r/gaming 9h ago

Xbox Game Pass Plans with Cloud Playtime Limits Live Now

Post image

See for yourself
$9.99 = 5 hours/month
$14.99 = 10 hours/month
$22.99 - 15 hours/month
https://www.xbox.com/en-US/xbox-game-pass

1.5k Upvotes

508 comments sorted by

577

u/Maniick 9h ago

5 hours a month??? why even include it

207

u/TehOwn 6h ago

Hey man, you'll play your 10 minutes a day and enjoy it, even though it's not even enough time to earn your daily play rewards.

66

u/Adventurous-Hunter98 4h ago

New tier bonus added

  • for extra $200 month, ai can play your games on the background so you can enjoy your 10 minutes more than ever. /s

12

u/bigmonmulgrew 4h ago

Did a project for fun where I got AI to play bomberman and this comment makes me realise I may have helped create something evil.

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22

u/Orange_Tang 3h ago

It's really a laughable amount. That's what I'd expect to get in a free trial a couple years ago.

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15

u/Eat--The--Rich-- 3h ago

15 hours a month??? Why even include it.

2

u/Alib902 59m ago

Yeah honestly thinking about why would someone even bother trying this service there's litterally no point

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1.1k

u/Iggy_Slayer 9h ago

The biggest news here was them basically admitting no one uses this service to begin with. They said they estimate only 4% of their subscribers will be affected by this, and that's just gamepass subs not all of xbox.

624

u/GracefulGoron 9h ago

First they came for the cloud gamers and I did not speak up, because I did not have a headset.

137

u/spyinthesky 8h ago

Or I didn’t speak cause who the fuck uses cloud gaming. It’s hella slow and awful

11

u/StoryAndAHalf 7h ago

I played Like a Dragon games while at my folk's place. They go to sleep early, so I had nothing better to do. Surprisingly snappy and didn't have any issues with input. The worst was waiting to connect for 2-5 minutes, but after that, never disconnected or anything.

e: the word games to lower case as that's not part of the title

5

u/IllustriousBar1440 5h ago

Yeah I didn't have my console for some time and used xcloud to play Fortnite. Was actually really good and snappy.

51

u/Nasugi 8h ago

My cousin uses it to play modern games on his xbox one, like expedition 33

49

u/Bagz402 8h ago

.... how do you play a reaction based game on cloud

27

u/PsychoticDreemurr 7h ago

Negative ping?

8

u/FitN3rd 5h ago

I did it and it was exceptionally frustrating. Parry was effectively not an option and dodging was extremely difficult and sometimes felt random whether it would lag/stutter or not.

0/10 would never do again

4

u/Graveyard_01 6h ago

The thing is, the timing is always gonna be the same for a given ping. So bro just has to react ever so slightly early every time. Something games like Elden ring and expedition 33 should be fine.

Something like apex legends or cod though… nah that’s just impossible

3

u/BsyFcsin 3h ago

I probably would play those games better with lag. I always parried too soon.

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27

u/BakedWizerd PC 8h ago

Some games are only playable on PC via cloud gaming.

I used to use it for the NHL games when I had game pass.

6

u/JP76 7h ago

Xbox app on PC has a whole tab dedicated to cloud gaming and just last month, they expanded cloud gaming to smart-TVs from HiSense.

3

u/JoushMark 5h ago

Then some people used it and they got the giant bill for the resources it uses, and ran directly to the subscriptions to add a pay-per-minute charge to it.

2

u/StoryAndAHalf 7h ago

I also used it on my Steam Deck thanks to Edge app. It's a bit awkward to set up, and I had some issues where I had to go into Desktop Mode to sign in, but after going back to regular deck mode, it was fine.

7

u/mrjamjams66 7h ago

I don't own any device that can play a modern Xbox game.

While I don't keep an active subscription, a few times a year I've done a month so I can play Starfield from my phone via streaming. I also like to play ESO and Fallout 76 during these times.

I'll easily use 15 hours within a weekend.

Guess it's a good thing Starfield came to PS5 finally....

2

u/TehOwn 7h ago

Wait a minute... Is GTA VI going to be available through cloud gaming?

Maybe they were anticipating a huge demand and wanted to cash in. Or maybe they figured those people will just buy an Xbox.

