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After over six years of public testing, Xbox Cloud Gaming (formerly Project xCloud) finally left the beta stage earlier this week, alongside yet another price increase for Game Pass. Now, Xbox Cloud Gaming is available across all Game Pass tiers, allowing you to play games that run in the cloud without paying for the most expensive Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, which now costs a whopping $29.99 per month. However, it appears that Microsoft wants to go even further by introducing a free Xbox Cloud Gaming tier.
Tom Warren from The Verge reports that sources within Microsoft revealed that the company is currently testing ad-supported cloud game streaming that lets employees play select games for free and without a Game Pass subscription. Before launching games, the service plays a two-minute ad pre-roll, and there is a one-hour per session limit with five sessions per month. As of right now, there is no information on what limits Microsoft considers for the public launch, so these could be temporary limits for internal testing.
Currently, if you pay for Game Pass, you can stream games from the catalog and select titles that you own. Since Microsoft is considering dropping the Game Pass requirement for Xbox Cloud Gaming, it could let you stream titles that you already own (like Nvidia GeForce NOW), games from the Free Play Days Program, and Xbox Retro Classics.
Microsoft reportedly plans to start public trials for the ad-supported Xbox Cloud Gaming tier in the coming months. It should be available on computers, Xbox consoles, handhelds, and web browsers. Microsoft received (and continues receiving) a lot of flak from users after the recent Game Pass price increase, but you can still get the subscription at the old price on Amazon. A free tier will make Microsoft"s gaming efforts more accessible, as long as you are okay with watching ads and having per-session and monthly limits.
Source: The Verge