We recently reported that Xbox seems to be having some troubles, with significant layoffs and a 100-day plan on the cards to bring the ship around. Some of Microsoft's issues include plummeting revenue, an affordability crisis, and low adoption rates. According to Xbox Gaming's Chief Stragety Officer, Matthew Ball, ad-supported tiers may be one potential tool to help improve things at Xbox. In an interview with The Game Business, Ball addresses the rising costs of gaming, saying that "the costs have gone up way too high on development, and at the same point, everyone feels terrible with prices going up on hardware or software or microtransactions. That is a challenge. It's not good if that is the only option." He goes on to compare it to streaming, noting that the vast majority of new streaming subscriptions in recent years have been on supported subscription tiers. The comparison to ad-supported streaming services suggests Ball is mostly talking about services like Xbox Game Pass, where there have been rumors of ad-supported tiers, or potentially even steeper subsidies for console hardware—an area Xbox is leaning into more and more since Asha Sharma took over as CEO in early 2026.
Far more affordable to just buy indie games instead, and you can play a lot of them on fairly affordable hardware. You could make do with an iGPU for a fair bit if you want to keep costs down low enough.
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