{"id":90839,"date":"2026-10-07T03:31:58","date_gmt":"2026-10-06T19:31:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=90839"},"modified":"2026-10-07T03:31:58","modified_gmt":"2026-10-06T19:31:58","slug":"previous-game-pass-strategy-sent-xbox-into-freefall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=90839","title":{"rendered":"Previous Game Pass Strategy Sent Xbox Into &#8216;Freefall&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"\">\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">It&#8217;s no secret that Xbox has had a rough time in 2026. With nearly 2,000 staff cut as part of sweeping layoffs and studio closures, Microsoft&#8217;s gaming business is in the middle of one of the most significant restructures in video game history. But what led Xbox to this point? According to CEO Asha Sharma, Game Pass played a key role. <\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">Today, in an internal memo obtained by Windows Central, Sharma reiterated that Microsoft&#8217;s Game Pass strategy sent Xbox&#8217;s balance sheet into &#8220;freefall.&#8221; Jez Corden, who initially reported on this memo, suggested that this was because of &#8220;the damage at both ends to Call of Duty and Xbox Game Pass.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">It&#8217;s easy to see why that may be the case. After Xbox bought Activision Blizzard for an eye-watering $69 billion and added Call of Duty to Game Pass, subscription costs skyrocketed, which likely scared away a lot of existing subscribers, and at the same time cut Call of Duty&#8217;s sales. After all, why spend $70 on the new Call of Duty when you can just buy a month&#8217;s subscription?<\/p>\n<p><output class=\"box-wrapper jsx-2673806401\" data-cy=\"article-slideshow\"><span data-cy=\"slideshow-view-trigger\"><\/p>\n<div data-cy=\"slideshow-preview\" class=\"jsx-1711207865 slideshow-preview\">\n<h3 class=\"title5 jsx-62124236 jsx-1085005187\" data-cy=\"slideshow-preview-title\">Every Video Game Franchise Xbox Owns After Acquiring Activision Blizzard<\/h3>\n<div data-cy=\"slideshow-images-container\" class=\"jsx-1711207865 images-container\"><button type=\"button\" data-cy=\"hero-image\" aria-label=\"Open Slideshow\" class=\"jsx-1711207865 hero-image\"><img alt=\"\" aria-hidden=\"true\" decoding=\"async\" role=\"presentation\" class=\"progressive-image jsx-2277167929 image aspect-ratio aspect-ratio-16-9 jsx-2605834259 jsx-2338608387 hover-opacity\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP\/\/\/yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7\" data-cy=\"progressive-image\"\/><\/button><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/output><\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">But for all the doom and gloom of Game Pass&#8217;s consequences, Sharma suggested that Xbox is on the way up. In the memo, Sharma said: &#8220;We&#8217;re making the right decisions to reinvest in the business, after an all time low, we&#8217;ve started to return to growth, more than 2 to 3 times what we were, and we expect that to continue.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">In the past Sharma has made statements suggesting that Xbox needs to reach more than 1 billion people each day. And while Xbox probably isn&#8217;t hitting those numbers any time soon, the reported return to growth shows the company is, financially at least, heading in the right direction. It probably doesn&#8217;t hurt that Blizzard&#8217;s World of Warcraft: Forever looks like a hit. <\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">It seems like Xbox is going to work to make Game Pass more accessible in the future too, though with a few catches. Last month, there were rumors that Microsoft would be introducing new tiers of Game Pass without the day one launches, both with and without ads. Around the same time, Microsoft also filed a patent that would suspend your game in order to show you an ad for additional game time.<\/p>\n<p><output class=\"box-wrapper jsx-2673806401\" data-cy=\"article-video\"\/><\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">If Microsoft was able to introduce these changes at a low enough price point, it could expand Game Pass by simply being a more affordable way to play games. Those rumors last month suggested the ad-supported tier would be $12.99, which seems high for such a subscription, especially when the base price is $9.99 right now. But if Microsoft was able to lower its asking price, a more limited ad-supported Game Pass could absolutely bring in new players, which does seem to be Sharma&#8217;s goal.<\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">When Sharma announced the Xbox layoffs in the summer, she admitted that Game Pass had failed to grow as Microsoft had expected.