Age of Empires 4 was a great success for Microsoft. But the second generation of strategy bangers has long been waiting in the wings – virtually free of charge.
PC Game Pass, that sounds much more impressive. The overdue name change to Microsoft’s game subscription underlines the publisher’s claim to offer a second home for PC gamers apart from the ubiquitous Steam. It fits into the picture that an almost PC-exclusive genre is now increasingly represented in Game Pass. That of strategy games.
Whether it’s Total War, Stellaris, Command & Conquer, Age of Empires, Humankind or Hearts of Iron – the list of real-time and turn-based strategy games that you can download for as little as one euro a month is constantly growing.
“Since launch [in 2017, editor’s note], we’ve more than tripled the number of strategy games we offer in Game Pass on PC” to 40 currently, Matt Percy, general manager of business and content planning at Microsoft, tells us. “In 2019, 15 per cent of all Game Pass titles were strategy games” and currently strategy games “account for up to 20 per cent of PC player activity on Game Pass,” he said.
No wonder Microsoft is expanding Total War: Warhammer 3, a major new strategy game, will be available on Game Pass from Day 1 on 17 February 2022. Developer Creative Assembly doesn’t seem averse to making more titles in the series available on Game Pass in the future, although they have “no plans yet”, Chief Product Officer Rob Bartholomew assures us in conversation.
Such a move seems likely, however, considering how close the cooperation between Microsoft and Sega, Creative Assembly’s owner, has become. Sega, for example, recently loaned Microsoft its RTS studio Relic to develop Age of Empires 4 – “a resounding success”, as Matt Percy calls the real-time strategy comeback.
It seems PC Game Pass is the place to be currently as a strategy game developer. Not to mention the future. So it’s conceivable that a new Medieval Total War will also appear on Microsoft’s popular platform at some point. Rob Batholomew has also recognised that the demand for new strategy games is great, but does not want to commit himself:
“Of course we’re aware that people would love to see a Medieval 3. We would also very much like to see a Medieval 3. […] What I can say about Medieval 3, other than we haven’t announced it yet and we don’t plan to, is this: We have a long list of all the things we want to do with Total War in the future. There are still a lot of projects we want to tackle. ”
And from the looks of it, more and more of them will be coming to Game Pass. Because that’s exactly Microsoft’s strategy.
Why Game Pass is so attractive for strategy games
Johan Bolin, Chief Marketing Officer at Paradox Interactive, is very pleased with the numbers the publisher is seeing for Crusader Kings 3 since the parallel relaunch on Steam and Game Pass: “Game Pass has definitely helped the game reach a large audience and continues to do so.” All three of our interviewees emphasise the positive impact of Game Pass on a game’s reach. In a way, this is logical – after all, they all benefit from the deal – but the incorruptible statistics also support their statement.
“There are more entertainment options than ever before […] and standing out from the crowd is very helpful in a world like this,” says Microsoft’s Matt Percy, referring to Netflix, the smartphone and other distractions. “By bringing [these games] together in a curated service, we can really help players discover new series and games.”
Visibility, after all, is key in the competitive PC market, where over 3,000 games were released on Steam in 2021 (that’s just over eight new titles a day). “It [Game Pass] is a marketing tool, for sure,” Johan Bolin of Paradox then also admits. But that doesn’t have to be a bad thing: “I definitely think that even people who wouldn’t have bought our games otherwise find them on Game Pass and play them.”
According to Microsoft’s analyses, those who get a taste for it in this way are more likely to spend money on the strategy games or other titles they try – for sequels, games of the same genre or for DLCs. “These people play 20 per cent more games outside of Game Pass. They play 30 per cent more different genres. And they spend 50 percent more on games outside of Game Pass. ”
The fact that the download add-ons that go with a game are almost never included in Game Pass, but only the main programme, is a matter of calculation. Game developers like Paradox Interactive or Creative Assembly are only too happy to satisfy the once awakened hunger for more content. For an extra fee, of course. Looking at Warhammer 3, Rob Batholomew explains:
“Right now it’s the base game that will be available on Game Pass on day one. And yes, we do plan to support it with a lot of content after launch. ”
Warhammer 3 will be the culmination of the series, but for us it’s actually kind of the beginning. It’s not the end, because we still have a huge amount of content and some really big plans for the next few years. And yes, we’d love to take Game Pass users on that journey as well. But right now it’s just the core game experience that’s available on Day 1 in Game Pass.”
