Idag råder det ingen brist på olika abonnemang för spel, men inget har haft samma genomslag som Xbox Game Pass. Många undrar dock hur det egentligen fungerar när spelen hamnar där, hur ersättningen fungerar och så vidare. I senaste avsnittet av Dual Screens Podcast berättar Ton Studios-bossen (utvecklare av Unto The End) Stephen Danton om deras avtal med Microsoft:
"I don't know what other deals are, they give you a lump sum of money on release, which I guess is offsetting or in anticipation of whatever you would sell it for if you were on a store. For us, there is no bonuses nor royalties for playtime or how many people we have on there. For us, it's a chunk of money when we give the game to them on day one. We're exclusive with Xbox Game Pass for six months. So what that means for us, is that we couldn't have the game on Apple Arcade for that time period. It can be on Steam and on Sony and stuff like that as a normally purchased item, either physical or digital, but not any other streaming/subscription-based service."
Det låter alltså som att exklusiviteter handlar om andra abonnemang, snarare än något annat, och Danton verkar väldigt nöjd med upplägget:
"We get that little bit of financial support, get to interact with those guys, and they show our games off at events. For Sarah and I, it's been absolutely amazing. I can't say enough about that opportunity, and they've been great to work with."
