Summary
- PlayStation Plus, Xbox Game Pass, and other subscription services may not be the future of the gaming industry.
- Rising prices, games being delisted, and a lack of revenue growth have cast doubt on subscription services' long-term viability.
- Analyst Mat Piscatella suggests subscriptions may play a role in gaming's future but won't be its main driving force.
Subscription services like PlayStation Plus and Xbox Game Pass are hallmarks of gaming today, but at least one analyst thinks they're not the future of the industry. Nintendo, PlayStation, and Xbox all offer their own subscriptions giving users a rotating selection of games in return for a regular fee, which all three also require for online play. However, PlayStation Plus and similar services may not be growing like they used to.
PlayStation has recently raised the price of PS Plus in several countries for the second time in two years, and Xbox Game Pass subscriptions became more expensive in 2024. Still, both services have seen their fair share of exciting titles and updates in recent months. While it may not look like this business model is fading out of fashion for now, some think that it may not reshape the gaming industry the way it once seemed like it would.
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Mat Piscatella, a video game analyst and Executive Director at market research firm Circana, posted on Bluesky that PS Plus and Xbox Game Pass are "certainly not THE future" of the gaming sector. This was in response to the news that Sony is pulling 22 games from PS Plus in May, including popular titles like Grand Theft Auto 5 and Payday 2. That decline in available games seems to paint a less-than-stellar picture of the future of subscription services in light of how, according to Piscatella, U.S. Spending on these platforms has remained relatively flat since a spike in 2020 and 2021.
Analyst Mat Piscatella Says Subscription Services Are Part of the Future but Not All of It
US spending on video game subscriptions had been basically flat for years following 2020-21 growth, only boosted by 12% in Q4 thanks to CoD going to Game Pass. Subscriptions are certainly not THE future of gaming (although they can continue to be part of it). — Mat Piscatella (@matpiscatella.bsky.social) 2025-04-27T19:14:33.105Z
Piscatella did point out that there was a bump in spending around late 2024, thanks to Call of Duty. The day-one availability of Black Ops 6 helped Xbox Game Pass set a new revenue record for the quarter, leading to a 2% increase in Xbox content and services income. Still, that was apparently the exception to the rule, although Piscatella did not write off subscription services entirely. He clarified that these platforms may still play a role in the future of gaming, but that they may not be the driving force behind it.
In response to a comment on his original post, Piscatella expanded on his point by saying some manufacturers are shifting away from pushing for subscriptions. However, some companies are still making the model work for them. Rebellion's CEO recently attributed much of Atomfall's success to Xbox Game Pass, which helped a larger audience find the game. Still, how much, if at all, platforms like Game Pass and PS Plus will grow and the future or how the industry may adapt remains to be seen.
