With the dust settled and Microsoft’s $69 billion USD acquisition of Activision Blizzard finally in the books, attention has very quickly turned to when players and subscribers might see some of the vast library of Activision Blizzard games make their way to Game Pass.
Some might have hoped that we’d see a huge drop of games into the service to mark the occasion, but talking to the Official Xbox Podcast, the head of Xbox and certified Game Pass-tor, Phil Spencer, revealed that it won’t be the case.
“I think that’s accurate. I would love it if there was some kind of secret celebration drop that’s coming in the next couple of weeks. There’s not,” Spencer told the podcast.
“Definitely when we think about the new games that are there, I would be straight with people, right. If we were going to put them in the subscription this year, I would tell people.
“And I know there’ll be some disappointment about that. This acquisition is definitely long term. So the fact that we’re not hitting day one with a bunch of games dropping in to Game Pass is a little bit of a downer, but I’m very excited about the future. And I just want to be straight with people that that’s where we are.”
Phil’s comments line up with what Activision had said prior to the deal closing [via VGC]: “As we continue to work toward regulatory approval of the Microsoft deal, we’ve been getting some questions whether our upcoming and recently launched games will be available via Game Pass.
“While we do not have plans to put Modern Warfare 3 or Diablo IV into Game Pass this year, once the deal closes, we expect to start working with Xbox to bring our titles to more players around the world.
“And we anticipate that we would begin adding games into Game Pass sometime in the course of next year.”
