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[GHG]

Version mismatch, clunky mod support, poor performance, and beyond.

While most of the funfest has been on Steam, Palworld is also driving a huge amount of growth on Xbox as well. Xbox Cloud Gaming has been suffering queues, which often happens when a big game enters the service, and Palworld has also been riding high on the most-played games lists on Xbox consoles in various territories. However, it's not all peachy in the world of Pals, at least for Xbox.


Palworld's inclusion on PC Game Pass has offered players the cheapest way to obtain the game, shaving $15 off the Steam asking price in exchange for the $10 monthly subscription via the Xbox app on Windows 11 and Windows 10. However, Palworld's inclusion there has also been driving discussions, once again, about the state of the PC Game Pass Xbox app in general.

I was planning to revisit the app for an article, given that I've been pretty critical of the Xbox app in the past. Let's re-examine where we are today, and what Microsoft still need to fix moving forward.

At the absolute basic level, the app works fine. You can install games, generally launch them, without issues. However, there are an array of niche problems with Windows 11, the store delivery mechanism, and other factors that can break installations from the Microsoft Store and the Xbox app as a by-product. All too often do I get questions on how to fix broken installations on the Xbox app on PC on my socials, prompting me to write that guide there on some of the common pitfalls. Recently, I haven't fallen afoul of any particularly bad issues, but I did struggle when I acquired my ASUS ROG Ally last summer, with stalled installations and games failing to launch, until one day the issue seemingly fixed itself. That's really one of the main issues with the Xbox app — the consistency of the content delivery experience is sub-par compared to, well, Steam, which right now remains totally and absolutely the benchmark for these types of services on PC.

There are a range of mild irritants, such as pop-ups containing useless information like the above, or the fact some games miss features such as Xbox achievements. I'm not a fan of the way the library is structured, with "Jump Back In" and "Play Later" right up at the top, even if they're empty, taking up a ton of space for no reason. There's no configurability here, and it's incredibly annoying — Steam lets you wholly customize how your library is curated, and again, Steam is the benchmark here. To find your games you need to scroll down the page and use a cacophony of filters and drop down menus, which are a pain to use on a touch screen device like the ASUS ROG Ally. Sometimes I wonder if the people using the Xbox app on PC actually use it day to day, or if they've ever used Steam, to get an idea of the delta in user experience. Beyond these mild irritants, there are far worse issues with the Xbox experience on PC too.

You really don't need to go far to find games that are straight up just hard-broken on the Xbox app for PC. I installed Fallout 3 GOTY Edition to test it out, given reports from different corners of the internet that it straight up won't launch on PC. The reviews say the same thing. Lo and behold, after an administrator pop-up, the Fallout 3 launcher just crashes and becomes unresponsive when you hit "play."

This kind of touches on the main issue really with the Xbox experience on PC — the games are all too often far behind their Steam counterparts. Either the layers of extra Windows policy bullshit on top causes issues. The developers have abandoned the games on the Microsoft Store due to low usage, and the low usage is the result of the games being sub-par vs. their Steam counterparts. Palworld also suffers from this quite prolifically. Palworld devs explained that the reason the PC Game Pass version is several months behind the Steam version is Microsoft's certification process, which is a complaint I've heard very often from developers I've spoken to.

There are tons of other games that are missing features on PC Game Pass. Death Stranding doesn't have its latest DLC on the Microsoft Store, vs. the Steam version. Users on this forum thread discuss how games like Forspoken, Jusant, The Ascent, and Control are missing graphics features like FSR and DLSS on PC Game Pass, while supporting it on Steam. Various games are missing Xbox achievements. Some games do eventually get their fixes in, but I can't see certain games that publishers have wholly moved on from getting up to parity on the Microsoft Store for PC. And what's worse, this often even extends to first-party titles. Quantum Break has a lighting bug on the PC Game Pass version that isn't present on Steam, and Pillars of Eternity is getting a bug fix patch on Steam, with no mention of the same patch hitting the Microsoft Store version.


