The best deal in gaming has gotten just a little bit worse over the last month or so. While Xbox Game Pass still has over 100 high-quality games on its service, and even more if players are subscribed to EA Play as well, there's no denying that the last weeks have been disappointing for not just Game Pass subscribers, but Xbox fans in general.
While removing the $1 Xbox Game Pass trial was a bit of a blow, it pales in comparison to Game Pass' latest failure, Redfall. A one-to-four-player co-op vampire shooter developed by Arkane Austin, Redfall has been marketed over the last two years as one of Xbox's biggest 2023 titles, and the first exclusive to really kick off the year in style. But Redfall's reception hasn't been all that great, and now all eyes are on Bethesda's long-awaited Starfield, the only game that could be Xbox Game Pass' saving grace in 2023.
Starfield Could Make or Break Xbox Game Pass in 2023
Xbox Game Pass, in general, has had a fairly solid year so far. January saw a handful of Persona games reach Game Pass, February had Mount and Blade 2, March had Valheim, and April had Ghostwire: Tokyo. But while Xbox Game Pass is continuing to receive some much-needed support from its third-party partners, its own day-one offerings haven't been all that great.
Though the year started off strong with GoldenEye 007, February saw Atomic Heart's controversial release, a long-awaited FPS that was extremely divisive among critics and fans alike. March's big-ticket item, Wo Long Fallen Dynasty, fell into a similar pitfall, receiving a relatively mixed reception overall. This only continued into April with Minecraft Legends, a highly-anticipated action-strategy spinoff that, again, received mixed reviews upon release.
Xbox Game Pass' own first-party and day-one offerings have stumbled at every turn this year, and the final nail in the coffin is Redfall. For the last two years, Xbox has put a lot of eggs in Redfall's basket, continuously reminding fans that this was its next big first-party exclusive, and it was going to be one to remember. Unfortunately, Redfall will likely be remembered, but in all the wrong ways. With controversies with framerates, a laundry list of technical issues on launch day, and generic FPS gameplay tucked underneath it all, Redfall has the potential to be Xbox Game Pass' first real disaster.
For a relatively low price every month, Game Pass subscribers are willing to put up with a lot, but Redfall could be the final nail in the coffin for Xbox Game Pass' lackluster 2023 so far, and it'll be extremely difficult for Xbox to claw its way back out again. But if there's one game that can do it, it's Starfield. A sprawling Sci-Fi RPG that's been in the works since 2015, Starfield is Bethesda's latest ambitious title. After the mixed legacy of Fallout 4, and the disastrous launch and continued support for Fallout 76, Bethesda simply needs Starfield to be a hit.
Once thought to be a developer that could do no wrong, even despite very buggy launches, Bethesda has lost a lot of goodwill over the last decade, and Starfield is its one opportunity to fix it all. And if that wasn't enough pressure, Starfield now has to save Xbox Game Pass too. After Halo Infinite failed to stick the landing, Grounded was forgotten about, and Pentiment was just a little too niche to attract a large audience, Redfall was supposed to be Xbox Game Pass' first big exclusive of 2023, and now that it's failed, it's all down to Starfield, and if it's anything less than Game of the Year material, Xbox Game Pass could be in real trouble.