<\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">\u201cOur business today is not healthy,\u201d Sharma said at the time. \u201cWe are operating at margins that are 3-10x lower than comparable platform and publishing businesses. We entered Gen 9 with a smaller install base and a higher cost structure. To grow, we bet on Game Pass, multi-platform, and a broader portfolio of content. While those businesses have created meaningful value, they did not grow at the pace we expected. As that happened, our core business weakened, and we added more teams, more investment, and more time, hoping for a better outcome. And now the industry is facing the most severe hardware crisis in its history. We must reset Xbox.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><span data-cy=\"tierlist-view-trigger\"><\/p>\n<section class=\"box-wrapper jsx-2673806401\" id=\"xbox-games-series-tier-list\" data-cy=\"xbox-games-series-tier-list\"\/><\/span><\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">The <u>Wall Street Journal<\/u> said that Microsoft had expected Game Pass subscriptions to hit around 77 million this year, but it currently has only about 30 million. As revealed during the FTC vs Microsoft trial of 2023, Microsoft had hoped for 100 million subscribers by 2030, which seems very unlikely at this stage.<\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">One of the first decisions Sharma made after replacing former Xbox boss Phil Spencer was to cut the price of Game Pass and pull Call of Duty out as a day one title. Sharma recently told <u>Bloomberg<\/u> that Xbox had &#8220;been able to reset Game Pass after an eight-month decline.&#8221; &#8220;It\u2019s now returned to growth and expanding retention,&#8221; she added, &#8220;and most importantly, we&#8217;re starting to get back to being closer to our players and our community.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">Still, the future of Game Pass is unclear. Will Microsoft eventually pull all its games out of the subscription as day one launches? Will Bethesda&#8217;s The Elder Scrolls 6 launch day one on Game Pass? Will the next mainline Halo game? Could we see Game Pass become more like Sony\u2019s PlayStation Plus, which does not launch first-party games day one?<\/p>\n<p><span data-cy=\"poll-view-trigger\"><\/p>\n<section class=\"box-wrapper jsx-2673806401\"\/><\/span><output class=\"box-wrapper jsx-2673806401\" data-cy=\"author-sign-off\"><\/p>\n<section class=\"author-sign-off\" data-cy=\"author-sign-off\"><span class=\"stack jsx-59817748 jsx-1927875859\"><\/p>\n<div class=\"rounded jsx-444076027 jsx-1730475047 profile-thumb jsx-2141281959 aspect-ratio aspect-ratio-1-1\"><img alt=\"Jacqueline Thomas Avatar\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"progressive-image profile-thumb-img jsx-249361588 jsx-2338608387 expand\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/assets-prd.ignimgs.com\/avatars\/640f55c4f3866b000174a9c6\/RD5zbE5b_400x400-1679594933868.jpg?crop=1%3A1&amp;width=56&amp;format=jpg&amp;auto=webp&amp;quality=80 1x, https:\/\/assets-prd.ignimgs.com\/avatars\/640f55c4f3866b000174a9c6\/RD5zbE5b_400x400-1679594933868.jpg?crop=1%3A1&amp;width=56&amp;dpr=2&amp;format=jpg&amp;auto=webp&amp;quality=80 2x\" data-cy=\"progressive-image\"\/><\/div>\n<p><span class=\"stack jsx-2509706801 jsx-3630940851\"><\/p>\n<div class=\"interface jsx-1132626198 sign-off-text\">\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\"><em>Jackie Thomas is the Senior Tech Editor at IGN and the PC components queen. She&#8217;s been covering gaming hardware for more than a decade for IGN, TechRadar, Gizmodo, PC Gamer and more. You can follow her\u00a0<\/em><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/jackiecobra\" class=\"link jsx-1337145738 jsx-3925284146 underlined\" data-cy=\"styled-link\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer noopener noreferrer\"><em>@Jackiecobra<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/span><\/section>\n<p><\/output><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><br \/>\n<center><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ign.com\/articles\/previous-game-pass-strategy-sent-xbox-into-freefall-ceo-asha-sharma-reportedly-tells-staff\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Read Full Article At Source <\/a><br \/>\n<center\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s no secret that Xbox has had a rough time in 2026. With nearly 2,000 staff cut as part of sweeping layoffs and studio closures,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":61779,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[31201,258,1541,5634,5753,162],"class_list":["post-90839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tech-gadgets-reviews","tag-freefall","tag-game","tag-pass","tag-previous","tag-strategy","tag-xbox","wpcat-32-id"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=90839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/61779"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=90839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=90839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=90839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}