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Microsoft Raising Xbox Live Subscription Cost

All those "Xbox Live going free" rumors were way off the mark, huh?

Xbox Live Director of Programming Major Nelson has announced that Microsoft will increase the cost of several Xbox Live subscriptions packages in the US, Canada, Mexico, and the United Kingdom. Starting on November 1st, the price of a one-year subscription to Xbox Live in the US will be adjusted to $60 a year, up from its current price of $50.
 
Here's the full breakdown of the price changes Microsoft will make to subscriptions in each of the four regions.
 

No Caption Provided

Major Nelson recommends that those subscribers who would like to buy a subscription at the current price do so now, before the new pricing structure takes effect. Those who do resubscribe now will be able to purchase a one-year subscription for $39.99, a $20 discount on the new price.

702 Comments

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WinterSnowblind

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Edited By WinterSnowblind

Like I said in the other topic, I'm sure this has been done because of retailers undercutting the price so much.  In the UK you can always find 12 month subscription cards for £30, if not less, when the official price is £40.  I'd guess they've done this just to bring the price a bit more inline with what it's supposed to be.
 
But I'm definitely not in favour of this, it's only going to discourage people and we're not even getting any extra features.  It's still better than Sony's PSN+, we're they're trying to convince you that you're getting something when you're not at all..
 
But I'm still reverting to being a silver member when my current sub runs out.

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zitosilva

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Edited By zitosilva

It may just be 10 dollars more, but now the service costs exactly the same as a new game, which feels... wrong I guess. I don't know, I never felt that Live was really worth the cost, specially with all the ads lingering around. I guess I can just start buying multiplayer games for the PS3 instead of the 360.

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theditor

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Edited By theditor

Hooray for non MMO pc gaming.

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bucky

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Edited By bucky

I mean this sucks and all, but c'mon. It's only $10 more. 

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nywt

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Edited By nywt

People really need to calm down with this announcement. While yes, it does suck that Microsoft is now charging more, it's $10 a year. If you can't afford that then you shouldn't have Xbox Live in the first place. Plus, everyone should wait and see if Microsoft adds any new features to the service on November 1st to justify the new price. No matter how it goes however, I'm Canadian so I don't have a price increase :P.

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Djeffers03

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Edited By Djeffers03

Fuck Microsoft.

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Demyx

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Edited By Demyx

I'm almost sure that they must be coming out with something new. Maybe making Netflix part of the package or something. If not.....wow.

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anypti

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Edited By anypti

Nothing to make a fuzz about in my opinion. 

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BounceDK

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Edited By BounceDK

LOL it's already a ripoff! hahaha wow that's crazy

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chililili

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Edited By chililili

And this is why I have my Xbox subscription silver and play online on my ps3. Party chat not worth 60 bucks, fuck you microsoft

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hexogen

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Edited By hexogen

:\
 
:\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

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HalfSunkBoat

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Edited By HalfSunkBoat

Dumb.

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NoXious

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Edited By NoXious
@nywt:
$10 - for nothing. Has nothing to do with 'if you can't pay it'...
You're paying $10 MORE and get absolutely nothing of value in return.
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Legxend

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Edited By Legxend

Not a huge increase but it is kind of expected

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Jack268

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Edited By Jack268
@nywt said:
" People really need to calm down with this announcement. While yes, it does suck that Microsoft is now charging more, it's $10 a year. If you can't afford that then you shouldn't have Xbox Live in the first place. Plus, everyone should wait and see if Microsoft adds any new features to the service on November 1st to justify the new price. No matter how it goes however, I'm Canadian so I don't have a price increase :P. "
This. A thousand times this. 10 dollars? big whoop. I spend twice of this new subscription price for WoW and I'm not crying about it.
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WhatTheDang

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Edited By WhatTheDang
@Skywarpgold said:
" If they do this, then they better get rid of all those damn ads!! "
aaaaahahahahahahahahahahaha
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cikame

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Edited By cikame

...great

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PhilESkyline

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Edited By PhilESkyline

I already cut my automatic renewal (it ends 11/18/2010) and I will be buying all my mutil-platform games for PSN for now on.

