According to a recent tweet by Microsoft’s Frank X. Shaw, the gaming giant has seen record levels of engagement in their gaming platforms on Xbox One and PC. Xbox Live now has nearly 90 million monthly active users, and Xbox Game Pass has surpassed 10 million subscribers. Microsoft’s “Netflix for Games” has been steadily growing in appeal as a cheaper way for playing tons of games. With Xbox Live Gold and Game Pass bundled into one package, that could be the reason for increasing engagement numbers. Also, Microsoft is garnering a greater share of the PC marketplace with Xbox Game Pass for PC and most Xbox exclusives being playable on both consoles and PC.
We saw record engagement in gaming this quarter:
• Xbox Live has nearly 90 million monthly active users
• Xbox Game Pass has more than 10 million subscribers
• Project xCloud has 100s of thousands of active users in preview across 7 countries, with more coming— Frank X. Shaw (@fxshaw) April 29, 2020
These numbers could usher in a new era into gaming similar to what streaming services did for movies and TV. With triple-A titles being added to Game Pass like Red Dead Redemption 2, the feeling from a lot of gamers is that they barely need to buy games outright anymore and can simply stream a bunch for a low price. A new console generation is on the horizon, so it’s worth watching how much more Sony and Microsoft focus on game streaming than they did this generation. For gamers who value getting more for their money, this should be a welcome development in the gaming sphere.
If you’d like to read more about KeenGamer’s thoughts on game-streaming, you can read our piece on cloud gaming for more detailed analysis.
