Microsoft say it’s “misleading” for the FTC to call the Game Pass experience “degraded” now it costs more

Microsoft have responded to the US Federal Trade Commission’s assertion that the tech giant are now offering a “degraded” Game Pass experience, posing “exactly the sort of consumer harm” the FTC warned was possible in advance of the Activision Blizzard acquisition.

Nuh-uh, say Microsoft, who call the FTC’s letter “a misleading, extra-record account of the facts”.

Earlier this month, Microsoft announced that the price of a PC Game Pass has risen from $9.99, €9.99 or £7.99 per month to $11.99, €11.99 and £9.99. They also introduced a new ‘Standard tier’ of Xbox Game Pass for console players, which is less expensive but doesn’t include day-one access to new games. This is what the FTC are referring to when they talk about a degraded experience.

“It is wrong to call this a ‘degraded’ version of the discontinued Game Pass for Console offering,” says Microsoft’s letter filed in response, as first spotted by The Verge’s Tom Warren. “That discontinued product did not offer multiplayer functionality, which had to be purchased separately for an additional $9.99/month (making the total cost $20.98/month. While Game Pass Ultimate’s price will increase from $16.99 to $19.99/month, the service will offer more value through many new games available ‘day-and-date.’ Among them is the upcoming release of Call Of Duty, which has never before been available on a subscription day-and-date.”

Microsoft’s letter also argues that the FTC chose not to make the subscription service a pillar of their argument at trial, instead focusing on the possibility that Call Of Duty could be pulled from rival platforming, thus harming competition. That’s not the case, Microsoft point out, as Call Of Duty “is not being withheld from anyone who wants it”. They’re also claiming that PlayStation’s own subscription service “continues to thrive, even as they put few new games into their subscription day-and-date”.

I can make no legal comment on this public slapfight, but personally I feel that a higher price – or a lower price without the day-and-date feature that’s clearly a cornerstone of Game Pass – constitutes a degraded consumer experience. That’s not offset by multiplayer being included in the lower tier because, well, I play games on PC, where access to multiplayer is not typically gated by any subscription other than the cost of your internet. There therefore is no lower tier for PC Game Pass; it’s simply more expensive than it used to be for fundamentally the same service. Boo, I say.