Microsoft's 'Avowed' early access inexplicably skips Xbox Cloud Gaming in favor of NVIDIA GeForce Now, putting Xbox customers last

[Windows Central]

If you paid the extra $10 for early access to Avowed and $20 per month for Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, you may find that Microsoft prefers your custom on NVIDIA GeForce Now instead.

Microsoft's 'Avowed' early access inexplicably skips Xbox Cloud Gaming in favor of NVIDIA GeForce Now, putting Xbox customers last : Read more

 

[fatpunkslim]

Lol, of course, it had to be you to jump on this kind of news. Once again, negative speculations for a simple mistake that will be corrected in a few days. We look forward to the update of your article in a few days to say that, in the end, it was an article about nothing! Lol, classic Jez, at least we can say you're consistent, always in panic mode!

Update from my previous comment:
At the same time, thinking it over, there's one thing I don't understand: the premium version doesn't mention early access to the cloud:

• Avowed Base Game
• Five Days Early Access To Avowed
• Two Sets Of Skins For Each Companion
• Avowed Digital Artbook
• Avowed Original Soundtrack

- However, cloud access depends on your Game Pass Ultimate subscription, right?
- So cloud access will be on the launch day in Game Pass, right?
- Avowed comes to Game Pass in just 4 days, right?
- So, cloud access will only be available in 4 days, correct?
- And only for those who are subscribed to Game Pass, right?
Basically, how can one say that the premium version should give access to Xbox Cloud Gaming right now if:

1. It wasn't included in the premium version
2. It is only available to Game Pass Ultimate subscribers
3. It is scheduled to be available on Game Pass in 4 days?

Unlike GeForce Now, which is a standalone service, Xbox Cloud Gaming is included in Game Pass Ultimate.
You're talking about Xbox Cloud Gaming as a standalone service, but it's not, right ? How can you compare it to GeForce Now under these conditions, especially since it's still in beta?

You could even say that we don't really pay for xCloud currently, and when it exits beta, there will probably be a specific cloud subscription.

It's the same for the "Play on Cloud Your Own Games" service, which is part of Xbox Cloud Gaming (xCloud) and is included with the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription. This means that to access this service and play your own Xbox games via the cloud, you need to be subscribed to Game Pass Ultimate.

And so the xCloud service will be accessible on the launch day in Game Pass, quite simply.

In fact, I don't understand @Jez Corden point. It seems to me there's something inconsistent in his statement, or maybe I missed something.

But if I'm right, it's further proof that Jez seeks negativity in ideas that are false and inconsistent.

 

[Jez Corden]

imagine advocating for customers to get what they pay for.

 

[fatpunkslim]

@Jez Corden I added a comment to my initial comment, I don't know if you read it! Can you explain to me because either I didn't understand how xCloud works, or there's something illogical in your statement.

imagine advocating for customers to get what they pay for.

Yes, I understand what you mean! But we can't demand everything from Xbox. I think they already offer a lot of services that can't be found elsewhere. We should highlight and commend that rather than always seeing the glass half empty. Don't you think ?

Beyond that, I think it's technically complicated to create some sort of exemption for people who buy the game but aren't subscribers. After all, we're talking about a 4-day delay. Is it worth making a big fuss over it?

 

[Gabe Szabo]

@fatpunkslim no, you're in the wrong here, clearly. Even if it's not malicious, it can be clearly seen as either an oversight or misleading, but nothing like what you say. If a user buys the advance pass, not the full version, it's so that they can play the game on Game Pass a certain number of days early. If the user plays solely on Xbox Cloud Streaming (Beta), because "Everything is an Xbox", and pay for advanced access, what do you think they'll feel when they can't play the game early?

 

[GraniteStateColin]

Lol, of course, it had to be you to jump on this kind of news. Once again, negative speculations for a simple mistake that will be corrected in a few days. We look forward to the update of your article in a few days to say that, in the end, it was an article about nothing! Lol, classic Jez, at least we can say you're consistent, always in panic mode!

