Xbox Series consoles and Game Pass subscriptions have seen significant price hikes, with the Series S increasing from R5999 to R8999 and the Series X from R11k to R13999, while Game Pass has risen from R129 to R268 per month. Picture: Michael Sherman/IOL
Image: Michael Sherman/IOL
As an Apple fan, one of the best things about their offerings is that the older products grow cheaper over time. In the gaming industry, and especially with Microsoft Xbox, the opposite is true, and that’s just shameful.
The Xbox Series S and X consoles were released six years ago in November. The lower-spec Series S for 300 US dollars, which works out to around R5,100, and the Series X for 500 US dollars, or about R8,600. Of course, the price would be slightly more when the devices came to South Africa, but not much more.
I bought my Xbox Series S in March 2023 from Makro for R5,999, and now the same model is going for R9,998. That’s an increase of R4000 for the same product in just over three years. Also don't forget, this technology now six years old and the price continues to increase as time goes by.
If you want to pick up the Series X, it will cost you around R14,999 at the moment. I remember considering the fancier Series X version, but at around R11k at the time, I was not prepared to fork out such a sum despite the performance gains. That’s especially since there was around a R5,000 price difference between the two models— so I could have bought almost two Series S consoles for the same price.
It’s not just Xbox though, as the base model PlayStation 5 Digital Version has also increased in price by 400 US dollars in 2020 and to 500 in 2025.
PlayStation is the more popular console, with approximately 75 million units sold by 2025, with Xbox selling around 31 million.
The main attraction of Xbox for years was its GamePass subscription. But that too has increased while offering the same product.
When I first signed up for Xbox Game Pass a couple of years ago when I got my Series S, it was R129 per month. That gave me access to around 100 games, and more new AAA games than I could play at any time. For example, I downloaded the new Indiana Jones game that goes for around R1100 on the Microsoft Store, for no cost with Game Pass.
It was quite honestly the best value subscription available as a gamer.
Then the first price increase struck, and then without much warning it went up by R70 from R129 per month to R199 monthly in September last year. That was a 53.8% increase.
Yet still, at R200 per month it was still worth it. Since then, Xbox has announced massive increase of R150 which equates to a R349 total per month. After a huge backlash from fans though, the price was brought back to down to R239 per month. That's without access to one of the most popular AAA game on Xbox - Call of Duty - for the first year. So you're still paying R40 more for less.
It's simply not a great time to be a gamer, or to go easy on your wallet.