I honestly have no idea but the timing is interesting.

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2

u/buffalowteens 7h ago

only thing i used it for. we played more than 15 hours in a couple weekends. its so grubby

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7

u/shinikahn 3h ago

I think the point is if you don't take a stance against a terrible move just because it doesn't affect you personally, at some point you will be affected and somebody won't care about you because maybe it doesn't affect them personally. If people were more united, companies wouldn't be able to duck over us so easily.

What goes around comes around.

10

u/Albireookami 8h ago

Its better in nations where the servers are in a good spot and the internet doesn't suck

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5

u/RSGMercenary 7h ago

I used it on vacation on an AirBnB's WiFi recently. I played some games on my laptop while my friends went to the beach cause I hate salt and sand lol. It was okay. Playable, but had some hiccups. I wouldn't recommend playing anything competitive, and I definitely wouldn't HDMI to a TV cause the combined input delay is outrageous!

2

u/cookiehacker 5h ago

I use it, its super fast. But I have 10gb internet.

2

u/BayAreaFox 5h ago

It’s not slow….im even able to play platformers on it. I use it to test a game out to see if its worth downloading

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u/Mikahl757 7h ago

Then they came for the digital gamers, capping monthly bandwidth downloads even for games you "own" to 1,000Gb/800Gb/500Gb/Mo. If you needed more for the month you pay a la carte.

101

u/ZenoSeraph 9h ago

4% may seem small. But reports dating back to 2024 have total gamepass subscribers at 30m+. That 4% effects over 1mil people who are actively benefitting from the unlimited model, who will now be forced to pay a premium just to play their games.

5

u/HUNplaymore 5h ago

They won't pay by the hour, this change will simply remove them from the ecosystem and deter potential subscribers.

9

u/UltraNoahXV 8h ago

Would like to also consider this hits anyone who probably doesn't have the best internet or is always traveling on the road. I know some folks who work corporate but have to take a plane across states (here in the U.S) or live in trailer parks that aren't necessarily the best for mobile 5g internet.

2024

Think about how many people bought the Series S in years prior before the price hikes too; Xbox went from being almost the best deal in gaming to the worst in 3 if not 4 years.

31

u/BilllisCool 8h ago

Anyone with bad internet would have a bad time cloud gaming and probably aren't doing it, so this wouldn't affect them.

12

u/Invadingpizza 8h ago

You'd be surprised, I have terrible internet but when it first came out I used game pass alot because it was waaaay faster than attempting to download large game files that would legit take 3 days. After the initial connection the gamepass games streamed great.

3

u/lioncat55 8h ago

That's more of a bandwidth issue for you. You could get 25mbit/s down and 3 up, but if it's stable and reasonable ping It'll be just fine streaming the game.

I've tried streaming a game to my phone while on the move and it's very hit or miss.

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63

u/Abaddonalways Console 8h ago

You are top comment, so I'm gonna piggy back off of you. Sorry not sorry.

Everyone acting like this isn't a big deal, need to take a moment to actually think.

What if other "streaming services" decide this is a good model? Would you be ok with Netflix, Disney+, HBO Max, or Prime Video limiting streaming time to 15 hours a month? What about spotify, apple music, audible? What about YouTube?

Just because it does not effect you now, does not mean it won't.

14

u/Ashmizen 8h ago

It’s not streaming its hardware costs. Specifically, the GPU to run these beefy games at better than 1080p are top end ones that can also handle AI. You know, the expensive, profitable AI tokens that are making billions of dollars and everyone is scrambling to build data centers to serve.

Microsoft is one of them, and they realized they could make billions with their xcloud datacenter repurposed to Azure AI instead of being utilized by 4% of gamepass subs that use it as unlimited compute.

8

u/Abaddonalways Console 8h ago

None of that wall of text actually answers what I said. That "4%" being thrown around is over a million users.

Would you be just as passive if other streaming services decide that they should do the same thing?

18

u/soyboysnowflake 7h ago

>passive

What am I supposed to do? Boycott a product I already haven’t purchased in years?

If other streaming services follow suit I’d cancel my subscription

If any of those million subscribers impacted by this doesn’t cancel, they ARE the problem

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3

u/JP76 7h ago

Cloud uses Xbox hardware. It's not usable for any kind of AI work.

