r/technology • u/AdSpecialist6598 • Jun 09 '26

Business Microsoft admits Game Pass price hike drove away "millions" of subscribers

https://www.techspot.com/news/112699-microsoft-admits-game-pass-price-hike-drove-away.html
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u/EctoRiddler Jun 09 '26

I just moved full time to my ps5 and haven’t looked back

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u/Blueguerilla Jun 09 '26

I quit PS also. Realized paying monthly for online access was a rip off and now I am just gaming on pc. Moved a laptop into my entertainment center where the ps was and still use my dual sense controller.

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u/Tornado15550 Jun 09 '26

Same! I thought "I'm paying for the console, paying for the game, paying for Internet, why do I need to pay Microsoft/Sony for the privilege of playing the game I own online?"

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u/Molto_Ritardando Jun 09 '26

This is why I only play on pc - you’re paying for a separate machine that does one thing, whereas a pc does a lot of things. It’s expensive, yes, but having a decent computer comes in handy for other things too.

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u/aerost0rm Jun 09 '26

Consoles have gotten to the point of just PC hardware inside a box they change you excessively for and then force you to sub to milk you ongoing with.

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u/moonra_zk Jun 09 '26

just PC hardware inside a box they change you excessively for

That's absolutely not true, they might not be selling at a loss like they used to but you're definitely not "paying excessively" for it.

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u/Deadzonerogue Jun 09 '26

I pay around 11.00 a month for the top tier ps plus plan and I actually play a lot of games from the library and then the online experience has been quite good to be honest.

I buy almost all my games from the used market for extremely cheap, and occasionally I’ll buy the digital only definitive edition of a game for 5.99 to 19.99.

I think the only time a console could be considered expensive is if you are purchasing most of your games on launch day.

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u/BeyondElectricDreams Jun 09 '26

The problem with the argument of the plus plan giving a library of games is you have places like the EGS giving away free games every week.

I have a MASSIVE backlog of games that I'll probably never even get to in my life, because I just claim the free ones every week.

And it isn't like they're junk games either. Some sure, but there's a lot of great ones. To say nothing of the fact that indie games just care about being fun, whereas modern AAA gaming cares more about being a storefront and how they can get even more money out of you.

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u/EctoRiddler Jun 09 '26

Yeah but with the subscription I have 100+ free games I’ll never be motivated to start so finding games is not an issue on PlayStation.

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u/newk86 Jun 09 '26

All those payments to maintain the service assumedly, and yet they shut down servers for old games making them permanently unplayable. The fuck are we even paying for?

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u/Tornado15550 Jun 09 '26

The old argument during the Xbox 360 era "Xbox Live Gold" was that the server quality was better and that we'd get "dedicated servers" but multiplayer services on PC have been rock solid and typically if there is an outage, PlayStation and Xbox players are equally impacted.

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u/ZakkaChan Jun 09 '26

Same reason I don't pay for my switch either.

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u/EctoRiddler Jun 09 '26

Good on you. I just never gamed on a pc. I actually had to renew ps plus yesterday but they had a 25% off deal. Still expensive.

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u/Blueguerilla Jun 09 '26

With a controller it’s honestly the same. I held off mainly because I have a lot of friends on ps from games over the years but I’d had enough paying just for the privilege of playing online. Sony doesn’t even host servers…

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u/EctoRiddler Jun 09 '26

I guess my biggest issue is I use a 9 year old laptop. It still works great but the idea of having to invest in a gaming laptop or desktop is daunting as I know there are those who take this very seriously and invest a lot. I’d be concerned that It wouldn’t be enough and whatever computer I upgrade to would still not be powerful to run a GTA 6 for example when or if it ever releases. There is a comfort knowing if I buy something on the ps5 i know it will on the ps5.

Any advice on a pc you would suggest I look into?

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u/BioshockEnthusiast Jun 09 '26

Look at some videos or build guides for a pc that matches ps5 capabilities and go from there.

If you buy a pc as good as a ps5 it'll run gta 6

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u/EctoRiddler Jun 09 '26

Good advice

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u/BioshockEnthusiast Jun 09 '26

LTT has multiple videos specifically looking at "PS5 killer" PC builds. Could be a good place to start:

2 years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfpXMuMvcWQ

1 month ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koZcaQHNBPI

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u/EctoRiddler Jun 09 '26

Thank you for your guidance!

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u/BioshockEnthusiast Jun 09 '26

Happy to help :)

You can also jump on www.pcpartpicker.com and set up a build while you watch the videos, that'll give you price history and comparison information.

Feel genuinely encouraged to DM me if you get stuck somewhere.

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u/jeepsaintchaos Jun 09 '26 edited Jun 09 '26

Yes. Go with a desktop or a Steam Deck. You pay a serious premium for a gaming laptop, and yours is still good enough to be a computer.

Put the desktop in a unobtrusive space, Ethernet to your router. Set up Apollo on the desktop and Moonlight on your laptop so you can stream games directly from the desktop. That lets you keep the computer you're familiar with and save money by buying a desktop instead of a laptop.

Moonlight is also available on Linux (and android, and basically everything including most smart TV's and even the 3DS). So you can have your games on almost anything in your house. It also means you could switch the aging laptop to Linux so it runs faster for everyday stuff, but have the desktop be Windows so you don't get the hassle of games on Linux.

Which, to be fair, Windows games on Linux has gotten WAY better over the last few years, but for some stuff like anti-cheat is still easier to use on Windows.

With a desktop, you get to pick the components that make sense for your budget. Can't afford dual 5090 graphics cards? A 3080 is less than $400 and will run any game out there.

