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Microsoft has described games industry analyst Michael Pachter’s claim that the annual Xbox LIVE Gold subscription fee will be raised to “100 bucks” as “flattering”.
Last week the outspoken Wedbush Securities analyst said on Gametrailers’ Bonus Round that “we all know” that the fee is “going up”.
While discussing the current state of PC gaming, Pachter said: “You can’t hook a guy into Xbox LIVE Gold if he’s playing on a PC. So, I mean, that’s the other problem – is you really wanna hook every gamer who has a 360, you want them to buy all their games on 360, play everything multiplayer, pay you 50 bucks a year so that in a couple of years, it’s 100 bucks a year. And that’s going up. We all know that. It’s a profit deal.”
When we caught up with Xbox LIVE Europe general manager Jerry Johnson to chat about the launch of Sky Player on Xbox 360 in the UK, we asked him whether there was any truth to Pachter’s claim.
“It would be interesting to understand what his basis was for that,” Johnson told VideoGamer.com. “It’s interesting to have someone come out there and say, ‘I think it’s worth more than you’re charging’. That’s not something I’m used to!
“I can tell you it wasn’t directed or tied to anything actually going on within our group. So I would say this was an analyst making a comment, as far as I can tell, on what he thought the quality of the value of the offering was. That’s why I was asking you if he went into any more detail.”
After we quoted Pachter to Johnson, he replied: “Yeah, I don’t know if everybody knows that it’s going up. I find it flattering that someone feels that the value of what we’re delivering is worth more than what we’re charging. That couldn’t have been popular with other press. Unless he was trying to be sensationalistic to get a quote out there.”
$100 equates, at the current exchange rate, to just over £60. If Pachter’s prediction proves to be true, it would mean a hike of £20 on the current £40 annual Xbox LIVE Gold membership fee.
See what else Johnson had to say by heading over to the interview in full.
What do you think? Will Microsoft raise the price of an annual Xbox LIVE Gold membership subscription? Let us know in the comments section below.
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