“We want people to play our games for a very long time,” Johan Bolin explains in the interview. “I’m of the opinion that if you have games that live for a long time and that people play for hundreds or thousands of hours, then that fits well with this kind of business model.” In this context, Bolin points out that Hearts of Iron 4 recently reached the one million player milestone.
“The older one of our games gets, the more add-on content we’re going to have and the more revenue we’re going to get from the add-on content compared to the base game. […] We want to find more players and we want them to try our games. And [Game Pass] is a way to do that, and it’s working well for us so far. ”
Money also plays a role
For Rob Batholomew, Game Pass is just one tool among many to expand the audience for Total War games. Because, “In our opinion, the PC strategy market is really huge and much bigger than the part we’re currently addressing.” With the release of Troy: A Total War Saga on the Epic Games Store and the unique free promotion to date (for the first 24 hours after release, anyone could download Troy for free and keep it forever), Creative Assembly has gained valuable experience.
“Troy was a fantastic opportunity to reach a large number of new players, which was very successful for us. […] The release of Troy has been fantastic for us in that respect. And it gives us a good feeling, a really good feeling of confidence for [Warhammer 3 and] Game Pass.”
Microsoft and Creative Assembly are “good friends”, Batholomew said. The two companies have worked closely together in the past, including on Halo Wars 2. What Batholomew doesn’t say is that, of course, Creative Assembly, like all other Microsoft partners, will be financially compensated for inclusion in Game Pass. After all, developers here offer their games, which are otherwise sold at full price, at a quasi-zero price from Day 1.
Technical difficulties due to Game Pass
Microsoft Store and PC Game Pass releases require additional customisation work from developers. Although they receive help from Microsoft, problems can sometimes arise. A negative example in recent months was The Ascent, whose Microsoft Store version was not technically on a par with the Steam version at release. Mod support is also a recurring topic.
In an interview, Creative Assembly gives us an insight into the difficulties the Total War studio has to deal with. Chief Product Officer Rob Batholomew explains: “Right now, you have to have all three parts of the trilogy registered in the same shop to get access to Mortal Empires with its combined campaign map. We are currently working with our various retail and platform partners to ensure that the technology that drives our Total War account system will ideally allow players to own content on any combination of platforms in the future and benefit from that linkage.
That’s our aspiration and something that’s being discussed a lot at the moment. I think everyone we talk to, including Microsoft, sees the value and our excitement about it and how good it would be for gamers, but there are still technical hurdles to overcome.
I should mention that Mortal Empires will come out some time after the release [of Warhammer 3]. So we hope to have Warhammer 1 and 2 available on the Microsoft Store before that happens. ”
None of our interlocutors wants to talk about the amount of the payments on the part of Microsoft; the contracting parties have agreed not to disclose the details. However, a vague idea of the order of magnitude is provided by (the information) that Epic Games has spent at least 11.6 million dollars for the provision of 38 mostly older free games in the Epic Games Store until September 2019. In addition, Epic paid various publishers over $217 million for the privilege of releasing their games first and exclusively on the Epic Games Store – up to a year before Steam release.
“I can’t go into a commercial agreement, but of course it’s a business partnership and we all have a desire to work together and come out of it positively,” is how Creative Assembly’s Rob Batholomew sums it up.
“But that only works if we give players great experiences at a great price, whatever that price ends up being. So, by and large, we’re very happy with what players are saying about Game Pass and the value they’re getting for it. We’re also very happy with what players are saying about our games and the value they’re getting for it, and that’s what matters.
If you’re going to spend your hard-earned money, the experience we provide for it really has to justify that investment. And ultimately we want players to be happy with their choices, because then they will come back. […]
We are long-term oriented. We know what the value is of a player who is really happy with what we’re offering, because over time they become a fan and we can sell them something else. For example, Medieval 3 in the future. [laughs]”
Microsoft’s Matt Percy puts it this way, “I think what Game Pass really does and helps with is giving developers another way to reach gamers and build a relationship with their fans. It’s also a way for them to take more risks.”
The Windows Group’s plan is clear: by investing in their own productions like Age of Empires 4 and new partners, they are strengthening the strategy game network in Game Pass and thus increasing the value of the entire service. And suddenly more studios come forward who also want to be represented in Game Pass. In 2020, Humankind, a Sega title, appeared in Game Pass; the release of Victoria 3 by Paradox Interactive is already confirmed for 2022. And Company of Heroes 3 (also by Sega) will probably not be long in coming either …