The Xbox app also frequently sports separated multiplayer pools that won't connect to Steam, owing to the extra hoops developers often have to do to get that working correctly. Warhammer 40K: Darktide notoriously was separated between the Microsoft Store and Steam for a fairly long time before being connected up, and it's looking like Palworld is about to go through the same cycle. And sure, Microsoft can't wave a magic wand and force developers to prioritize their platform over Steam — assuming they would even have the resources to do so — but for the end user, all they see is an inferior product offering with PC Game Pass branding on it.

There are various other issues too, of course. Installing mods has been a common complaint, with compatibility being iffy and inconsistent. I'm also endlessly annoyed that there's no cloud save upload visibility in the app too, which has created version mismatch scenarios for me moving between my ASUS ROG Ally, my main gaming PC, and my Xbox. If you overwrite with the wrong cloud save, which is very difficult to manage on PC and Xbox, you could lose hours of progress.

Microsoft advertises and aspires to cross-platform capabilities, but the underlying toolkit still seems really underbaked to deliver on that vision.

More here (too long to quote all of it):

Palworld has, once again, highlighted the on going deficiencies in PC Game Pass and the Xbox app on Windows 11

Version mismatch, clunky mod support, poor performance, and beyond.

www.windowscentral.com

I'm glad someone's talking about this. It remains the biggest hurdle between them (and as an extension, gamepass) gaining significant traction on PC. As long as offers an inferior experience to what's available elsewhere on the platform then in large, people will continue to ignore/dismiss it.

 

[Baki]

GP is not the cheapest way for playing the game. Paying $120/year to “rent” the game is a terrible idea. Most people will pick $26 to own the game on Steam.

The Xbox version being behind is just the certification process of consoles being more stringent.

 

[XXL]

In my opinion, as much as they have struggled trying to gain ground against Playstation......they will struggle even more trying to gain ground against Steam.

 

[GHG]

In my opinion, as much as they have struggled trying to gain ground against Playstation......they will struggle even more trying to gain ground against Steam.

Which is equal parts bizarre and baffling considering it's their OS.

If anyone should know how to produce a high quality and performant storefront/gaming client on the platform it should be the them.

At this point they might be better off offering the Xbox OS as a bootable solution.

 

[DeadOblivion78]

Honestly, when I heard the first time of an error in the Windows store where storage used to download a game was locked and couldn't be deleted, I vowed to never use the Windows store in case that ever happened to me.

 

[R3TRODYCE]

PC Gamepass is almost worthless for me.

 

[Daneel Elijah]

If possible I would like more options on the poll GHG . I don't want to play it now, but I may when it will be more feature complete, or when it will be on sale for cheap. Thanks for the link by the way. I remember reading about PC Gamepass a few years ago in a blog that I follow.

 

[Topher]

This article could double as "Why Steam Deck is better than Windows handhelds".

 

[Roxkis_ii]

Buy a game and be able to mod it, or rent the game and not be able to mod it.

Gamepass on PC is giving PC players the worst part of console gaming.

Looking at the steam numbers for Palworld, it's seems lot of people feel the same.

 

[GHG]

If possible I would like more options on the poll GHG . I don't want to play it now, but I may when it will be more feature complete, or when it will be on sale for cheap. Thanks for the link by the way. I remember reading about PC Gamepass a few years ago in a blog that I follow.

Go for one of the "not playing it yet" options. Those should cover it.

 

[bender]

I too would like more poll options.

 

[Bry0]

Which is equal parts bizarre and baffling considering it's their OS.

If anyone should know how to produce a high quality and performant storefront/gaming client on the platform it should be the them.

At this point they might be better off offering the Xbox OS as a bootable solution.

The windows platform itself I would not describe as high quality or performant. Let alone MS apps.

 

[GHG]

I too would like more poll options.

What would you like Mr. Robot?

 

[HeisenbergFX4]

I started it on PC Gamepass and would love to jump to Steam but not starting over

 

[bender]

What would you like Mr. Robot?

