Can a Game Pass already have 30 million users? -apkrig
No one can doubt that Microsoft hit the imaginary jackpot with Game Pass. Although we can still talk with some concerns about the financial return of this service, from the players’ point of view, this is an ideal solution for playing a myriad of new and older titles for a very low monthly investment and many of them even through xCloud. The positive reception of the service, which resonates in discussions between players, is also underlined by the officially published numbers of the number of subscribers, which, according to the latest official report from January this year, were over 18 million. The current numbers will of course be higher, but the question remains how steeply the Game Pass has increased and whether the increase in subscribers is accelerating. Microsoft has not delivered an update for eight long months, but from time to time more or less credible speculation has emerged, and others have been fueled by Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick, paradoxically following his speech in a debate with Phil Spencer at The Grill’s online conference. organized by Yahoo.
Both managers answered mostly general questions from TheWrap magazine editor Sharon Waxman. These included the state of the gaming industry, the changes brought about by the coronavirus pandemic, the lack of chips or new business models for video games. And it is here that logically mentioned the Game Pass, which Phil Spencer – as he has several times before – introduced as a central service, connecting fans across the gaming ecosystem of Microsoft. That is why Zelnick, who is known for his completely negative approach to this model, continued in a very relaxed and jovial spirit, although he acknowledges that the service works thanks to its high value, precise targeting and fulfillment of what current and potential customers want. Zelnick further confirmed that he often talked to Spencer about the Game Pass, and inadvertently apparently released information that had not yet been addressed to the public. “You have about 30 million subscribers, Phil, don’t you?” Something like that, “Zelnick asked his colleague. And with a slight smile, but without being surprised by the question, Spencer only repeated the last officially communicated number – 18 million. In a relaxed spirit, the moderator of the debate also asked the number mentioned by Zelnick and the CEO of Take-Two moved it by stating that it would therefore be certainly more than 18 million.
Zelnick confirmed that he often talked to Spencer about the Game Pass, and inadvertently apparently released information that had not yet been made available to the public.
If you are wondering if it is possible that the Game Pass has gained 1.5 million users per month since January in order to reach the mentioned number of 30 million users, then we have a context for you that confirms this pace. In September 2020, Microsoft officially announced that the service had climbed to 15 million users, starting in April of that year and out of 10 million subscribers. The rate of this increase was 1 million new users per month, while from September 2020 to January 2021 it was already 1.3 million. Accelerating to 1.5 million new subscribers a month therefore seems realistic, and if Microsoft were to do well in the next 6-10 months, the Game Pass could catch up with the number of people subscribing to PlayStation Plus, for example. In this case, however, it is only about hezkou statistics, since each of the services offers something different and the equivalent for PS Plus is of course Xbox Live Gold. In the last few months, however, it has begun to seem that Microsoft wants to fill the Game Pass library with attractive subscription titles, while Sony is trying to come up with brand new titles for PlayStation Plus, such as Destruction AllStars, Oddworld: Soulstorm or this month’s console version of Hell Let Loose.
