Subscription services are becoming the way of the future no matter the medium. Video games are no different with more and more services, launchers and storefronts popping up with many more to come, especially combined with streaming becoming more prevalent. Whether that’s a good or bad thing is up for debate, but one person who is optimistic is the Co-creative Lead at Mobius Digital Loan Verneau.
In an interview with GamesIndustry, Verneau says that with new services like Game Pass, it will open up doors that previously were closed for “weirder” titles. With companies looking for content for subscription services over necessarily funding games for individual sells, more games will find funding that once could not. He points to the types of TV shows that have been funded via services like Netflix and Hulu that would never be able to find a home on traditional TV networks.
“We’re on Game Pass for Xbox, and it’s been really awesome becuase I think it’s brought a lot of players to the game who would not have known about it otherwise,” said Verneau. “So I think that’s been a big shift. The same way it’s changed the TV and movie worlds, the subscription system is also going to impact the game industry very significantly. We’re starting to see that, and starting to see it maybe unlock the market to weirder things and more original things that would have been more risky beforehand.”
Whether Verneau is right or not will be something we’ll just have to see as time goes on. For now, Outer Wilds is available on PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC and is available via Xbox Game Pass. You can check out an in-depth look at the making of the game with documentary, as well as our recent interview with Verneau through here.