Xbox LIVE Gold subscription prices getting jacked up starting Nov. 1.

[Timby]

Re: Xbox LIVE Gold subscription prices getting jacked up starting Nov.

I could see myself taking advantage of that.

Memberships stack (for up to four years), so if you buy now at $39.99 (although you might not necessarily want to trust Microsoft with your credit card information; Newegg is still selling 12-month cards for $39.95), those twelve months will stack on top of your existing Gold account.

 

[TheBrew]

Re: Xbox LIVE Gold subscription prices getting jacked up starting Nov.

IGN posted an article about why the price went up:

http://xboxlive.ign.com/articles/111/1116983p1.html

One word: Socialists.

 

[gh4chiefs]

Re: Xbox LIVE Gold subscription prices getting jacked up starting Nov.

I could see myself taking advantage of that.

Memberships stack (for up to four years), so if you buy now at $39.99 (although you might not necessarily want to trust Microsoft with your credit card information;

I think I'm misunderstanding something here. I get what you mean about the prepaid cards, but are you also saying I could renew for up to 4 years with MSFT at the $39.99 price?

 

[Aragorn]

Re: Xbox LIVE Gold subscription prices getting jacked up starting Nov.

If anyone cares, Bloomberg reported that Xbox Live grossed $1.2 billion in 2009.

 

[Timby]

Re: Xbox LIVE Gold subscription prices getting jacked up starting Nov.

^Grossed, but there's no word on net profit, if any.

I could see myself taking advantage of that.

Memberships stack (for up to four years), so if you buy now at $39.99 (although you might not necessarily want to trust Microsoft with your credit card information;

I think I'm misunderstanding something here. I get what you mean about the prepaid cards, but are you also saying I could renew for up to 4 years with MSFT at the $39.99 price?

No, the Microsoft offer is only for one year. But you could purchase four 12-month cards from Newegg and they'd stack.

 

[gh4chiefs]

Re: Xbox LIVE Gold subscription prices getting jacked up starting Nov.

Ok, gotcha. Thanks for clarifying. I could do that, not sure I want to tie up $160 at one time though, especially when I'm facing an uncertain future about online gaming. If additional fees (over and above XBL) imposed by the game publisher become a reality, that's probably when I'll say goodbye to online gaming.

I suck pretty back anyway and I often get frustrated. Why pay to aggravate myself?

 

[FordSVT]

Re: Xbox LIVE Gold subscription prices getting jacked up starting Nov.

I guess we can agree to disagree. The problem is, everything else is going up too, and at some point, you have to say, "Ok, what do I want to keep and what can I live with out." $50 a year frankly was bad enough when PS3 was free but it was worth something for the extra features of XBL compared to PSN. $60 is just too much IMHO. Your mileage may vary.

The other thing, I think is the principle of it. This economy with 1.5% growth in the last quarter, and MSFT is hitting their customer with a 20% increase. Granted I've been out of college a long time now, but I was an Economics major, and the two things just don't compute. Recessions put downward pressure on prices, not upward.

Entertainment products don't get impacted like other sectors of the economy do. The motion picture, gaming and MP3/smart-phone industries have recorded record grosses during the past 2-3 years. People are willing to give up all sorts of non-essential items before they're willing to be bored, it's a simple fact. It's cheaper to sit around playing games than going on vacation, or buying an ATV, or even just going out to dinner.

And in reality, paying $50-60 a year for online gaming is pretty cheap entertainment. Where else do you get that kind of value? A $50 a month cable or internet bill? A half dozen magazine subscriptions you'd go through in a few hours each month? A $8 paperback novel you can read in an afternoon? I know you say "it's the principle of it", and when everything goes up at the same time it can be a head-ache, but MSFT has had virtually the same subscription model for several years now, it was bound to change, and a buck a month isn't going to break the back of most gamers, not when they're already subscribing and spending $40-60 a month just buying the games. Do people have to make choices about what they want to spend their money on? Absolutely! In fact, if people had actually made that choice instead of saying "I want everything" for the past 10-15 years, maybe we wouldn't be in the economic mess we're going through.

Not to sound too judgmental, but less than a buck a month increase is all it took to make Live irrelevant to you? If things are that tight for you in the course of a year that you can't afford an extra $10, I'm surprised you pay to play online at all.

 

[gh4chiefs]

Re: Xbox LIVE Gold subscription prices getting jacked up starting Nov.

Not to sound too judgmental, but less than a buck a month increase is all it took to make Live irrelevant to you?

Yeah pretty much. It's just a matter of the principle of them saying "F you customer, we can charge what we want because you'll pay it." Well this customer ain't gonna pay it. I don't have to have it. I'd rather take that $60 a year and spend it elsewhere.

And now that you mention it, it is kind of stupid of me to pay $50 for XBL when the PSN is free and does what I want it to do. (I'm not really that big of an online gamer anyway.)

 

[Haggis and tatties]

Re: Xbox LIVE Gold subscription prices getting jacked up starting Nov.

This will also in a roundabout way hit all those like myself here in the EU/UK who bought their 12 months codes online for less than the RRP of £39.99, it was obvious that those selling 12 month XBlive gold online were selling the cheaper US versions, that's why they could sell them for £30, now with the increase in US gold codes you can bet the importers of those US online codes will now have to go up in price....how far i don't know, possibly to the £35 mark which is still cheaper than that RRP over here.

To be honest I'm surprised MS allowed this to happen for so long.