2

u/[deleted] 5h ago

[deleted]

3

u/JP76 2h ago

Not all GPUs are created equal, when it comes to AI workloads. Nvidia is the clear leader here. Amd has some models that can do Ai, but Xbox's GPU ain't it.

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19

u/Mr_Suplex 9h ago

I’m reminded of how absurd it was that cloud gaming was stated as the reason to block the Activision acquisition. 😂 🤡

3

u/E3FxGaming 4h ago

For reference Nvidia set a 100 hour / month cap on GeForce Now cloud streaming and up to 15 hours unused hours can be carried over into the next month.

Nvidia says 100 hours per month playtime limits affect 6% of their users.

I think on Gamepass the 4% at 15 hours figure stems from many Gamepass subscribers not using cloud gaming at all, but it would be terrible if they use the median instead of the overall average amount of playtime as a basis for their 15 hour limit.

2

u/Street-You-422 6h ago

4% of players use more than the alotted amount of time

3

u/Cloud_N0ne 9h ago

No wonder nobody uses it. $23 per month and you only get 15 hours? Who is this even for?

9

u/spellinbee 8h ago

The 15 hours thing is new, you used to be play unlimited amounts streaming. (and technically that hasn't even kicked in yet, they said it would start in November, so that wouldn't cause people to have historically not used it)

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140

u/CrimsonBeherit 9h ago

15h/month is a joke

3

u/JaxxisR 23m ago

Cloud gaming is kind of a joke to begin with.

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407

u/simagus 9h ago

15hrs is one weekend for "serious" gamers. They must have run the metrics and think it's viable, but unless they are charging pennies on additional hours that's going to tank hard.

178

u/DaRealBurnz 9h ago

Granted, "serious" gamers likely will have their own setups and would be mostly using that instead

33

u/Wootai 9h ago

This exactly! Cloud gaming is best for when you’re away from your main setup, or want to test out a game without installing. That’s my main use case. I’ll basically play every gamepass game as it’s released for a few hours on cloud before deciding if it’s worth clearing space to download or not.

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3

u/drugsbowed 8h ago

I tried cloud gaming on my TV and it was decent for something like TMNT Shredder's Revenge, but playing Expedition 33 was a laggy mess.

I think this "limit" is overblown, but I think they should be doing something to make it feel "compensated" for, like a reduction in price.

8

u/TheRealK95 6h ago

I got a good setup but not everyone does. Especially with prices these days. Cloud gaming let me play the latest games with family members who had good internet but no Xbox. If this really impacted only 4% of their business, why do it? It’s a major blow to that 4%. At least consider unlimited for your “ultimate” plan. It’s just greedy, and I know it’ll cost a few subs in my family for sure

7

u/Moscato359 6h ago

It's one day, not one weekend 

2

u/PatSajaksDick 6h ago

Truly I think they noticed it ate into console sales, you literally never have to buy a console if all you do is GamePass and cloud gaming. It seemed kinda crazy actually.

9

u/PanamGotMeOiledUp 9h ago

Any person that seriously gaming isn't using cloud play.

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3

u/Riff_28 9h ago

No serious gamer is limited to cloud play

4

u/Abaddonalways Console 9h ago

Because the series s/x (launch models) has the space for 4 AAA games, and if you play more games than that you can't be a "serious gamer"?

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203

u/Retrostaircase72 9h ago

“Sorry boys, I can’t play tomorrow. I gotta go to work and earn some Microsoft play hours”

70

u/Dyne4R 8h ago

PLEASE DRINK VERIFICATION CAN

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110

u/aceofspadesx1 9h ago

Step 1. Make terrible changes that exploit and extract money from your most dedicated players.

Step 2. Walk them back halfway saying you are listening to the fans and apologize.

Step 3. Get people to accept the halfway, which is what you really wanted in the first place.

They did the same thing with raising GP prices last year and got applauded despite still raising it. They will change this to 30-50 hours and get applause.

18

u/Dull_Mirror4221 8h ago

Rinse and repeat

3

u/sklova 2h ago

“We hear you …”

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u/CosmicOwl47 8h ago

So this completely kills cloud, right?