-Piracy Joke,
-Nintendo Switch Joke
- German Hops Joke

 

[Topher]

"There's no configurability here, and it's incredibly annoying — Steam lets you wholly customize how your library is curated, and again, Steam is the benchmark here. "

Jez's MS Rewards points are going to take a tumble this month.

 

[Banjo64]

I’ve bought 891 games on the Microsoft PC store and 2 on Steam. Never had any issues.

 

[GHG]

I’ve bought 891 games on the Microsoft PC store and 2 on Steam. Never had any issues.

Didn't know there were that many versions of candy crush.

 

[Topher]

I’ve bought 891 games on the Microsoft PC store and 2 on Steam. Never had any issues.

Banjo64 's GAF account has been hacked

 

[Daneel Elijah]

Go for one of the "not playing it yet" options. Those should cover it.

After rereading them I found out what was giving me issues. It's the when. It make the decision a lot more definitive than I would like. If one option was "Not playing it yet, but if I do it will be via Steam" I would have taken it. Thanks for the answer.

 

[bender]

I’ve bought 891 games on the Microsoft PC store and 2 on Steam. Never had any issues.

 

[RespawnX]

Started it on Game Pass after yesterday's patch.
I think it's too easy to blame Game Pass or Microsoft here.
The developers have obviously stitched the release together. The Steam version is also full of bugs. Every console developer knows that app stores have review programs. You have to take that into account, but apparently some changes were only finalized at the last minute. What's more, we're talking about a developer who took months to fix fundamental things in the console version of Craftopia.
There are a lot of developers out there who can manage their software properly.
If I were Microsoft, I wouldn't pay a cent to developers who don't manage to guarantee a certain level of parity.

 

[Fredrik]

I started it on PC Gamepass and would love to jump to Steam but not starting over

Same here, easy entry point, and I saw that it’s on top of the PC Gamepass list so it doesn’t seem like people are ignoring it there. It’s big everywhere it seems.
Would be interesting to see sales numbers on Xbox or Windows though. That’s a difficult sell I think. I haven’t bought anything for PC on Microsoft Store, 90% Steam here, the rest on GOG.
As for the version differences. I understand that it’s extra work to sync everything but it should be the norm tbh.

 

[Ar¢tos]

I’ve bought 891 games on the Microsoft PC store and 2 on Steam. Never had any issues.

Have you tried running them?
I can easily believe you had no issues buying them!

 

[GHG]

Started it on Game Pass after yesterday's patch.
I think it's too easy to blame Game Pass or Microsoft here.
The developers have obviously stitched the release together. The Steam version is also full of bugs. Every console developer knows that app stores have review programs. You have to take that into account, but apparently some changes were only finalized at the last minute. What's more, we're talking about a developer who took months to fix fundamental things in the console version of Craftopia.
There are a lot of developers out there who can manage their software properly.
If I were Microsoft, I wouldn't pay a cent to developers who don't manage to guarantee a certain level of parity.

What do you say with regards to the following from the OP then:

You really don't need to go far to find games that are straight up just hard-broken on the Xbox app for PC. I installed Fallout 3 GOTY Edition to test it out, given reports from different corners of the internet that it straight up won't launch on PC. The reviews say the same thing. Lo and behold, after an administrator pop-up, the Fallout 3 launcher just crashes and becomes unresponsive when you hit "play."

They aren't exactly setting a good example are they?

 

[Mortisfacio]

I spent $60 for gamepass ultimate and bought 3 years ($180 total) so I'm still personally fine with PC GamePass. 100% got my value out of the money spent and still subbed until end of next year. That said, I still bought this on Steam.

 

[bender]

What do you say with regards to the following from the OP then:



They aren't exactly setting a good example are they?

 

[Topher]

Have you tried running them?
I can easily believe you had no issues buying them!

Don't tell Banjo, but he's been buying all these games and then clicking on the wrong button to play.

 

[RespawnX]

What do you say with regards to the following from the OP then:



They aren't exactly setting a good example are they?

