Xbox Game Pass lineup disappoints again ahead of major change to the service

XBOX has had a bit of a rough run lately, with recent months showing modest offerings on the platform’s video games subscription service. 

Xbox Game Pass is widely seen as one of the best deals in gaming, with hundreds of games available for a relatively small monthly cost on both Xbox consoles and PC. 

Xbox

Age of Mythology Retold is one of the games coming to the service this month[/caption]

The past few months, though, the new additions to the service have been somewhat underwhelming, with very little in the way of big releases being added to the service, and some big games being removed. 

Fans were hoping that this month would be different, after a price increase for the service a few months ago and some big changes coming later this month. 

Back in July, Microsoft revealed that it would be increasing the price of Game Pass and changing how the service worked, something that didn’t go over very well with fans. 

The company scrapped the cheaper Game Pass for Console tier, leaving players on Xbox consoles to either subscribe to Game Pass Core, which has a much smaller library of games, or to Ultimate, which is much more expensive. 

The replacement for Game Pass for Console, just called Xbox Game Pass (Standard), is set to roll out later this month, but it comes with a big caveat. 

Unlike the previous Game Pass for Console and Game Pass Ultimate, new game releases won’t be available on the new Standard tier. 

Instead, players will have to wait for the games to appear on the service some months down the line, or upgrade to the pricier Ultimate tier. 

Microsoft hasn’t given a date for when the new tier will be available, but existing subscribers to Game Pass for Console will be able to continue on that tier for the time being — new subscribers will miss out on day one releases. 

Five games have been announced to be coming to the service so far in September, with three of those being new day one releases, and subsequently would not be available to Standard subscribers once that tier goes live. 

The first game, Star Trucker, is available today, and sees players flying a big rig through space to deliver cargo, while tomorrow will see the release of an Age of Mythology remaster. 

Expeditions: A MudRunner game, Riders Republic, and Train Sim World 5 are all set to be coming later this month too, with the latter being a day one release. 

Here’s the full list of games coming to Game Pass in September with their release dates:

• September 3
  • Star Trucker (Cloud, Console, and PC)
• September 4
  • Age of Mythology: Retold (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X|S)
• September 5
  • Expeditions: A MudRunner Game (Cloud, Console, and PC)
• September 11
  • Riders Republic (Cloud, Console, and PC)
• September 17
  • Train Sim World 5 (Cloud, Console, and PC)

For more Xbox news, check out our recent story about a game that was delayed indefinitely after its developer claimed Xbox doesn’t care.