A couple years ago I was helping my buddy set up his new TV, and it had the new (at the time) XCloud app on it. He signed in and connected a controller and we were playing Forza on the cloud just like that. I thought it was a glimpse into the future where consoles would be optional. Basically Stadia but with all the established Xbox infrastructure and your account.

With time limits like this that vision is dead. $22.99 for 15 hours of playtime is terrible. Cloud will just be relegated to the handy feature you can use while traveling.

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u/PointlesslyLongName0 9h ago

It's because they have to use their infrastructure to make AI slop instead

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u/kinokomushroom 9h ago

15 hours is half an hour per day lmao

17

u/Julch 8h ago

Dude 15h is at most like Fri-Sun for a loooooooooooooot of the gaming community. Sheesh a new poe2 league ppl blow that in a day easily. Wtf rofl xD

6

u/wyldmage 8h ago

And that's the real problem.

As they said, this affects only 4% of their users. But that 4% use it A LOT. And it's going to be incredibly restrictive for those players.

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128

u/EIDuderino 9h ago

These companies are just playing hot potato with who can disappoint their install base more at this point

21

u/ToastyXD 8h ago

It’s no longer console wars, it’s a console rat race to the bottom

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u/Joustiin76 9h ago edited 9h ago

ah yes a 5th of my monthly playtime for $23

8

u/ChellHole 9h ago

Looks like I got out in time

22

u/ph33randloathing 9h ago

Oh boy, but they get reward points!

10

u/TheGentlemanCEO 8h ago

Don’t sleep on reward points.

I’ve spent about $600 of Microsoft’s money over a couple years of not so serious earning

2

u/Palemka91 3h ago

Yea, if you live in US it's probably infinitely more useful. In my country I never could get Xbox cards as rewards, just weird overpriced discounts for non-gaming related stuff. I also never could earn points by playing games, just clicking on the browser thing.

25

u/RDGOAMS 9h ago

who the fuck is paying for this shit???

8

u/ZigyDusty 8h ago

They are paying for Gamepass to play the games and some will occasionally use the cloud feature on the side, nobody's subscribing just to use cloud.

6

u/klingma 4h ago

I absolutely subscribe just to use cloud lol 

Being able to play 400+ games without needing to download them has been amazing. 

2

u/Abaddonalways Console 2h ago

4% (number given by Microsoft) = 1 million users

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u/Synth-Pro 9h ago

Everybody's already got the "This is shit" base covered

But... "Live Now"? Here I thought they said this wasn't in effect until November.

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u/Thebaldsasquatch 9h ago

I used to use this on my phone from work. A couple times I hit that 15 in 2 weeks, especially towards the end of the year when it’s slow

6

u/ball_fondlers 8h ago

Genuinely, what is the future of gaming? New gen AAA games cost the GDP of a small nation to create and publish from one of a handful of megastudios that will lay off half the team and get sold to Saudi Arabia regardless of how well the finished product does, all to run like shit on anything other than hardware that costs $2k minimum. Seems like you need $1k for a rig that can turn low graphics settings into playable FPS, and consoles are about to break that ceiling as well. I know no one wanted cloud gaming, and it’s good that it’s failing past the point of commercial viability, but like…are we even going to have video games that run on devices other than cell phones in 20 years?

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u/cheezkid26 PC 7h ago

15 hours per months is kinda crazy

8

u/AReptileHissFunction 9h ago

We used to just buy games and have a whole collection of PS1 and PS2 boxes on our shelves that we could play anytime.

2

u/hagren 3h ago

And you can still do that ^^

8

u/b1zz901 8h ago

15 hours a month holy hell. If anyone paid for cloud gaming they are now gone.

2

u/Secret_Ingenuity997 4h ago

I don't have a current gen console. I only just bought premium for the first time two days ago specifically for cloud gaming

51

u/KeepRockband5Alive 9h ago

This is actually insane.

They gotta be trying to sunset xbox

33

u/OhMyTummyHurts 9h ago

Anything to chase the AI bandwagon nobody wants except upper management

3

u/RecentMatter3790 8h ago

tuxedo people

2

u/TehOwn 6h ago

When is it going to start paying off? All these supposed productivity gains haven't materialised in this industry at all.

We've seen great things done by AI in medical research and material sciences but in gaming the best we've seen is upscaling.

