It was the only incentive for most people. The most baffling thing is not the price hike - it’s the price hike combined Xbox Game Studios release roadmap looking barren compared to the last 2 years. What is this $30 supposed to pay for? Severance packages?

Xbox Studio Games are responsible for most of the current top 10 best selling games on PlayStation. They don’t have that much interesting stuff in the pipeline though.

It was never sustainable, they threw in tons of money to disrupt the market and get subscribers share, and now that they have done that as much as they can, they are trying to get the money.

Don't forget to pirate games and just pay your favorite studios directly

Ultimate was $20. Still an enormous price hike.

Most of the games I play on it are $5... I'll probably stop now too

It was $15/mo before it's first price hike, too. And before that, a lot of people were taking advantage of the Xbox Live Gold conversion deal, where folks were getting access to GamePass Ultimate for $60/year. I once spent $180 for 3 years of GamePass, and now that same amount only gets you 6 months.

It was like 15 -> 20 and now to 30. It was great at 15 because at that point 180 a year you could be sure to play 3 AAA games worth in a year. Doubling that is pretty ehhhh. You need to cycle through a ton of games to get your money worth there.

This is just the zeitgeist of 21st century capitalism. ✓ Subscriptions. Make them pay you forever. ✓ Low initial price to saturate market share and stifle competition while you operate at a loss. ✓ Drive all realistic competitors out of the market (stadia et al.) ✓ Slow user growth? Jack up prices! I'm not surprised they got out of the hardware business. Software license ~~protection~~ publishing fees are way more lucrative than hardware sales. The hardware is just there to lock people into the software.

Hell I remember when it FIRST came out and it was like $1.

The price hikes will continue. Tale as old as time.

MS is on drugs. Full lunacy.

You have a source for that claim? This says otherwise: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_PlayStation_5_video_games