Ubisoft May Have A Subscription Service In The Works
Video games could be going the way of Netflix, and Ubisoft may be the next company to take the plunge.
Reporting from VG247 states that an image referencing something called 'Ubisoft Pass Premium' was seen on the Ubisoft Store, though was quickly removed once discovered by others. On top of that, a category named 'Ubisoft Subscriptions' was also present inside the store for a brief period before also being removed. The name of the pass suggests that Ubisoft may be creating a service similar to EA's Origin Access subscription, which has both a basic and a premium tier. And it further drives home the possibility that, in the future, we might be paying our favorite game companies a monthly subscription to access their libraries instead of buying each title individually.
Say what you will about Ubisoft and its collection of titles, but the company could definitely support an entire subscription service on Ubisoft games alone.
We assume that the Ubisoft Pass service would come to PC, as Ubisoft could offer the subscription through its Uplay platform. The big question is, would we ever see Ubisoft Pass on consoles? A look at the Xbox Game Pass library shows there aren't any Ubisoft titles present there, and if you view that through the most generous lens possible, Ubisoft isn't including any of its games in Game Pass because it has its own subscription in the works.
Either that or Ubisoft sees no value in these subscription services, and would rather sell its games. In that case, what is Ubisoft Pass, then?
We'll likely find out in the weeks ahead. Ubisoft has an E3 press conference planned for Monday, June 10 at 10 a.m. ET. In addition to getting an extended look at Ghost Recon: Breakpoint and Ubisoft's remaining lineup for the year, we could get more dirt on what Ubisoft Pass aims to do, where it'll be accessible, and how much it'll cost. Here's hoping Ubisoft Pass is something akin to EA/Origin Access, and that the price is somewhere in the range of what that service costs. The majority of Ubisoft's back catalog at $5 a month, or the company's newest games right at launch for $15 a month? Count us in.
Should we learn more about Ubisoft Pass as E3 approaches, we'll let you know.