7

u/catptain-kdar 9h ago

Why does this give you that impression?

4

u/uhFraid 7h ago

reddit moment

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u/Valhadmar 8h ago

Jesus. I wont be purchasing an xbox pass again. I dont have an xbox so I used my phone to play games through the clouds, that weren't available on my other console.

There a few others I know who did it as well. Im not paying $25 bucks for 15 hours of game time, when i usually play Jrpgs.

5

u/Tolendario 7h ago

just axe the service at that point,

5

u/Electrik_Truk 7h ago

Should be way higher for Ultimate. Understandable it's lower for cheaper tiers

4

u/metalsatch 7h ago

I don’t get it, if no one is even using cloud gaming that much, why even announce they are capping it?

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u/LaughteRx 7h ago

Rant inbound. It genuinely feels like Microsoft can’t announce good Xbox news without some kind of bad news showing up a few days later. Xbox announces something exciting? Awesome. Now we’ll just have to wait for the other shoe to drop.
•A great game announcement is followed by a delay.
•A promising showcase is followed by studio closures and layoffs.
•A big Xbox update comes with some frustrating catch.
•A win for the ecosystem somehow gets paired with news that makes you question where things are headed.

Maybe that’s why I and so many other Xbox fans that I know have become so cynical. It’s not necessarily that we don’t appreciate the good things Microsoft is doing. It’s that we’ve been conditioned to wait for the bad news.

When Xbox announced the disc-to-digital program at Gamescom, I was genuinely excited. It was the kind of announcement that felt like a win for consumers and a reminder that Microsoft can still do things that make Xbox fans feel heard. But then that little voice came creeping up in the back of my head: “okay… what’s coming next?”

Flash forward a couple of days later and as many of you probably saw today, Xbox announced changes to cloud gaming that will introduce time limits based on Game Pass tiers. Regardless of where you personally stand on the change, it became yet another example of positive Xbox news being followed almost immediately by something that shifts the conversation in a negative direction.

And that’s what frustrates me the most. As a longtime Xbox fan, I’m tired of feeling like every good announcement comes with an expiration date. I want to be able to celebrate something Xbox does without immediately wondering what announcement is waiting around the corner to sour it.

To be clear, this isn’t me saying that Xbox isn’t doing anything right. There’s so much to be excited about and I’ve been encouraged by what Asha has shown in her first few months in leadership. There’s a lot to like, and I genuinely want to see this new era succeed. That’s precisely why this is so disappointing. I had hoped we might finally be moving away from this cycle of (Good news > excitement > bad news > damage control > repeat.)

Xbox fans shouldn’t have to brace themselves every time Microsoft gives us something to celebrate. We shouldn’t have to celebrate with one eye on the announcement and the other looking for the inevitable catch.Sometimes, Xbox fans just want the good news to be good news. No asterisk*, No “but wait…”, and No more bad-news announcement a few days later.

Just let us have the win. Please.

16

u/TheDangerousDavid 9h ago

Microslop can chew on my bussy 🤬

9

u/timey_wimeyy 8h ago

It is infuriating that the highest tier only gives 15 hours a month.

My Xbox is on a TV upstairs so I regularly stream games on my Samsung TV in our family room. This sucks.

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u/TheGentlemanCEO 8h ago

How does this impact remote play to your console?

Is that included in the cloud play time?

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u/DuckyMcQuackerson 8h ago

This is what I’d like to know. I usually connect to remote play while working in the other room to play console games not on pc.

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u/iminabed 8h ago

I stopped laying for gamepass a while back now but for a while it was such a great deal. This just solidifies it. So dumb. Might hit a pc only pass every once in a while for new games but that’s it. Not a recurring membership that’s for sure.

3

u/Vamparisen 8h ago

They had to do this the day after i figured out I could stream on my steam deck...

3

u/Pogotothego 8h ago

Anything is an Xbox!... Until it isn't.

3

u/NeverNotOnceEver 8h ago

Is cloud gaming just streaming games?

3

u/NIDORAX 8h ago

$22.99 per month to play cloud gaming for max of 15 hours before you get charged extra per hour is a bloody rip off. They think cloud gaming is like using water, electricity and gas.

3

u/AlwaysChewy 7h ago

So if buying the console is too expensive and renting the console is expensive and only gets you 15 hours/month, who tf they think it's gonna be playing their games in a few years?

