By now, you all have heard about the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and how awesome it is. In this article, I'm not just going to list the features of Game Pass Ultimate. I will share the game-changing experience it has brought to my life, and how others, who are not really gamers but still want to play, can use Xbox Game Pass Ultimate to find something that they are really missing out on.
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate:
Video games are so fun. However, until July 2019, I wasn't enjoying video games as much. Why? Because I wasn't that good of a gamer and just didn't spend enough time. I didn't spend time playing the right games. Before July 2019, I was playing only five to six games. I spent most of my time on two sports games - Madden & NBA 2K. Yes, I spent most of the last decade playing football and basketball on my Xbox 360 & Xbox One. Because of my love for sport and desire of being a general manager of a football or a basketball team, I wasted the best time of my life by playing only those two-game series and by missing out on some of the greatest action and role-playing games.
Then there was a video recommendation on YouTube. A video about Microsoft going crazy with its Xbox Game Pass subscription deal. Before watching the video, I tried to remember all the games I saw on Game Pass when I first subscribed to it a year or two prior to that day. I remember the games on the Game Pass list weren't that new or cool, so I ended up canceling my subscription a week later. But as I continued watching the video on YouTube by an Xbox user, I got to see the amazing deal that Xbox was offering for its game pass subscription. The deal was for three years of Xbox Game Pass subscription with gold for only $181. In order to get that deal, we had to first subscribe to three years of Xbox Live Gold for $180 and then subscribe to the promotional $1 deal of one month of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate. After doing all that, our three-year gold subscription turns into three years Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription. We get access to over 100 plus games on console and 100 plus games on PC from the Game Pass catalog, and three games from Xbox Live Gold every month. I said to myself that this deal is amazing but the games aren't that new or amazing. However, later in the video, they showed some relatively new games like Metro Exodus (2019), Shadow of War (2017), Monster Hunter World (2018), and also the upcoming Gears 5 (released September 6) game. The person from the video mentioned that Gears 5 will be available to all Game Pass subscribers the day it will release. I said to myself what??? A brand new game along with 100 other games for the price of $181? That is crazy considering the price of a brand new game is $60, which is one-third of the cost for this subscription with 100 plus games. Initially, $181 seemed like a big investment for me to spend in just one day, so I settled for one year of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate for a total of $65 after taxes. It was one of the best investments I made in my life. Investing on Xbox Game Pass that day would have been the best investment had I gone for three years for only $181 plus tax. Just think about it. If I had decided to buy games like Gears 5 ($60), Metro Exodus ($40), Monster Hunter World ($30), and Shadow of War ($30) from GameStop, these four games would have cost me about $170 after taxes. With the three-year Game Pass subscription, I can play all four of those games and I can try several games from the Game Pass catalog that would constantly add new games for the next three years.
Gears 5 was about two months away, so I ended up playing games like Metro Exodus and Shadow of War (should have played Shadow of Mordor first, but anyway). Then after having a blast with those two games for about a month, Blair Witch game was released on Game Pass. I had to play that game right away because I admire good horror shows and movies. Playing a horror game would be even scarier and more exciting than just watching something horrific. Not gonna say it was the greatest game in the world, but it was extremely fun and scary for sure. Around the same time, Devil May Cry 5 became available on Game Pass. The game itself was released for Xbox One and PlayStation 4 earlier in 2019. It was available to Game Pass subscribers in less than six months after it was released. I said to myself 'wow, Game Pass is adding expensive and really cool games to its library.' The short amount of time I spent playing Devil May Cry before Xbox Game Pass, I didn't enjoy the game much because it was really hard. However, the graphics of the game and combat were amazing. Devil May Cry 5 had two additional playable characters and the graphics were even better than previous DMC games. Then in the next few weeks, I got to try Fallout 4 and Gears 5. Fallout 4 isn't my kind of a game. I really want to see my player when I'm playing with it. Yes, you don't even get to see your player in Metro Exodus and Blair Witch but in my opinion, the graphics and game-play of those games are just much better than Fallout 4. Gears 5 is definitely a fun game, but I've been struggling with it lately. So as of right now, I'm just playing two games with my Game Pass: Shadow of War and The Witcher 3.
