Sony Has Approached Subscriptions 'Healthier' Than Xbox, Says Former PlayStation Boss

I'm with him. That's my talking. And I'm pretty sure thats why several studios had to close or fire employees.
Gaming is on a dangerous position right now and Game Pass changed a lot of people's behavior of gaming.

Well that's probably true what he is saying but I wouldn't be better for us gamers just the multi billion dollar company so it really doesn't matter at all does it I'm all about whats is better for the consumer ie. Me not the faceless corporation 🤷

I think it's a matter of perception. That, and I'm not too sure Sony would have been able to afford to take those sorts of gambles in the same way that MS can / did. Either way, it is what it is and if MS can balance the sheets through multiplat sales than GP will continue to offer the better service.

I think game pass will be the healthier option over time, also business wise. It’s still growing unlike the playstation subscription service.

And it’s thé subscription to take if you’re playing games on pc, and in time, on phone as well,

I really don't care about how well a particular business does when it comes to gaming. I just look for whichever service offers the best value (gamepass), go with that & enjoy myself. That's the end of my involvement as far as I am concerned.

They don't pay me to balance the books or worry about future financials so I don't.

I actually agree with him. Yes, people can still buy GP games but you have less incentive to do so when it's day and date. But a related question is "Is the Sony model better for consumers?" To which I'd say, "Probably not."

However, in a capitalist economy, companies will look at what maximizes profits in the long term. MS is more likely than not working towards having gamers not own anything, which will get them more money back. While the service looks nice today, it could eventually morph into something we don't like. No way to really know long term, but it's a possible scenario.

Looking at the charts and how most games fail to sell enough on Xbox and PS, I think that subscriptions like Game Pass are the future.

@RiverGenie Yup. I think we can tend to forget how things used to be or look at the past with rose tinted glasses. Can you imagine if we had something like Gamepass growing up? Gaming is already too expensive as is. Gamepass helps alleviate some of that. It's pretty much my main and only source of gaming now.

I feel that with gamepass it’s a case of “the horse has left the barn.” Anyone that’s consistently used the service has already had their spending habits changed - I know I have.

Unless you’re absolutely swimming in money, and let’s be real very few people are these days, gamepass is a phenomenal value proposition. How many people spend considerably more money to effectively accomplish the same outcome? I could have spent £70 buying doom: the dark ages and about 20 hours doing absolutely everything, or signed up to gamepass on pc for £10 and achieved exactly the same result. I did the later.

I rarely buy games at launch for full price. If I do, they’re often on ps5 and purchased on disc with the intent to sell immediately after completion. A practice which is also damaging to publishers as they see none of the revenue (and potential lost sale) from a used physical copy.

Publishers want you “buying” a digital copy of a game. They don’t really want you buying a physical copy, and unless they have the money of Microsoft, they’d also probably rather you didn’t “rent” your copy.

@Friendly

"I think game pass will be the healthier option over time, also business wise. It’s still growing unlike the playstation subscription service.

And it’s thé subscription to take if you’re playing games on pc, and in time, on phone as well"

Yeah, maybe healthy for Microsoft, but not the studios. And where is Game Pass growing??? Major faults like porting Gears or Forza to PlayStation is because Game Pass is "not" growing anymore.

And what a lot of people don't understand.
If you're subscribing like for a month of Game Pass Ultimate and in that time period, you're completing like 1 or 2 new games like Doom The Dark Ages. Yeah, than it was a good. It was like renting from a video store.

But many people just pay and pay, month for month, not having the time for all these 800 games. And they still think it's a good deal, acting like it's for free.
After canceling the subscription, nothing's there.

There’s room for both.

There’s going to be a limit of what casuals are willing to pay for subscriptions and games.

Game costs are also going up, so there will be a limit MS/Sony are willing to pay to get games on there.

If subscription become the main - then all we will see is like TV, each publisher will have their own, and it would dilute the value for customers,

Gamepass is only unhealthy if Xbox isn't their primary system. If it is the revenue stays in house. Discounts inspire game purchases if that is your main ecosystem.

For instance I am primarily a Nintendo Gamer with Xbox as secondary and PS5 as exclusives only. When I had gamepass I used it to trial indie games I knew were on switch. That turned into purchases on switch. But it also turned into a few purchases of xbox exclusives (south of midnight and coral island which was canceled for switch) despite me already beating the game. But it didn't make me more partial to xbox (more than it being my secondary system). But it did get a constant revenue stream from me to MS until I canceled (since I never had gold consistently I never used the discounts and always paid full price for gamepass). The problem I feel isn't with gamepass but still microsoft's same issue. They aren't giving enough incentive to make themselves the primary platform. They give an amazing argument to be the secondary one though if you aren't fond of playstation for whatever reason (I hate the controllers). The problem is still many people only buy one system.

