Former Xbox exec says he’s ‘scared’ of Game Pass’s potential impact
Former Microsoft exec Ed Fries has expressed concern over the potential impact the company’s Game Pass subscription service could have on the games industry.
Speaking as part of a wider interview with Xbox Expansion Pass, Fries – who was part of the original Xbox launch team before his departure in 2004 – was asked what he would do were he still part of Microsoft’s gaming team today.
Fries didn’t give an explicit answer but said that he was ‘scared’ of the impact Game Pass could have, should it become a dominant business model like Spotify has in the music industry. He also made broad claims about Spotify’s impact on the music industry, some of which have been disputed by experts.
Xbox Game Pass launched in June 2017 and has become central to Microsoft’s gaming business, offering members access to over 100 titles for a monthly subscription fee.
As of January 2022, Game Pass has over 25 million subscribers, according to Microsoft, so it still has a long way to go before it reaches the level of Spotify (182m) and Netflix (222m). In fact, it was recently estimated that subscription services account for just 4% of annual games revenues in Europe and North America, compared to 65% of global music revenues.
Both Microsoft and PlayStation have said they don’t believe subscriptions will ever be the dominant model in video games. However, former MS exec Fries encouraged the platform holders to be “careful” over the business models they create.
“The one thing that they’re doing that makes me nervous is Game Pass,” he said. “Game Pass scares me because there’s a somewhat analogous thing called Spotify that was created for the music business.
“When Spotify took off it destroyed the music business, it literally cut the annual revenue of the
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