Microsoft has made a big announcement about one of the big perks of Xbox Game Pass, cloud streaming, and the news is not great.
Starting in November, Microsoft will put limits on how many hours per month people can use the service, and then allow people to pay more to unlock more time. Below is a breakdown of how many hours you’ll get included with the tier of Game Pass you’re subscribed to:
- Game Pass Ultimate: 15 hours
- Game Pass Premium: 10 hours
- Game Pass Essential: 5 hours
Microsoft said it understands this is a “meaningful change,” especially for those who use the cloud regularly for gaming. However, the company said it estimates that these changes will impact about 4% of Game Pass subscribers, though the company did not share any specifics on how it arrived at that projection.
For people who want or need more monthly streaming hours, Microsoft will allow people to buy more–but pricing was not announced.
Additionally, Microsoft said that in November, for the first time, people will not need to have an Xbox Game Pass membership to stream games with the cloud. People outside of Game Pass will be able to buy cloud playtime through the Xbox Store, though, again, pricing was not shared. Microsoft said this option is meant to appeal to people who don’t want to subscribe to a recurring membership like Game Pass and only want “occasional access.”
“We’re introducing this model because the cost of providing cloud gaming grows as more people use it and play for longer. Moving to monthly limits allows us to keep offering the service while continuing to invest in its reliability and performance. We understand that for some players the practical result is a higher cost,” Microsoft said. The company added that it will “listen closely” to player feedback and make adjustments if necessary.
Xbox’s cloud gaming service runs on Azure servers, and the Azure business is booming. For the first time ever, Microsoft just revealed how much money it makes on Azure quarterly, and the latest numbers showed $29.4 billion in sales. As relayed by Reuters, that’s behind Amazon’s latest quarterly revenue for AWS of $42.2 billion but ahead of Google’s $24.8 billion cloud business results.