It's a bit dystopian to think this but I don't see my kids growing up on consoles like I did. It probably will be stuff like xcloud streaming through a TV box or fire stick (once they sort the latency and bitrate out)

That's kinda what the goal of game pass is now, it's hardware agnostic. So if nextbox comes with Steam and Epic that's fine because it caters to us old school gamers, MS still get their cut of 70% on software, and they get to market game pass at us the whole time.

Like, Daddy's in his office playing GPU on his PC like a dinosaur and the kids are streaming something on the TV.

The Sony way is healthier for Sony though because they sell exclusives so every sale matters. Really doesn't for Xbox coz they're everywhere

I use Game Pass as a try before you buy service. There are so many games I've bought purely because I tried it on Game Pass and liked it. I don't think I've ever loved a game on Game Pass and not bought it.

On the other hand, I cancelled my PS+ subscription over a year ago because there was never any games that interested me that I didn't already own. It was a complete waste of time and money for me.

Gamepass is great for smaller developers as the service encourages gamers to try out stuff they normally wouldn't, which tends to benefit indie games.

Also, just try changing it now. You can't, for better or for worse. If I had to move back to paying full, even discounted, price for every game I play, I'd probably get a life and play a LOT less.

As a consumer, I view the gamepass model as far superior. I do not want the company to force me to buy the game at full price or subscribe to a monthly service to get access to that game in the distant future. Xbox gives the consumer the decision, buy to own or play it with a subscription. Pro tip - buy 1 month of gamepass, use %20 discount to purchase to own a couple games the savings will be more than the month of gamepass so you save money and get 1 month of gp access.

By "healthier" he really means less appealing. FOMO/exclusion is the only card Sony plays. Now that Sony releases are so few and far between, what will ever make their subscription appealing?

Given that Microsoft is now starting to sell its titles outside of Game Pass on other platforms — including PlayStation — you have to say that Yoshida probably has a point

Yeah, when you go out and aquire two reasonably big (😉) game publishers ,you start exploring avenues of return for said investment. It's not an unheard-of concept...

Acknowledging his bias as a former PlayStation leader before going on to champion them anyway

Kudos to Shu for being upfront about it 😅.

Now, from my position as an Xbox ecosystem customer, Microsoft's approach has been financially super healthy for me.
There is a reason why I no longer subscribe to any PlayStation subscription services since early 2023, and it's not because Sony's approach to subscription services is healthier 😀...

I think they are too late to the party. I believe Game Pass will always be the leading subscription based gaming portal.

I think what Xbox is doing confirms what he is saying. If they were crushing it with their own subscription service like they had hoped, they would not need to port games to PS/Switch. They had wanted 100M GP subs I think and they’re probably like 35M.

Now on the other hand, GP is awesome for me as I have played so many games I wouldn’t have bought. Great for the consumer, terrible for MS.

The only part of this I agree with is studios need to stop over promising. It’s a plague. They always say this game is bigger or better; and it ends up disappointing them because it’s not exactly the promise. They need to get buzz words out of the marketing. Just market the game, and let the community decide. They would have far less moments on social media of people re-quoting them and creating memes.

Aside from overpromising; unless you’re in the room signing the contracts for third party games on GP, then you can’t comment on the approach. They get compensated for their game. If it isn’t enough, then they don’t have to agree to the terms. A large majority of those games will fail because a lot of people are unwilling to pay full price for a game they aren’t that interested in. And that’s only going to continue as game proceeds rise. So there needs to be a market for subscription services to allow people to play many games for a low price. Whether you agree with this strategy or not, it’s clear there is a market for it, and it will continue to grow. As will all prices over time.

@Nintendo4Sonic Of course, nobody can play 800 games a month, much like someone who pays for a streaming service cannot watch thousands of movies a month.

I pay for whatever games I can play - been doing so for three years without regrets. GamePass is an excellent deal that meets my needs and the reason why I'm still an Xbox owner.

Try to come up with some logical criticism.

@Nintendo4Sonic they just want extra revenue. Releasing it on Playstation creates that extra revenue.

https://screenrant.com/xbox-game-pass-ad-based-subscriptions-2025-op-ed/

From 34 million last year to an expected 50 million this year.