3

u/xKazIsKool 7h ago

Literally just got this shit yesterday because it's the only way to play gears of war 3 on pc besides emulation, and then they do this shit. Go fuck yourselves.

3

u/kdropk 7h ago

One of the biggest reasons I had Ultimate was the ability to stream gamepass games to my Mac when Im not by my gaming pc.

3

u/ITCHYisSylar 6h ago

Total BS.  Better to scrap Xbox Cloud completely.

Only reason Im subbed to Game Pass now is cause it was included with my Rog Ally (already canceled to turn off reoccuring billing).  If I paid for it, id cancel now and request a refund, if I couldn't be grandfathered in until end of subscription.

Xbox Cloud was neat when it started many years ago.  But it failed to improve and compete against cloud competition.  It is total crap by comparison.

You are better off getting PC Game Pass, linking yiur account to Nvidia, and playing on Geforce Now.  Which is the ONLY way I will ever pay for Game Pass going forward, and probably wont even do that.  

3

u/Kremsi2711 6h ago

15h in the highest tier?

15h per month is nothing

3

u/chaoseffect616 2h ago

Paying for a service, and then having a time limit put on said service is peak dystopia.

3

u/haushunde 2h ago

This is how you can tell no one in that office plays games.

3

u/grope_da_pope 1h ago

Someone explain this to me.. If you get Game Pass... can you download the games and play them as much as you want?

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u/h8unt3d 9h ago

I wished it worked long enough to play 15 hours….

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u/InsideyourBrizzy 7h ago

There we're definitely people using cloud as their Xbox. Thats dead now. 

7

u/AscendedViking7 9h ago

Fuck the cloud

2

u/121jigawatts 8h ago

Pathetic

2

u/Dull_Mirror4221 8h ago

That’s literally a weekend worth of gaming session. Wtf! Pay 22+ dollars to only play half an hour a day lmao this is so garbage!

2

u/DrunkLastKnight 8h ago

I'd use cloud gaming more if it worked on my Xbox

2

u/FascismIsSoLastYear 8h ago

No one can afford anything anymore, so let's price gouge them. Microslop made over 100 billion in profit last year. Suck them dry is their new motto.

2

u/AstronomerEasy7223 8h ago

Just proving more and more that gaming centralization away from personal machines is the worst choice overall. I understand the increasing prices of everything is prohibitive, but it really is the only way where you still have any level of control. Also outside of slower paced games I still don't know how people deal with the latency.

2

u/CJDistasio 7h ago

They tried to make it sound good and the future but didn't even hit their acquisition goals before they had to implement their enshitification plan. A nice failure all around. Play any RPG on the cloud it will take you a few months...unless you pay extra!

2

u/PoohMyTigger 7h ago

Well, Xbox could make worse decisions. When I think of something I'll update this comment.

2

u/Instigator187 7h ago

I can see it as they are just getting ready for the next Xbox in order to have a better priced console for the consumer, it will have a cloud based option that requires very little hardware compared to a full next Gen system.

But, it will require a subscription to Gamepass and they will limit how much you can play before charging you more.

You can pick between the $1000+ model or the $300 model that will charge you extra monthly to game over 15hrs. (Made up numbers, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was something like this).

2

u/Neuroticaine 7h ago

So basically cloud play doesn't exist, got it.

2

u/accurate_seahorn 6h ago

Fuck, I loved long hours of streaming Horizon 6. My 8 year old laptop cant run such a heavy game.

I normally play for about an hour per day so this isn't going to work out.......

Fuuuuuuuuck

2

u/JAXxXTheRipper 6h ago

What are these stupid limits? 5 hours a month??

What gamer plays only 5 hours a month? Who is this unicorn?

It's not a shocker that Microsoft is disconnected from their users, but this is incredibly useless now. 5 hours, lmao

2

u/GraysonG263 PlayStation 6h ago

How did gaming come to this

2

u/ubitub 4h ago

But it's ALSO locally, right? Did anyone actually ever use the cloud games?

2

u/Slackeee_ 4h ago

But you have to understand, Microsoft needs that compute capacity for the more serious task of making sure that the AI in your notepad works!