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Potter9156

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Edited By Potter9156

Well that's sucks. Fuck you, Microsoft.  
 
Oh well, this just means I'll have to start shopping around instead of just walking into Best Buy and picking up a card. 
 
Also, fuck you Microsoft.

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Sadisticham

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Edited By Sadisticham

Shove your facebook and twitter. Never use them. 
 
Not allowing BBC's Iplayer on Live for free when the British public already payed for it annoyed me.
 
Constant Microsoft tax on anything that comes onto your service pissed me off.
 
Increasing your price and trying to claim I've got a great deal is a pure and simple slap in the face and I'll be caneling my subscription. It's only a small increase but it's an unjusitfied increase for a service I already feel charges to much and gives far too little. I'll play my multiplayer on my PC/PS3 you can keep your halo.

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Jensonb

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Edited By Jensonb

It's funny because I'm not renewing my Xbox LIVE Gold Subscription and taking my online gaming to PS3/Mac.

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lacke

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Edited By lacke

The place where I used to buy my 12+1 months card raised the price where I (Sweden) about a year ago. I rarely play on my 360 anymore (not since I bought a high end pc last fall) and if they raise the price again I'm not resubscribing. Although last time I checked, they were going to release Halo Reach themed LIVE cards which were 12+2 for the same price as 12+1 cards. essentially giving you an extra month. I might pick up a few of those.

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natetodamax

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Edited By natetodamax
@nywt: Jeez, it has nothing to do with "If you can't afford it then you shouldn't be using it". That's just silly to say. Unless Microsoft announces some awesome new features that are worth an extra $10, this price increase is completely worthless and unfair.
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SkullcrusherMountain

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Well, they only cleared a billion dollars in revenue last year.  Obviously, they're hurting, so we all have to sacrifice.

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TheYear20XX

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Edited By TheYear20XX

This is pretty shitty, especially considering that things like 1 vs 100 aren't around anymore, so what more am I getting for my $10? ESPN? It can't be Hulu Plus since that will require its own separate subscription. Really lame, but I guess I'll have to deal.

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ProfessorEss

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Edited By ProfessorEss

I can't remember the last time I paid full price for a Live Subscription but that still doesn't make the news any less worrisome as the prices of everything continue to creep slowly upwards.
 
I'm getting more and more curious about how long gaming will continue to be a "good value" form of entertainment to me.

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Hector

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Edited By Hector

They want every penny from our pockets!!!

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deactivated-5ffc9b71f33ff

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Nothing like screwing customers. More ads coming soon too!

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Crono

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Edited By Crono

It was bad enough already having to pay for what results in little more than shoddy peer-to-peer online gaming experience, but actually asking for more money for such a low-tech approach to multiplayer gaming?

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mystakin

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Edited By mystakin

This really upsets me, for the past few years Microsoft has been pretending their service is amazing by adding lazy feature on top of lazy feature ( Facebook, Last.fm, Twitter ) with a couple of good services every now and then ( Netflix, Party Chat, maybe ESPN ).  When they rolled out ESPN for free to Gold Members at E3 I thought that was a genius idea. 
 
Now I guess we see why.  The only way I can see this justifiable is if Silver goes free to play online, or they add a 3rd tier without all these extra features that a lot of their userbase doesn't even want.  It's really sleazy, and is the type of thing that would make me switch to a PS3 if I could, but I'm tied to the 360 by fake plastic instruments and a friends list big enough that I'm sure we'd lose people switching to PS3.  There's nothing about this announcement that could be seen as positive for anyone but Microsoft, imo.

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Metroid545

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Edited By Metroid545

whatch them change their mine last minute because all they wanted was thousands of fans to panic and buy year subscriptions

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metalsnakezero

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Edited By metalsnakezero

So whats the $10 extra for? They should really tell us now instead of having to wait for a another announcement.

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MJHAYLETT

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Edited By MJHAYLETT

I've never paid Microsoft for a Gold Membership and well I have nothing to add :D

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Daveyo520

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Edited By Daveyo520

Well this sucks.