Reportedly, @Friendly, it's not growing, particularly on console. PC Game Pass saw an increase last year, but not console. And let's not forget, that Microsoft thought Game Pass would hit 100 million subscribers by 2030, yet it is stagnant (or falling) from not much over 30 million...

I get your thinking, @Kaloudz, but from a business perspective, propping up part of your business with funds from another part is not a sensible thing to do, and Microsoft didn't get where they are today by making nonsensical decisions. If Game Pass isn't growing, or bringing in sufficient revenue, they will not pay for its existence from a more profitable area of its business.

The only reason that Microsoft is putting their games on the PlayStation is because they are not making enough money via Xbox sales, Game Pass subscriptions, and PC/Steam. There is no way Microsoft would be putting their games on PlayStation, if having them as exclusives day one on Game Pass was generating enough money. That is why I fully believe that Microsoft will pull the plug on Game Pass (in its current guise) within the next 5 years...

Sonys approach has me ready to cancel ps premium though where i have no qualms paying for gamepass ultimate.

Value prop is important and as I dont play games online, there really isnt much for me to continue paying for ps plus in any variant. Only reason ive kept it is because they keep discounting it massively when i dont resub and let it lapse. Even that may not be enough this year.

I'll be the one that says I don't agree , lets face it if gp was so bad for Devs would gp have half the games it does ???? No ,the problem is no matter if gp exists or doesn't ppl are spending less on gaming as prices for everything just keep going up and up , one of the casualties of having less money is paying a hell of a lot for a game you buy for say £50 complete over a weekend then might not even touch again days are gone and it's costing a lot more to actually Create the the games now than it used to with the rising costs ,gp is actually good for the consumer for once .

i will buy games that I love and most games I wouldn't have spent the money to buy to play first of it wasn't for game pass I'm just a lot more picky nowadays in what I will pay for

Translation: Be as greedy as possible before providing quality products to consumers.

PS+ is so "healthy" that they keep losing subscribers and are miles away from Game Pass. And let's talk about how difficult and expensive it is for third-party developers to get visibility on the PlayStation store.

Xbox, on the other hand, supports the gaming industry by injecting billions into third-party studios to foster creativity and innovation. You certainly can't say PlayStation is doing the same...

This is just the statement of a bitter guy who probably got a little check from PS to say this kind of nonsense.

@Fiendish-Beaver where does the prediction of the analysts then originate from?

This IS GAME PASS!! kicks Yoshida in the balls

@Friendly GP is not growing, its levelled. The recent increase was purely based on PC subs and, considering the low increase, its clear they lost subs as well. PS plus is hardly on the up i imagine or we would have heard about it as well. However, as of last official numbers, Plus has quite a large number more subscribers and as they sell far more consoles, will likely attract more.

Either way, somethings gotta give on the sub front.

Edit: for context, plus had 47.4 million subscribers in March 23. GP still hasn't matched that across all platforms and tiers. While I doubt plus has gone up, the more hardware sales likely means its hovering around that figure i would imagine.

@Friendly probably the same place the analysts predicted the death off consoles two generations came from.

I disagree - Game Pass doesn't stop me from Spending Money - I still buy games and perhaps more DLC and other 'extras' too. I bought BO6 after playing it at launch on Game Pass in a sale and paid for the Vault edition - I have also bought every Battle Pass since. I pre-ordered the Premium editions of Starfield, Indiana Jones and Doom - although I haven't bought these outright yet. I also bought Robocop recently too.

I really don't see the value of Sony's Sub service and why I decided to let it lapse. Game Pass doesn't take away the consumers Choice to buy the Games they want to own, but it also gives them the choice to try before they buy, to play whilst waiting for a Sale or to play it without 'buying' it all - which is better for Consumers.

It maybe 'better' for Publishers who get 'more' money per Sale but that doesn't mean its 'better' for the Consumer who may not like the game and/or play it for more than an hour.

It's funny that 'SALES' focussed CEO's that are only focussed on their own Profits and not what's 'best' for the Customer are the ones that make these type of Statements. Game Pass model is not 'better' for Sony as its business model is Sales focussed with 'Services' more as an additional revenue route, MS is a more Service Driven Business with Sales being more additional - although Xbox was Sales driven until Phil Spencer merged it into Microsoft.

