Microsoft CEO Confirms That Xbox Game Pass Will Come To PC

There’s no shortage of subscription gaming services out there, but Microsoft’s Xbox Game Pass looks to be one of the better ones for the money. Well, it will be if what company CEO Satya Nadella uttered during a financial call proves true: that the PC will gain Game Pass support in the future.

For a die-hard PC gamer, the biggest drawback to Game Pass for me has been the lack of PC support, and while I have an Xbox One, it’s only hooked up when I feel the pull of nostalgia (I contend that Rare Replay is one of the best Xbox One titles). I could see me subscribing to Game Pass once in a while if it was available on PC, because the 100+ strong list of available games changes on a regular basis, and… $9.99/mo seems reasonable to be able to partake in that selection. Remember when we paid $10 to rent a game for a couple of days?

Unfortunately, that $10 doesn’t cover multiplayer, which means on Xbox, people still need to shell out for Xbox Live to gain that basic functionality. That said, I’ve played Forza Horizon 3 on PC without an Xbox Live subscription, with a friend playing on an Xbox One, and I had no issues. Hopefully that trait will carry through to the service at large on PC.

Here’s where things get interesting: Game Pass doesn’t include only Xbox One titles, but also titles for the Xbox 360 and original Xbox. We’ve seen from games like Forza that Xbox One games work well on the PC, but the others? The bane of many emulator fans’ existence has been the fact that an original Xbox emulator has been elusive, so to potentially see certain older titles working natively on the PC would be quite surprising to see.

To be clear, Game Pass isn’t a streaming service. To play a game, you will need to first download it. That means you get good performance (though some games will undoubtedly be framerate capped), and won’t have to worry about your internet connection or dealing with image quality loss whenever it decides to strike.

Forza Horizon 4 is a brand-new release found on Xbox Game Pass

I can’t wrap my head around original Xbox games running on PC natively, so I’ll have to see it to believe it. It could be that not everything was revealed on the financial call, and that there will in fact be limitations, but the fact that none were mentioned bodes well for the future.

If original Xbox games can run through this service on PC, it’d be nice to see Jet Set Radio Future get some love, since that’s an original Xbox game that was never released on any other platform… ever. Much to my chagrin.