Update from my previous comment:
At the same time, thinking it over, there's one thing I don't understand: the premium version doesn't mention early access to the cloud:

• Avowed Base Game
• Five Days Early Access To Avowed
• Two Sets Of Skins For Each Companion
• Avowed Digital Artbook
• Avowed Original Soundtrack

- However, cloud access depends on your Game Pass Ultimate subscription, right?
- So cloud access will be on the launch day in Game Pass, right?
- Avowed comes to Game Pass in just 4 days, right?
- So, cloud access will only be available in 4 days, correct?
- And only for those who are subscribed to Game Pass, right?
Basically, how can one say that the premium version should give access to Xbox Cloud Gaming right now if:

1. It wasn't included in the premium version
2. It is only available to Game Pass Ultimate subscribers
3. It is scheduled to be available on Game Pass in 4 days?

Unlike GeForce Now, which is a standalone service, Xbox Cloud Gaming is included in Game Pass Ultimate.
You're talking about Xbox Cloud Gaming as a standalone service, but it's not, right ? How can you compare it to GeForce Now under these conditions, especially since it's still in beta?

You could even say that we don't really pay for xCloud currently, and when it exits beta, there will probably be a specific cloud subscription.

It's the same for the "Play on Cloud Your Own Games" service, which is part of Xbox Cloud Gaming (xCloud) and is included with the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription. This means that to access this service and play your own Xbox games via the cloud, you need to be subscribed to Game Pass Ultimate.

And so the xCloud service will be accessible on the launch day in Game Pass, quite simply.

In fact, I don't understand @Jez Corden point. It seems to me there's something inconsistent in his statement, or maybe I missed something.

But if I'm right, it's further proof that Jez seeks negativity in ideas that are false and inconsistent.

I'm usually too long-winded, but this one is simple: Microsoft offers the game and cloud access via its own cloud service. If a user paid extra through the MS service for 5 days' early access and can't get it through MS, only through a competing service, that's a failure on Microsoft's part to provide the service. Jez is correct.

To your point, hopefully MS does correct this quickly and then this issue partially goes away. But even if they do fix this quickly, the fact that once again MS screwed up in a way that hurts their most devoted customers is absolutely par for the course with MS. They constantly communicate through actions like this that their fans should not trust them. That's just really bad business and strategy, something I say with sadness as a definite Microsoft fan who wants nothing more here than for MS to be successful in the consumer and gaming space (I have other strategic objectives for MS too, but not relevant here).

 

[fatpunkslim]

Okay, so logically, Game Pass Ultimate subscribers who purchased the premium version of the game should have had access 4 days earlier in the cloud, right? Knowing they already have early access on PC and console? And that means those who bought the premium game but aren't subscribed to Game Pass Ultimate don't have early access in the cloud?

Was it the case for Indiana Jones, for example? Did we have early access in the cloud for those who bought the premium version? Sorry, I ask because I never buy premium versions, so I really don't know!

But all this seems quite complicated for Xbox to manage technically, as it involves a lot of different conditions and cases.

Besides, making a big deal out of a 4-day delay seems a bit disproportionate to me!

 

[Gabe Szabo]

That's the point. People are paying for 4 days early access and you're saying they should just "wait a few days" for Microsoft to figure it out? Have you ever tried flushing money down the toilet? At least you weren't expecting anything in return if so.

I believe Indy was available on xCloud on advance access day 1, but I might be wrong (I don't pay for, or play, early access either).

It might seem complicated to you, but it's not your problem to solve. It's Microsoft's. I don't believe it's any more complicated than flipping the proverbial switch, though. xCloud has the same licence checks I assume Xbox itself has on the hardware, so I don't assume it's complicated at all. And Microsoft indeed should be called out when something like this happens and their loyal customers get the stick instead of the carrot...

And I don't mean to overstep, but please, try to be a bit more civil regarding your opinion of Jez (I mean across these forums, you're pretty vocal about pointing out how Jez is trying to be negative about Xbox, whereas I believe he has a right as a "not-journalist-blogger" to voice his opinions just as much). He's passionate about this, and his views change over time; he listens to people and reconsiders his points. Like an adult person, not like a jaded fanatic football fan or something. Also, Phil Spencer seems to constantly react to points raised by @Jez Corden too. Just lately, on Gamertag Radio, he essentially confirmed that he was the one who pushed them to market Xbox Play Anywhere at the last Dev_Direct, and I assume it was because Parris Lily and Jez are pretty loud about trying to push this. We should very much call them out on EVERY mistake they make. It's OUR money and OUR time we invest in their products, after all.

 

[fatpunkslim]

That's the point. People are paying for 4 days early access and you're saying they should just "wait a few days" for Microsoft to figure it out? Have you ever tried flushing money down the toilet? At least you weren't expecting anything in return if so.

