Depending on who you ask, the game pass is a very good thing for game developers. Some people argue that it’s also very bad.
While some games have undoubtedly managed to join the Game Pass, other developers have spoken out frankly about criticism of the service. Journalist Christopher Doling said some of the games that appear on the game pass earlier this year could lose up to 80% of their profits. That’s a pretty big number.
Former PlayStation boss Jim Ryan calls GamePas “disruptive” and claims “all publishers… unanimously don’t like GamePass.”
Atomfall developer Rebellion enjoys working on the game pass
The gaming business recently hosted Rebellion CEO Jason Kingsley and asked if GamePass would support the recently released Game Atom Fall.
The game pass was amazing. This is mainly because we gained a lot of exposure due to new brands, new ideas. In particular, the engagement Microsoft gave us was amazing. They really helped spread the word. They want to promote subscriptions to gaming services, so it makes a bit of sense.
But they were working very easily… Sometimes very demanding… when things are going well, people need more things to support it, so they really escalate because they need more screenshots and more video presentations. The more you succeed, the more people want to show, the more new things have to be created.
Kingsley says this can sometimes lead to stress, but that’s “good stress.” He even says that his work with Microsoft and Game Pass is a breath of fresh air in terms of working with someone in the industry.
This is completely different from the fate and Grome scenario that Ryan portrayed several years ago, but fair, it was during a trial between the US Federal Trade Commission and Microsoft over the then-maintenance acquisition of Activision Blizzard.
Of course, not everyone will have the same success as Atomfall or Expedition 33 while on the Game Pass. But for these titles it’s worth it.