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Magicallystoopid

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Edited By Magicallystoopid

Hey Microsoft, dump the stupid ads that are on there and MAYBE I'll pay up.
 
I still need to fix my 360's disc drive...

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Vikernes4

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Edited By Vikernes4

 wow microsoft sure is greedy. i've had nothing but troubles with my xbox.
unreadable disc errors on new games, error e68 on my first hard drive, then "game could not start, please download the game again" on my second hard drive, killed my usb stick after 2 days of using it.. and so on.. not only you have to pay to play online, now its getting more expensive as well?
thanks but i'll stick with my ps3.. not because of microsoft's monthly fee, but because of the overall lack of quality in all of their products.. oh and btw.. your steering wheel is a joke as well.. DUH

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jstaunton

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Edited By jstaunton
@Baljot187 said:
" Ridiculous. Does Microsoft have any idea of the economic climate in which they are raising prices :| "
An economic climate wherein gaming is seen as an escape so people will (within reason) happily pay for services which allow them these gaming habits.
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bkfountain

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Edited By bkfountain

Whatever, I have been a silver member for over a year, so this changes nothing to me. 
 
I play tons of games and have a decent gamescore in the 65k range, but will never pay MS a dime for something that is free elsewhere. PSN is a competent service for the price of nothing, and I'm actually moving more to PC gaming because of all the console bullshit this generation.

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SaltyJack

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Edited By SaltyJack

My Xbox broke recently along with the expiration of my gold subscription. Although this doesn't seem to affect the UK as much as the US, this isn't overly inviting me to buy a new Xbox.

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Ace829

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Edited By Ace829

Well this sucks for me. *picks up some $40 12-month Gold cards*

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SpecTackle

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Edited By SpecTackle

Yay for paying a subscription to a service that doesn't provide dedicated servers for any of the games played on it. You're paying them money so you can host games off your own cable line - makes perfect sense.

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Dopey2400

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Edited By Dopey2400

why? seriously, they want us to pay more for the same services? I don't even use half of them. When was the last time that you used Facebook, Last.FM or Twitter from your console? I did that once it just isn't practical; it's just a gimmick. ESPN on my Xbox? who cares. Why don't they put another service on there that would justify the extra 10 bucks, and not have to pay any extra charges. Netflix you have to have a subscription, which means extra money. Deal of the means if you buy the deal then you are still paying extra money. Why not put something on there where I would be like, "You know what I don't mind the extra $10 a year for that." Perhaps Boxee (feel free to make any suggestions) would be such service. Come on Microsoft don't raise the prices without providing something real.

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TheChaos

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Edited By TheChaos

I lol'd because this does not affect me. 
Still a dick move though.

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bulletstorm

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Edited By bulletstorm

So, that's where my money's going? Fucking Facebook, Twitter and Last FM? Fuck. 
 
And why make me pay for those services and ESPN? I CAN STEAM NETFLIX FOR FREE ON MY COMPUTER. ON MY ROKU BOX. and it doesn't cost me 60 dollars a year, I CAN GO ON FACEBOOK and it doesn't cost me 60 dollars a year. 
 
I and every other motherfucker on Xbox Live can get everything it offers for FREE on the god damned computer.

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C2C

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Edited By C2C

As a person who may get a 360 in the future, this really puts me off : /.  It's just $10 sure, but cmon man.  

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get2sammyb

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Edited By get2sammyb

What the heck? That's crazy...?

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Jeffsekai

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Edited By Jeffsekai

I like how the Article forgets to mention the 12 months subscription stays the same.
 
WAY TO GET DEM CLICKS GIANTBOMB.

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Vorbis

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Edited By Vorbis

How about you remove all those goddamn ads now?

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ch13696

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Edited By ch13696
@baron_calamity said:
" What happens is I switch my account from gold to silver? "
Back in 2008 I tried doing that and they said that it was impossible. If I don't pay, either my account will continue to be suspended or I would have to cancel my account all together. Basically creating a new account. I don't know if it's different now, but that's basically what happened.