The Game Pass model does 'hurt' Sales of games when they are at their most expensive and most profitable for the Publisher. As Sony are Sales focussed, that 'hurts' their Business model but you can't argue that Day 1 releases in Game Pass for MS is better for Consumers/Gamers.

not even sure what hes trying to say here. for years, gold an plus was effectively the same exact thing. all anyone wanted it for was to just play online. the monthly freebies always a forgetable thing simply because people only have interest in what they're eyeing. not whats being handed to them. they'll buy what they want to buy. the gamepass service, an now the ps catalog, are really only there to entice people who never even gave those games a second thought. they was honestly never going to buy said game they'd try out on these sub services. the very purpose renting held in the 90s. try before you buy.

buy what you really want. try what looked or didn't look interesting. extend your reach in "try" an try to hook them into wanting your stuff.

this is basic consumer mentality.

Ok - I the guy that thinks that not only is GP sustainable but profitable. The porting of games to PS makes it even more so. MS will raise GP prices on a yearly basis but still makes an enormous amount of money. The fact it is also a great deal to gamers makes it a win win…what I do see is that games in the service are evolving to be longer to complete so that you are more inclined subscribe month after month… it’s no coincidence that these 50+ hour games are showing up in bucketloads

I still buy games. If a game on game pass has a premium upgrade I usually get it. I ditched the ps4 for a multitude of reasons and came back to pc and xbox platform. Love that they connect seamlessly. Game pass helps pay for development cost on games. It also gets games a bigger audience. So much of this world is unsustainable and we focus on game pass? More games are being made than ever before with lower barriers of entry for independent developers. Games are supposed to be fun. Why do I care about the business of it all when one of the biggest corporations is spearheading it? Even if gamepass ended tomorrow it’s not going to stop people from making games. People get hired and fired everyday and it’s a dream of most to work in a “creative” industry. Plenty of jobs out there but with probably less pay. Don’t blame game pass for that, this version of capitalism is unsustainable and game pass is a mere fraction of that.

"We know you like paying full price for games. Maybe even more than $80. It would be evil of us to take that away from you. Trust us, we're frend."

Also, how many games were canceled, and studios closed on sony's side? Game pass' fault?

Perhaps from Sony's point of view. From the gamer side, the PS+ is not good, and only offers minimal value. And over the past year or two more games have left then joined the service. And that includes the titles added to premium which are all classics Playstation titles that have been made backwards compatible on modern consoles.

I've always said the Sony service is better for the industry as a whole as it doesn't take away from initial game sales when they matter the most in the opening weeks, and as mentioned only boosts games down the line.

That said even if GP is damaging its already out there and you can't fault anyone for using it, if they feel its good value for them. My worry is a possible future where Subs replace hardware because at that point Sub prices will rocket as companies chase constant growth.

@Sol4ris I agree with you, I have a PS+ subscription paid upfront till next year and I don`t use it from almost a year, I have game pass paid for other 2 years and 8 months and I own 1000 games on Xbox ecosystem
I think they confuse "healthier" with anti-consumer

In theory, their argument seemed valid. However, in reality, considering the decline in game quality and release frequency of Sony's first-party game studios, it appears that Xbox is in the right.

I guess make the most GPU whilst it lasts as it is and at the current price.

I don’t think it’s a workable model as it is with the number of subscriptions. If it had at least treble then maybe, bust going publisher at least brings in some more money to help support GPU as it is.

Xbox own studios still need that amazing killer app subscription game. It has been great this year but they still haven’t delivered a game that gets the gamers and general public going I MUST HAVE. You now TOTK, Astro Bot etc.

It’s all great but not Amazing.

Let's put it this way, @Millionski, the powers at Microsoft will know whether Game Pass is viable, and they will also know whether subscriber numbers are increasing sufficiently to keep it going. I am absolutely certain that the past 8 months will have added more subscribers than probably the last 2 years combined before that. Nothing has demonstrated the value, to the user, of Game Pass more than since October last year. However, for the Service to keep growing, and for the new subscribers to remain subscribed, Microsoft need to keep knocking it out of the park, and that is where the challenge lies, because as much as they can keep adding their first party-content at a regular cadence, it has been hits like Blue Prince and Expedition 33 that has really shone recently, and neither of those was expected to be as phenomenal as they turned out to be. Arguably, Microsoft got lucky, because the vast amount of stuff they add scores between 6 and 8, not 8 and 10 (and remember, they are adding half what they used to, so chances of finding that hit are halved too).

Also, each time that Microsoft increase the price of Game Pass, there will be a number of people that decide that the price is just not worth it, and so it is finding that balance between finding new subscribers, keeping those that will pay the price no matter what, and covering the loses borne of people that choose to leave the Service.