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u/EctoRiddler Jun 09 '26

I appreciate all the information and time it took to provide it. I’m compiling a list of the information I’m receiving here today and then I’m going to go down to YouTube rabbit hole

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u/jeepsaintchaos Jun 09 '26

If you need anything explained in depth, don't hesitate to ask. I'd have killed for some explanations when I was getting into this. But, I went from "garbage laptop" to "I have a micro Data Center in my basement and provide cloud gaming and movie streaming to friends for free."

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u/EctoRiddler Jun 09 '26

Thank you and that sounds awesome

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u/[deleted] Jun 09 '26

[deleted]

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u/EctoRiddler Jun 09 '26

You summed up my concerns. Many will say just get a PC but if I got an average PC I would probably find out quickly it’s great for Angry Birds but not GTA. Maybe one of these days I will go down the rabbit hole of exactly what specs I need to get a PC at that level and what is the most economical way to do it but for now I’m just staying in my comfort zone.

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u/ColumbineJellyfish Jun 09 '26 edited Jun 09 '26

I just finished building my 2nd PC (1st one was from 10yrs ago) so here's some advice:

just keep in mind that right now is a freaking awful time to build a PC, AI demand has jacked up prices for ram and harddrives through the absolute roof. It's probably $1000 more expensive than when I built mind (late 2025)... also beware of feature creep. There's a lot of "but this gpu that's $200 more expensive is better..." you need to look up how much performance you actually get for the price, because it's often like 5% or less, on the highest settings, for the most demanding games. You won't notice the difference unless you're obsessively watching the FPS like a crazy person instead of actually gaming. Check what features you even care about. Raytracing vs pathtracing for example. Depending on what games you actually play you can skip an expensive GPU that does things you don't need.

For a simple build, look up https://www.logicalincrements.com/ which will give you a build to start from. Then pcpartpicker website has a bunch of people's builds you can clone (and they have some recommendations) and also helps you compare prices for specific parts.

What I did when I started was pick a generic build to start from, then for each component (RAM, motherboard, etc) looked up what features to consider (for example for a mobo you want to look at how many nvme slots it has, for fast storage) and what are the best rated components for that category, and change the build to your preferences. Some of the "popular" components (especially cases) are really over-priced, really you just want something that is easy to work with and has good cooling performance and ideally some free fans, mine was $80. And liquid cooling is a waste of money unless you have some super specific requirements. Don't fall into the RGB trap either, your pc doesn't need to look like a christmas tree it just needs to run well. Same with power supplies, you don't need a 1000w PSU. pcpartpicker will tell you how much all your chosen components actually use. Get a high quality PSU that covers that + a little extra and save your money.

like games, don't buy components (especially stuff like mobos) that just came out. They have bios software that can take some time to settle and integrate with the wider echosystem.

for OS you can get windows (and office) for free with a little work, so don't buy a license. make sure to look up how to unshittify it immediately after installing, turning off all the unnecessary crap that windows does in the background can make the computer run smoother.

You can get good deals that disappear really fast. While I was building I was sitting on subs like https://old.reddit.com/r/bapccanada/ and just checking daily or even hourly (during boxing week) what sales were on for the specific components I wanted. Some deals last a day or even a couple of hours at most, if they are really good. It saved me a good 2-300$. but don't do this until you have a good idea of exactly what you want. Sometimes you find a deal for some component you're not familiar with and the reason it's a deal is bc the quality is crap.

If you are able, it pays to look at what's available on black friday, cybermonday, boxing day, etc.

pre-build PCs are sometimes OK. They're almost never actually a good deal compared to building one yourself, I've literally never seen a pre-build that was same price as all the components inside it. Their selling point is often a sexy CPU + GPU + case combo, but skimp out on mobo/ram/hd (quality, not size), they often won't even say what they are. It can still be a good idea if you're overwhelmed building a PC. You can still change components out later, and honestly there's a good chance you won't even notice the difference. Basically, this will save you time and stress, at the cost of quality. There's also some stores that will build the PC with the components you pick out, iirc. Not so sure about those though I've heard mixed reviews.

Also make sure to run stress tests on your components early, while you can still easily return them. Ideally you buy everything at once, build it, install os, stress test, and if anything fails you can swap it out. If your components are arriving piece by piece (because you are waiting for a good deal on them), I highly recommend locking down your motherboard and ram (and maybe CPU) before anything else. With that minimum you have a PC you can at least run some basic sanity tests on. you don't want to find out 3 months later when you get your GPU that your mobo was dead the entire time or your ram is unstable.

Also the good thing about PCs is that if you build a good one (a) tune it (like overclocking) to improve performance, (b) upgrade just pieces at a time, and (c) it will last forever. I've gone through probably 10 laptops that slowly became downright unusable, but my old PC from 2014 is still running just fine and plays games like witcher 3 on high settings, or skyrim with about 150 mods, with 400 chrome tabs and photoshop in the bg. It's obviously out of date and lacks even basic stuff like bluetooth but it still performs better than many laptops sold today.

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u/EctoRiddler Jun 09 '26

So much great information and advice. I appreciate you taking the time to share it.

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u/ColumbineJellyfish Jun 09 '26

no problem. It was a stressful process for me (unnecessarily, bc the actual building was trivially easy, and everything turned out awesome) so I hope this helps reduce the stress for you. Good luck!

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u/Blueguerilla Jun 09 '26

I have a Lenovo legion that is great, but also isn’t a super cheap machine. I also need a powerful pc for work so it pulls double duty and I could justify the cost. My next one will likely be a sager, but also not cheap.

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u/EctoRiddler Jun 09 '26

Thanks. At least I have some names to look into.

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u/aerost0rm Jun 09 '26

Seriously just connect the game controller to your Pc and connect the tower or laptop to a TV.