The Witcher 3 is easily one of the best games of the decade and the best game on Game Pass. There is so much to do in this game. The story is very engaging and I love to fight the bag guys with swords and superpowers. In video games, I prefer fighting with swords, other weapons like bow and arrow and axe, and or just attack my enemies with punches and kicks. Shadow of War's game-play is pretty much the same as The Witcher 3's, and just like The Witcher 3, the story is fun and there is so much to do. The Witcher 3's story is definitely more interesting and its side quests mean more than the side quests on Shadow of War. The bottom line is that Shadow of War and The Witcher 3 are my two favorite games on Game Pass and I can't stop playing them. If it wasn't for Game Pass, I would have missed out on these two games for sure and wouldn't have been able to try new games without spending any money. The Witcher 3 was released in May of 2015. That means I wasn't aware of this game for about four and a half years. Four and a half! That's just because I was busy playing all the boring games like Madden and NBA 2K.
Games To Be Played
Lately, since November of 2019, I've been playing at least two games from the Xbox Game Pass library. So I'm going to play another game along with Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice. One day I will play Hellblade and the next day I will play Final Fantasy 15 Royal Edition that was just added to Xbox Game Pass last week. It is one of those game series that never occurred to be a fun one to me. However, the Final Fantasy game series has a pretty decent fan following. I'm gonna have to play this game and find out why some fans are crazy about this game series. On the internet, especially on Twitter, I keep seeing comments where a lot of gamers are anxiously waiting for the Final Fantasy 7 remake. Sadly, that game is not going to be on Game Pass because it is a PlayStation timed-exclusive (how come PlayStation has all the exclusives?). It is not for certain that I'm going to play Final Fantasy 15 besides after Hellblade. I might go for A Plague Tale: Innocence. Another game that was recently added on Game Pass, and another game that was released in 2019. The trailer that I saw for this game on my Xbox looks amazing and quite frankly, it looks like my type of game. Action game with a scary story. You know what? That's what I'm going to play along with Hellblade. Screw it! Playing two scary games every other day would be fun.
Then after I'm done with Hellblade I and Plague Tale, I will play Gears of War 4 next. Back in September, I did start playing Gears 5 and played it till early November. I stopped playing Gears 5 because I was struggling to play with guns (I prefer sword games over shooters) and started focusing on Shadow of War and Devil May Cry 5. I will continue playing Gears 5 and start playing Gears of War 4 just to see how good or bad this Xbox exclusive Gears of War series is. Most of the gamers rave about PlayStation exclusives and say the only good exclusive series on Xbox is the Halo game series.
Speaking of exclusives, the next two games that I will play from Xbox Game Pass following Gears of War 4 and 5 are going to be Sunset Overdrive and Halo: The Master Chief Collection. I did try Sunset Overdrive like a month ago, and it felt fun. Graphics aren't realistic, but it looks and feels different than most of the games that I'm playing right now. Halo: The Master Chief Collection includes six total games. Yes, I don't like shooting games, but I am going to try all five of those games and see why the Halo series is loved by almost every single Xbox player. Besides, I can try anything from Game Pass, since I won't have to pay anything extra to download and play the games. In fact, I will try Halo tonight. I created a schedule (yes a gaming schedule) where I planned how much time I will spend on my Xbox games and on my PlayStation 4 games. Yes, I also have a PlayStation, which was gifted to me by my former supervisor like a month ago. Before I talk about the PlayStation and if I prefer it over Xbox, take a look at my schedule.
What do you guys think? Four days on Xbox and three days on PlayStation. Yes, technically I should be playing PlayStation more than Xbox because I just got the PlayStation 4 and just started playing games on a PlayStation console for the first time since 2009. The last time I played a video game on a PlayStation console was on PSP (PlayStation Portable). Okay, back to my schedule. So yes, I'm playing Shadow of War and The Witcher 3 on Xbox One S with my Game Pass subscription as much as I'm playing God of War and The Last of Us on my PlayStation 4. I got GOW and THOU along with Horizon Zero Dawn with the PlayStation 4 bundle that I received from my supervisor. Will play Horizon Zero Dawn once I get done with God of War.
Xbox & PlayStation?
