tiered subscription services, offering Essential, Premium, and Ultimate tiers with their own unique offerings, unfortunately, this does mean that the service has seen substantial price hikes, hoping the newly added roster of games will help alleviate the sting.

Its cheapest tier, Essential, offers the bare minimum with in-game benefits, online play, cloud gaming, and the ability to earn as much as $25 a year in the Store with Rewards for the price of $9.99.

Its middle tier, Premium, offers a touch more to what fans were used to with Game Pass — access to Xbox’s first-party lineup… except there’s a catch. This tier, which costs $14.99, cites that first-party Xbox titles will be available within 12 months of release… excluding Call of Duty, that is. It also shortens wait times and bumps the Rewards cap to $50 a year.

The last tier, Ultimate, is mostly just seeing a price hike and some small additions to try and make it worth it for select people. It’s gone from $19.99 to $29.99 and beyond being the only tier with Day One first-party games, some bonus subscriptions were added to sweeten the deal, like EA Play, Ubisoft+ Classics, and starting in November, Fortnite Crew. It also boosts the Rewards cap to $100 a year.

Naturally, this isn’t going over well with the community, as Game Pass was a huge draw for Xbox gamers, but with these changes, its value is falling into question.

Do you think Game Pass is still worth the price even with the hikes and changes? Let us know below!