Xbox Cloud Gaming, once a vaunted lure for the Microsoft ecosystem, will soon cap players to 5-to-15 hours of base playtime per month based on the tier of their Xbox Game Pass membership.
In a blog post, Microsoft outlines substantial changes coming to its cloud gaming service. "Today, eligible Game Pass subscribers can stream without these monthly hour limits," it reads. But beginning in November, subscribers will only be able to stream games through the cloud for a few hours each month.
- 15 hours a month for Game Pass Ultimate
- 10 hours a month for Game Pass Premium
- 5 hours a month for Games Pass Essential
This is, you may have deduced, not a lot of monthly gaming time – half an hour per day on average. What happens when you run out of cloud gaming time? Well, you won't be able to play games through the cloud until the month rolls over. Of course, you could also upgrade your subscription to gain more time, or, in a show of "you'll own nothing and like it" rarely seen, you can buy more playtime.
"Players will be able to purchase cloud playtime hours through the XBOX Store and stream eligible games they own on supported devices," Microsoft clarifies. "This will provide another option for people who want occasional access to cloud gaming or do not want a recurring Game Pass subscription."
Microsoft says just 4% of Game Pass subscribers with heavy cloud use will be impacted by this change, which, assuming it's true to how players would describe an impact, suggests the feature isn't especially popular. This seems to tie into Microsoft's explanation for "why we're making these changes." The short version? Money.
"We're introducing this model because the cost of providing cloud gaming grows as more people use it and play for longer," Microsoft says. "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."
There's no getting around the optics here. In a world where people understandably resent, and will file lawsuits over, the obfuscation around digital game purchases amid the forced decline of physical games, paying for game time hour by hour is not going to win hearts and minds. "You are running out of playtime, please buy more" is the kind of offer you'd see a gaming subreddit cook up in some hyperbolic parody poster. And, well.
Xbox won some measure of good will with a disc-to-digital feature that could save delisted games, but this cloud gaming stance has renewed fears that – gasp – companies don't have your best interests in mind and our increasingly digital age will erode consumer rights if we let it.