I believe Indy was available on xCloud on advance access day 1, but I might be wrong (I don't pay for, or play, early access either).

It might seem complicated to you, but it's not your problem to solve. It's Microsoft's. I don't believe it's any more complicated than flipping the proverbial switch, though. xCloud has the same licence checks I assume Xbox itself has on the hardware, so I don't assume it's complicated at all. And Microsoft indeed should be called out when something like this happens and their loyal customers get the stick instead of the carrot...

And I don't mean to overstep, but please, try to be a bit more civil regarding your opinion of Jez (I mean across these forums, you're pretty vocal about pointing out how Jez is trying to be negative about Xbox, whereas I believe he has a right as a "not-journalist-blogger" to voice his opinions just as much). He's passionate about this, and his views change over time; he listens to people and reconsiders his points. Like an adult person, not like a jaded fanatic football fan or something. Also, Phil Spencer seems to constantly react to points raised by @Jez Corden too. Just lately, on Gamertag Radio, he essentially confirmed that he was the one who pushed them to market Xbox Play Anywhere at the last Dev_Direct, and I assume it was because Parris Lily and Jez are pretty loud about trying to push this. We should very much call them out on EVERY mistake they make. It's OUR money and OUR time we invest in their products, after all.

Don't you think you're exaggerating a bit? People are not only paying for 5 days early access on Xcloud. They still have:

• 5 days early access on PC and console
• Two Sets Of Skins For Each Companion
• Avowed Digital Artbook
• Avowed Original Soundtrack

And what percentage of players bought the premium version specifically for 5 days early access on Xcloud? In my opinion, it's not that many.

So, it comes back to what I said from the beginning, it's a lot of noise for not much and not many people!

Regarding my opinion on Jez, I respect his opinion, and I would ask you to respect mine as well and not position yourself as a lesson-giver; and I am far from the only one who thinks that he tends to always see the glass half empty rather than half full, often speculating negatively, and often stubbornly sticking to things that are factually incorrect. Also, when you read his articles, they are often biased, and he tends to present his opinions as absolute truths, which demonstrates a certain arrogance and a lack of humility.

That said, I acknowledge his tolerance and intelligence, if only for responding to people who don't necessarily agree with him, and for that, he has all my respect.

 

[Gabe Szabo]

I'm sorry if my comment came off as condescending or lecturing to you, it wasn't my intention. You were asking questions, and I was trying to answer to the best of my ability. I just wanted to point out that I didn't agree with your view, that's all.

I wasn't exaggerating. I was talking hypothetically, about those who generally buy advance access. Not this particular case, but any case. Their reason to buy the package, especially early on, is obviously because they want to play earlier than others, bacause of FOMO. And in this case, they might be paying for the early access and not care about the other stuff. You can't know.

However small the percentage of people might be who are affected, and I'm not even saying there *are* any, your argument to me seems like was "they shouldn't expect" cloud streaming as part of their premium upgrade, and they should very well be content with whatever else the upgrade gives them. I think you're missing the point here. The problem is not that these (theoretical) people should or shouldn't have advance access to the game. It's that Microsoft provides advance access through GFN but not their own streaming service. I'm not sure you're intentionally missing the point or not, but whichever the case may be, I think saying that the minority's voice should not matter because they are fewer, is pretty unempathetic. Especially given that seeing what happened with other Microsoft consumer products, it was always the most hardcore that suffered from Microsoft's actions. It might be the minority, yeah. It doesn't make it any better.

I know Jez's articles are biased. He knows his articles are biased. I don't understand what's wrong with acknowledging that and don't understand why do you have to call that out at all. He's not denying it or even trying to hide it. He can be sometimes overly negative and overly positive, sure. But I NEVER once heard or read him present his opinions as absolute truths, and I've listened to quite a few of his podcast episodes with Rand and read many if not most of his articles.

Although, I'm not trying to convince you either way and not trying to argue. You can have your opinion on the matter of course. I aired my concerns, thanks for reading.

 

[Lurking_Lurker_Lurks]

At this point XCloud is a beta within a beta. I'm all for Microsoft taking their time to bake it, but you can really see cloud gaming start to evolve past them. Which again, not necessarily advocating for rushing. The financial model alone is a headache, but with stuff like this you'd wish they'd be investing more and moving faster.

