FTC says I told you judge, I warned you bro, as it unloads on Microsoft for Game Pass price hikes and 'a degraded product' that it says break promises made to seal the Activision merger
Are you upset about the recent Game Pass price hike? Well, good news: so is the mighty American state. Or part of it, anyway. The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the country's antitrust and consumer protection watchdog, has submitted a filing to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in which it attacks Microsoft for «introducing a degraded product» with its new Game Pass Standard tier.
If you're not up to speed, Microsoft announced just over a week ago that it was overhauling its Game Pass subscription tiers across console and PC. Here's a quick breakdown of what changed:
You don't have to be an antitrust lawyer to realise that's a bit of a raw deal: The whole kit and kaboodle is getting more expensive and some tiers are even losing features in the process.
That's what's gotten the FTC so riled up. In its filing, the agency notes that a current Xbox Game Pass for Console user wanting to keep their day-one games «must pay 81% more to switch to 'Game Pass Ultimate,'» and for anyone not willing to do that «Microsoft is introducing a degraded product,» by which it means Xbox Game Pass Standard, which still «costs 36% more than Console Game Pass, and withholds day-one releases.»
The filing is just part of the FTC's larger campaign against Microsoft's merger with Activision Blizzard, which finally closed last October. It seems remarkably unlikely—now that Activision and Microsoft are officially intertwined—that the merger will be rolled back, but the FTC's not giving in without a fight.
In the filing, the agency notes «Microsoft’s price increases and product degradation—combined with Microsoft’s reduced investments in output and product quality via employee layoffs,» and calls them «the hallmarks of a firm exercising market power post-merger.»
It also notes that Microsoft sure forgot to mention this when it was talking a big game about the acquisition giving Game Pass subs day-one access to new CoDs. The FTC says, «Microsoft promised that 'the acquisition would benefit
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