14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft Game Studios boss Phil Spencer has talked a bit about the Games with Gold program offered to Xbox Live Gold subscribers on the Xbox 360, saying that comparisons to Sony's PlayStation Plus service are unfair and that the system will evolve to please customers.
For quite some time now, Sony's PlayStation Plus service has offered current subscribers access to all sorts of great free games across the PS3, PS Vita, and PS4 platforms.
Microsoft countered the move last summer with Games with Gold, a service that brings two free games each month to Gold subscribers.
Unfortunately, while the idea is quite good, Xbox 360 owners have complained about the low quality and really old titles that are offered for free, especially when compared to PlayStation Plus, which features new and great games.
Microsoft's Phil Spencer has talked a bit about all these problems and once again emphasized during a panel at SXSW, via Polygon, that the comparison to PS Plus is a bit unfair, as Gold subscribers can still play the free games when their subscription lapses, as opposed to Plus members.
"One of our issues with Games with Gold — not 'issues,' but differences between the other system we get compared to, is the fact that with Games with Gold, you get to keep that game, regardless of whether you continue to subscribe," Spencer said.
"And the business around Games with Gold, for us, is just fundamentally different from some of the other programs that are out there, which does put a different financial picture on a — you're going to go buy a game that's brand new, the cost of putting that in, just to be kind of blunt about it."
After making things clear, Spencer did assure Xbox fans that he had been meeting with the Games with Gold team in order to address the different complaints from users and really make the experience an attractive one.
"That said, I have been sitting down, monthly now, with that team — some of the earlier months were already programmed — and playing a more active role in picking franchises that show up in Games with Gold, and I think you'll see at least something that feels, at least, more true to what I think Games with Gold should look like with the constraints that are there," Spencer added.
As of right now, Games with Gold is available only on Xbox 360, but Microsoft has promised that the service will expand onto the Xbox One later this year.