One of the ideas generated during this time was a game rental service, and a project to establish this service was started under the code name Arches. Spencer, after taking over the Xbox brand, recognized he needed to put the Xbox in a better position as they planned for the next generation of the console, while reinvigorating the team he had with new ideas for this, even if his ideas were risky. Mattrick had positioned the Xbox One as more of an entertainment hub and not a gaming console, and certain design decisions made prior to launch had to be reverted following negative criticism of this positioning from consumers and the media. First was with Phil Spencer taking over for Don Mattrick as the head of the Xbox brand at Microsoft following the troubled launch of the Xbox One in 2013. The service was launched on June 1, 2017, while Xbox Live Gold subscribers received priority access on May 24.Ĭonception of what would become Game Pass came from two areas. Xbox Game Pass provides this service on Xbox Series X/S and Xbox One consoles, as well as Android, iOS, and iPadOS devices via Xbox Cloud Gaming, selected Samsung TVs via Xbox Cloud Gaming, while PC Game Pass provides the service to personal computers using Windows 11 and Windows 10 or MacOS with support for Xbox Cloud Gaming.

Both services grant users access to a rotating catalog of games from a range of publishers and other premium services, including Xbox Live Gold (Ultimate Game Pass exclusive) and EA Play (PC/Ultimate Game Pass exclusive), for a single monthly subscription price. Xbox Game Pass and PC Game Pass are video game subscription services from Microsoft.

Gamepass pc