To add to this article, I don't think Xbox first party games are counted in the "play games you own" AND for whatever reason playing Avowed in early access doesn't count as the game being on Game Pass (it DOES NOT track for me for the daily game pass quest). The first one I can kinda get. Xbox first party is guaranteed to stay in Game Pass Ultimate permanently, so there's no rush to do whatever software change is needed to make those games you can play without GPU. That'd all be backend stuff no one would notice because there's no standalone XCloud subscription to JUST play games you own on the cloud (like Nvidia). The second one is even more baffling than the first. Despite being able to just buy the early access upgrade separately and use Game Pass to prove you own the game itself (and play it early) it still doesn't count as a game pass title during early access?? What??

The bottom line seems to be that Nvidia GFN is a mature service. Not in the since that cloud gaming is ready to replace native gaming (that'll need major internet infrastructure improvements for more people), but that the service understands what it wants to be. It'll continue to improve and probably raise prices and make some changes, but it won't see any major evolutions. XCloud or Xbox Cloud Gaming is not. It still hasn't evolved into its final form and Xbox is still figuring out exactly what that final form will look like. Owned games being available is a long time promised feature that only just happened and it's still being treated like a pilot program in this public beta "perk" (as Microsoft still refers to the entire service as a "perk" not a feature or proper platform). There's still a lot of investment to be had there and a lot of work in building it up as a platform with consistent reliable support (which I think is the end goal).

As someone who LIKES the "this is an Xbox" campaign, I agree that it is entirely premature. The only real stable and good quality experience Xbox platform are Xbox consoles. Xbox on PC still needs a lot of work. Xbox on Mobile is nonexistent due to locked down mobile operating systems. XCloud/Xbox Cloud Gaming is still evolving and remains a beta within a beta. I think Xbox has the winning strategy, but they haven't even it a consistent stride yet, so them just pushing the big red button to market it like that was... a poor choice. Right now it feels more like a proof of concept you'd see at CES or something. Microsoft really still needs to invest in their platforms and ecosystem. If I were them I'd have gradually ramped up marketing to focus more on the benefits of Xbox Play Anywhere and Xbox Game Pass and make those more general knowledge, while primarily focusing new users adoption on the console side. Then in maybe late 2025 (if they've figured this out by then) start the "this is an Xbox" campaign and keep it rolling into 2026 with the 25th anniversary with a celebration of all things Xbox. If rumors of a 2026 next gen are true then they could also cap it off with a "This is the new Xbox" and have that be the final big note to push Xbox on. The goal would be to increase Xbox adoption on those new platforms they've expanded to and to celebrate Xbox gamers on console, PC, Cloud, and mobile. But none of this works when only 1/4 of those platforms really feels like a platform. PC feels like an afterthought, cloud as stated by Microsoft is still just a "perk" that's in beta, and mobile is just a pipe dream right now unless courts pull through (which is a major problem in the US under the new administration).

Also to provide maybe more for the why, I had just assumed that due to the agreements with Nvidia and GFN that Microsoft signed when trying to push ABK through, they just HAVE to make a first party game available when and if they can. And GFN just works based on "do you own this game or not" once a game is on the service. They probably already put in the work to add it, so now it's just "do you have a working license to play Avowed". Whereas for Xbox, it seems like Avowed is not currently in Game Pass and since it's not in Game Pass and "play games you own" isn't an across the board thing then there's no early access Avowed for cloud.

 

[Gabe Szabo]

I agree that the "This is an Xbox" campaign is very premature, exactly because they market XCloud as "Xbox", when in reality, XCloud is still a Beta service (that hasn't seen mich improvements in recent months, not much in years either). Tons of stuff "missing", including local-multiplayer simulation, more options to configure streaming, sharing options etc.

As for the technicality of it, I'm sure there is probably some quirk on the backend that makes it work this way, but I believe they should've ironed it out before feeding a competing service this way. Most probably, the backend only tracks/checks your entitlement, and as you said, it's probably a value from the following enumeration: "Owned" (you can "own" free games/demos too), "Game Pass", "Gold", "EA Play", "Ubisoft+". Maybe some others. But given that "Game Pass" is the entitlement, you can't "Game Pass"+Premium Advance Access a game, because "Game Pass" only works when the game becomes available on the service. And then, it becomes available for everyone. So yeah, I understand "why" this could be the case. Doesn't mean it's not on Microsoft to fix, or at least directly address.