Now, yes this article is about how Xbox Game Pass has changed my life and how it showed me the real world of a true gamer. Yet, here I am talking about playing games on PlayStation 4. How and why I'm playing PlayStation exclusive games on PS4 after I talked about me getting an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription and having the greatest time of my life playing games from it on my Xbox? A true Xbox fan would never play and enjoy PlayStation 4 and its exclusives. Well, that's what I felt as an Xbox fan before I subscribed to Xbox Game Pass and discovered these awesome games like Shadow of War and The Witcher 3. After I started playing these two games on my Xbox thanks to Game Pass, I went to my computer to read about these games. I wanted to see how these two games are rated and what other games are there that are similar. Found out both games were praised by the critics and fans, especially The Witcher 3. Then, I came across games that were rated as good or higher than The Witcher 3. None of the Xbox exclusives were compared to either of those games and to my surprise, some PlayStation 4 exclusives were right up there in the list of the best games of the decade. For some reason, I always thought the most extraordinary games will always come out for both consoles. Like, there can be good to pretty solid exclusives for both consoles, but developers will always want to produce the greatest games for both consoles. Two of the biggest games of the decade were released on PS4. God of War and The Last of Us. Along with those two, there were games like Marvel's Spiderman, which I just can't believe how Xbox miss out on (since everybody loves superhero games), Horizon Zero Dawn, Bloodborne, Days Gone, and all the Uncharted games released as PS4 exclusives. I was like wow PlayStation got some big-time exclusives. When I played God of War on my PS4, I noticed this game was full of amazing graphics and the combat is just fantastic. I felt like I had powers while I was playing with Kratos (the playable character from God of War). However, if it wasn't for Xbox Game Pass, I would have most likely never tried these gems on PS4. Shadow of War and The Witcher 3 helped me understand there are so many awesome action games with great story-lines besides Batman Arkham games and the Amazing Spiderman game series. My gaming knowledge was so bad prior to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate that I thought only superhero games can be action games with story-lines. Yes, I was basically uneducated when it came to gaming.
So thanks to Xbox Game Pass, I know about all the great games. Not just great games on Xbox, but on PlayStation and Nintendo too. I do own all three of the consoles from this generation: Xbox One S All-Digital Edition, PlayStation 4 Slim, and Nintendo Switch Lite. But make no mistake, I'm an Xbox Fan first. Yes, PlayStation and even Nintendo have better exclusives, but I enjoy gaming on my Xbox One S more than I do on those two consoles. In my opinion, Xbox has a better controller than PlayStation 4 does. Games look better on Xbox than they do on PlayStation. Finally, Xbox's dashboard is way better than PlayStation's (this might be a fact). Dashboard doesn't determine how good and smooth a console plays a video game on it, but when we are talking about consoles in general, how the consoles look and feel, the dashboard does play a part. Xbox One's dashboard is more colorful and shows a lot more than the PlayStation 4's dashboard does. The thing that I like the most about Xbox's dashboard is when you back out of your current game and return to the home screen, it shows that game's cover in the background (see below). PlayStation 4 doesn't show any nice pictures or games in the background on its home screen. Plus, Xbox's dashboard has five main tabs; Home, Game Pass, Mixer, Community, and Store. PlayStation 4's dashboard basically is just one screen with apps, settings, games, and PS Now all lined across one another.
Note: I will talk more in detail about Xbox vs PlayStation in a different article. For now, I just want to say something quick about PlayStation Now. It is a gaming subscription similar to Xbox Game Pass, but it is not that good. PS Now doesn't have as newer games in its library as Game Pass does, and unlike Game Pass, it does not add new first-party games the day they are released on the console.
The bottom line is the Xbox Game Pass was the best investment I made in my life as a gamer. I have so far spent a total of $285 to get myself three years and three months of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate. If I want, I won't have to spend a single dollar on video games until December of 2022. Most likely, I won't be spending any money on Xbox games since I know Game Pass will constantly add new games to its catalog and will add their own exclusives the very day they are released. Well, I promised myself I won't spend any money on Xbox games unless a new Batman game comes out for both Xbox and PlayStation, and is not available on Game Pass day one. For PlayStation, I will only spend on their exclusive action games such as the upcoming Last of Us 2.
Now I have so many games to play. I wish I could get some more time to play these awesome games.
Thank you Xbox Game Pass!
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