Right now, Game Pass is on a real high, but 2022-2024 were not great years for the service. And so whilst we can look at it now and say that it is outstanding value, it cannot always viewed that way, and a price hike will make it less attractive still. I agree with you that a price hike is likely to be coming soon, probably within the next 3 months, but there is a risk that they price themselves beyond what many are willing to pay (particularly if they increase by a similar percentage to that applied to their hardware recently).

Ultimately, I stand by my comment that I can see the Service ending within the next 5 years, though I will add one cavate to that, which is that if they can keep the Service consistently at its current high quality, then just maybe it can keep going, but I just don't see Nadella propping up a failing part of his business with profits made elsewhere because in doing so, he is lessening the total amount of profits Microsoft are actually making. After all, Nadella has shown himself to be pretty ruthless.

The real question though, is how do you wind down a service like Game Pass when people have it stacked for years in advance...?

Maybe I'm just a pessimist, but I think the "budget" demographic will soon encompass the vast, vast majority of gamers, and there's nothing Sony or Microsoft can do to change that. Microsoft is however working to make Game Pass a viable option for the "budget" demographic, so Yoshida's criticisms here strike me as ignorant of the emerging financial reality for the lower and middle classes.

I completely agree with Mr Yoshida! It’s better to have games that you cannot buy in highest PS+ tier, and also some free games every month that you keep forever. That is the way to go to save the industry!

…well, I think he just wanted to say Game Pass is healthy, and PS+ is killing the industry.

He's right. But gamepass was born when the entire Xbox division was about to be shut down by Nadella. It's not from a position of power. It was a desperate attempt by a trillion dollar company to regain market share and relevance. It's easy for Sony to take this position because their hardware sells.

Uh in what era? I don't sub so I look on the outside and eh some fair changes over the years, others still who cares worthy. Also don't have to pay for Xbox save/other cloud storage, do for Nintendo/PS so I mean come on. XD

Also rest mode/updates/downloads is PS+, why? That's stupid. For betas/discounts sure. Rest Mode Updates. What lol. XD

In terms of games offered I mean it varies what customers want, if they don't want to buy a game then well those people are very Gamepass driven sure, Sony doesn't offer that.

Offering their big games years later (not a bad thing there) or briefly is a bit hit and miss. Brief availability is a bit dumb to me I think that's just stupid. They end up cheap or what many buy on the console if into what they offer besides the others that get whatever third parties so to me it's a bit strange there.

For monthly games I mean to me they can be $30 or less my region or bad and to me it's still who cares offerings.

Many Indies or others are fair but most audiences don't like them anyway. So to me the AAA bad ones get dumped on these services, while other times many are successes but go for cheap and then on the services.

So desperation, cheap, mix of games that work or don't and Indies many ignore when people pay for online mostly and the others are a bonus sure. But they still a usually pretty eh and that's besides I don't even like modern games so many of them I wouldn't even want anyway. XD

I mean if were talking PS Now it was pretty bad it had to have dramatic shifts for a reason even after buying up small companies with different business models for the tech, but nowadays I don't know, sure different business model changes but the prices are probably more clear then Xbox's offering, but otherwise eh the prices and what is offered differ.

Sony has more Japanese games so if into those sure, others may or may not appear on an Xbox from other region due to what deals the companies have or couldn't make.

Otherwise though to me most make no difference.

Other then PS+ has the PS2 games I want 'slowly' and many people go 'there is nothing here' when I see what I wanted niche games on there great.

Will many other niche ones I want probably not but even still. Xbox back compat program is over and focus on compatibility/perofrmance in the future and while that's fine the licenses by many companies or source code was the issue besides maybe team was like eh it's enough effort or licensing money. Which is sad as to me many could be on there even ABK games Activision is too lazy to offer or doesn't care about the IPs/source code for so that sucks.

At least Battle Engine Aquila PS2 came to PS4/5. Why no Xbox version prior Atari. Hmm.

I mean in a way both digital back compat can be bought which NSO doesn't offer at all.

Otherwise I mean Gamepass does what it can and didn't have as much of a dramatic shift as PS Now to later PS Now to PS+ expansion.

I don't need a Xbox subscription to get Cloud Storage would Cloud gaming but not basic Cloud Storage but then again Google's 15GB versus Apple and Microsoft's differs there too of even smaller then 15GB.

No idea what Xbox, Sony's or Nntendo's cloud storage is like for games/saves but Sony's seems to be pretty limited in number, then storage size as already seen it hit already by another user.

I don't care for subscriptions at all so to me as an outsider I go eh some are fair here, others not and I will never sub because none of it is compelling at all.

its not better for me