2

u/Mineplayerminer 3h ago

Imagine paying for the fucking ultimate tier and getting only 15 hours of playtime per month. That's 30 minutes per day. You'll basically deplete the plan in 3 days if you plan to play a story game.

2

u/mrnonamex 3h ago

If essential was 15 hours a month it wouldn’t be that bad

Ultimate should at least be 30. If not 50

2

u/Deliriousious 2h ago

I could understand maybe limiting to 5 hours a day.

Maybe even every week…

But 5 hours a month?! What’s the fucking point?!

Having monthly caps I can get, but even at 15 hours… what the actual fuck…

2

u/Zyntastic 1h ago

I think the time limit, especially so low (15h is nothing in a month) is ridiculous. Imagine netflix, Disney etc started saying you can only watch 15 episodes per month. Or 5 hours or whatever.

2

u/LlorchDurden 1h ago

Sony: "you will own nothing"
Microsoft: "you will play nothing"

2

u/Momo-Velia 1h ago

Lmao, who’s paying for that sh*t?

2

u/JiffTheJester 57m ago

That is honestly fucking insane lol

2

u/SMYLTY 40m ago

In our home we use xbox cloud gaming quite often, probably 20+ hours per week between me and the kids. The benefit had been not taking up storage for a game only one person plays, allowing storage to be used for large install games such a COD. We have a fibre connection, so the speed and quality is fantastic. Really shame that cloud is being sacrificed for AI.

2

u/Bigd1979666 33m ago

Wow. 3.75 hours per week?! What can I even play with so little time ? 

3

u/DawnOfSilence 8h ago

15 hours per month, lmao. What utter trash.

2

u/vapor_elessar 5h ago

No one cares about cloud gaming anyway, good riddance

2

u/Tellenit 8h ago

Wait so is PC gamepass a good deal again?

3

u/Dunge 8h ago

Always has been

2

u/Weasel699 8h ago

i think i run 2 games off the cloud so this is stupid

2

u/Krazyflipz 8h ago

It's basically a worthless service now. Wild decisions.

2

u/Worldly-Basil-8933 6h ago

I play 15 hours of Path of Exile in like 3-4 days.

2

u/annaleigh13 4h ago

Cool, looks like I don't need to resubscribe starting next month. Was really good for when I wanted to play console only games, now screw it.

1

u/FantasySuperhero000 9h ago

Local gaming: $0.00 = Infinite hours/month

1

u/Easy_Jux 9h ago

I tried cloud once awhile ago and the games are always stuttering or the screen would get all pixelated and weird. Haven’t touched it since

5

u/Abaddonalways Console 8h ago

I use it daily to play games like Cyberpunk, Fortnite, Mass Effect LE, Halo MCC, Fallout 4 (modded), Warframe, Phasmophobia, or Dead by Daylight. It runs pretty smoothly, for hours at a time.

5

u/FrancoManiac 8h ago

Same, I'm really bummed by this.

2

u/Easy_Jux 8h ago

How is it with games like MCC? No input delay?

2

u/Abaddonalways Console 8h ago

I play the campaigns, as my human latency isn't what it once was, and I can't keep up with the youngins in pvp, but I have no issues with it even on legendary.

3

u/theofficialnar 8h ago

It mostly has to do with your internet and server location. I’ve tried geforce now for a month and had 0 issues with it. Latency was barely noticeable and video quality was very decent.

2

u/agenttc89 9h ago

Meaning I’m going to have a 15 hour a month limit playing series xs games on my Xbox one?

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1

u/AReptileHissFunction 9h ago

That essential plan sounds shit. Why would anyone get that?

1

u/BOBBIESWAG 8h ago

I rely on this to play nba2k on Xbox as pc isn’t crossplay. What a shame

1

u/Dunge 8h ago

Why is PC advertised as 300 games and Ultimate 500?! It was always the same catalogue except the very rare titles that exist only on console (like 10, not 200). Please tell me they won't start cutting down this offer.

1

u/the-doctor-is-real 8h ago

WOW! Microsoft lets you play for a whole 5 hours per month ! ffs

1

u/liguinii 8h ago

Am I not getting something. Seems like you can still play on your own machine. It's just the cloud play that is time limited.

