In 2019, Microsoft floated the idea of getting Xbox Game Pass on multiple platforms, with Xbox head Phil Spencer calling it a "long-term goal" for the company, only to double back on it a year later. Now, Xbox still wants to get Game Pass and its first-party titles on PlayStation, Nintendo, and every other platform beyond its namesake.
Xbox chief financial officer Tim Stuart referenced the strategy at the Wells Fargo TMT Summit on Tuesday, per a report by GameSpot. He said the goal is to make Game Pass and first-party games available on "every screen that can play games," including the PS5, Nintendo Switch, mobile phones, and smart TVs.
"It's a bit of a change of strategy. Not announcing anything broadly here, but our mission is to bring our first-party experiences [and] our subscription services to every screen that can play games," Stuart said. "That means smart TVs, that means mobile devices, that means what we would have thought of as competitors in the past like PlayStation and Nintendo."
Stuart also said that Game Pass has become big business for Microsoft, alongside advertising and its first-party games. Now that Microsoft has Activision Blizzard under its belt after closing the $69 billion deal with the publisher last month, he said the company wants to expedite the process of making Game Pass available to everyone, whether they own an Xbox console or not.
Game Pass is already accessible on PC under the PC Game Pass, but only if you have a desktop or gaming laptop that runs on Windows. Xbox also added PC Game Pass support to Nvidia GeForce Now, allowing subscribers to sync their Xbox accounts and access Game Pass titles. Game Pass isn't officially available on Steam Deck, but you can still run it on the handheld PC through a browser with Xbox Cloud Gaming.
We can understand how Game Pass would fare on PlayStation and smart TVs, but we're not sure how it would do on the Nintendo Switch, given the technology it has that may cause graphic fidelity and latency issues that set it back years behind its rival consoles. When the Switch 2 — or whatever it's eventually called — comes out in the near future, maybe Game Pass will run better with improvements.
Cristina Alexander is a freelance writer for IGN. To paraphrase Calvin Harris, she wears her love for Sonic the Hedgehog on her sleeve like a big deal. Follow her on Twitter @SonicPrincess15.