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1

u/breakingcustoms 8h ago

15 hours for ultimate seems unreasonable. Go unlimited for ultimate to pull people in

1

u/Masokis 8h ago

How much is it after the 15 hours

1

u/CharityDiary 8h ago

Why is their ENTIRE business plan chasing 4% of their users who aren't even profitable, since they have to charge $23 for 15 hours/month for it to even make sense? And that portion of the base already doesn't buy any games or hardware.

Game Pass clearly wasn't a killer business plan, either.

Have they considered just... making a game and selling the game? This has never been tried before, but maybe it's just crazy enough to work.

1

u/N0_L1ght 8h ago

So for new subscribers this change is immediate it seems.

1

u/Lyndon_Boner_Johnson 7h ago

“Get more value.”

Get more fucked.

1

u/Broseph_Bobby 7h ago

I think I’d just never play a new game again if I had to play using cloud gaming.

I think I’d be ok with only playing classics.

1

u/tnypissdkumquat 7h ago

Xbox is this generations Westwood Studios

1

u/strikerz911 7h ago

Is this time limit stuff only for games not streaming from your Xbox??

1

u/shadow6161 7h ago

I play about 10 hours a week on cloud and about another 10 on console.   That's one of my main reasons for gamepass.  I've recently played ff7 rebirth and ff16 on cloud and if you need gamepass to do that and there are limits why bother?

1

u/Baalwulf06 6h ago

21 billion in revenue fiscal year 2026. Billion with a B.

1

u/DTFlash 6h ago

So did Microsoft remove XBOX from their data centers for AI? These times are so absurd that it seems more like this is all they are allowed to do now. XBOX really feels like it's being phased out by Microsoft IMO.

1

u/TheLazyHippy 6h ago

My friend and I just started playing stardew last weekend, we blew right past 15 hours. This is fucked.

1

u/GrimmTrixX Xbox 6h ago

Reminds me I need to lower both my Xbox and PS plans. Im just not using Gamepass and PS+ like I used to and I am just wasting money when Essential plans will cover what I need which is basically just cloud backups saves and the ability to play online. I hardly touch and games they throw on either service. But I play a ton of Switch Online classic games and at $50/or you cant go wrong at all.

1

u/PTSDDeadInside 5h ago

Isn't this just the ohone data scam? 10gigs a month then $40 per additional gig

1

u/Niadain 5h ago

Fifteen hours a month. God.

1

u/backOFturkey 5h ago

If I don’t use it can I be credited for not using the compute?

1

u/waking-up-late 5h ago

15 hours a month? 30 minutes a day? Those are rookie numbers

1

u/Vlaed 5h ago

Having a cap is annoying enough but those hours are a joke.

1

u/voreo 5h ago

at that point you might as well just scrap the cloud gaming part of game pass if it costs that much that it has to be capped that low

1

u/OctoDADDY069 4h ago

I see they made it worse... again

1

u/Feather_Sigil 4h ago

Goodbye, Game Pass

1

u/Positive_Buy_821 4h ago

What I am taking from this is that GTA is coming to play your own game and they are looking to cash in.... I use cloud gaming as my PS5 broke and I don't play enough anymore to justify the cost new console, so you have millions of PC gamers with no GTA annouced so if it comes to stream your own game you are looking at a massive increase in the userbase

1

u/D_Winds 4h ago

Welcome to the future.

1

u/ThatDogIsAGoodDog 4h ago

It's real. Wtf this is legitimately unbelievably stupid lol

1

u/icecubedyeti 4h ago

AOL memory unlocked😂

1

u/Imaginary_Nothing_ 4h ago

We have now entered the subscription era: Prison Rules.

1

u/Razmatazzer 3h ago

Whats going on with console companies? Are they purposefully trying to see who can make the worst, anti consumer decisions possible?

Wonder if Sony is going to do the same thing which will suck because PS3 games can only be played through Cloud Streaming

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1

u/clonetrooper-lab 3h ago

Bro fr fr what the fuck are 5h/Month - how are they not embarrassed by that statement on it self hahahahah

1

u/Eat--The--Rich-- 3h ago

Where is the cloud only plan?

1

u/GameSetChampionship 3h ago

Why don’t you Xbox boys just buy games 😂

I can’t stand the feeling of renting games, like you are on Gamepass.

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