No they aren't and especially older games that were added later by today's Xbox studios are often not in good shape.

However, it has become obvious in recent years that Microsoft's entire quality management has to be restructured. Something like Redfall should never have come out in this state, Forza Motorsport was an early access release without any labeling and Starfield "magically" ran 20% faster after patch one month after release despite "optimization". Forza Horizon 5 has an insane level of optimization and quality, but bugs are sometimes not fixed for entire seasons and translations are realized using software that makes Bing translator look like a genius. The quality assurance between the studios is massively fluctuating.

But this is something that runs through the entire company and is not just a Microsoft-specific problem. Software nowadays is often rushed and issues that are not deal breakers get passed to the release.
Classic management issues and "modern" production structures especially in large corporations.

 

[BlueLyria]

Honestly, when I heard the first time of an error in the Windows store where storage used to download a game was locked and couldn't be deleted, I vowed to never use the Windows store in case that ever happened to me.

Exactly my experience with Phantasy Star Online 2 global release (I blame Xbox getting it before pc and the exclusivity period on windows store as to why base PSO2 never gained traction on the west), I had to clean the microsoft app folder like 6 times, it was hell.

I was an avid user of PC Gamepass when it was still on "beta", since it was cheaper, I had issues every week with games not installing or booting. Then the app released, and it was exactly the same as the beta, with all the same issues but more expensive.

I haven't paid for gamepass since Darktide's release (Paid 1 month to try it), and before darktide my sub had already lapsed for over 1 year, maybe 2, if MS offered gamepass through steam, I'd be more willing to sub again sometime

 

[twilo99]

No reason to not take advantage of gamepass on PC ...

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

please tell me this is not a jezzz corden opinion article?

 

[Sleepwalker]

No reason to not take advantage of gamepass on PC ...

Except, literally all the reasons in the OP?

 

[Bojji]

GP is not the cheapest way for playing the game. Paying $120/year to “rent” the game is a terrible idea. Most people will pick $26 to own the game on Steam.

The Xbox version being behind is just the certification process of consoles being more stringent.

I'm using cheap 2 or 3 month trails that I buy on eneba, create account to use them and then play on my main one. Gamepass is relatively cheap that way. But God, the application sucks ass...

 

[GHG]

No reason to not take advantage of gamepass on PC ...

Yes, apart from the dozens of reasons outlined in the article.

But if you want to be a marketing bot on behalf of Microsoft then may I suggest you vary your prompts every now and then?:

Otherwise there is zero reasons to not take advantage of it on PC.. it’s a great service

I’m a PC gamer and I take full advantage of gamepass. Why wouldn’t you?

The storefront works just fine..

 

[mckmas8808]

In my opinion, as much as they have struggled trying to gain ground against Playstation......they will struggle even more trying to gain ground against Steam.

This is such an odd truth that still boggles the mind. They are worth $3 TRILLION for god's sake man!!!

 

[LiquidMetal14]

Garbage game pass windows PC store shenanigans driving people away from playing it on Game pass. I can vouch for some of the issues.

 

[Killjoy-NL]

No reason to not take advantage of gamepass on PC ...

Then how come GamePass isn't taking off on PC?

 

[Bojji]

Garbage game pass windows PC store shenanigans driving people away from playing it on Game pass. I can vouch for some of the issues.

I had this problem with games still being on the storage after uninstalling them on W10, AND YOU CAN'T ACCESS THEIR FILES to delete them manually. There are ways to take admin control etc. but in the end I had to reinstall windows, such bullshit. But this was 2 years ago and I think they improved it in this aspect at least.

Then how come GamePass isn't taking off on PC?

Way too much competition. MS just can't win, in consoles they are dominated by Sony and on PC probably even Epic is doing better (free games!).

 

[GHG]

please tell me this is not a jezzz corden opinion article?

It is. He's feeling very betrayed these days.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

Then how come GamePass isn't taking off on PC?

i mean.....we all know the answer....

 

[Ronin_7]

GP is not the cheapest way for playing the game. Paying $120/year to “rent” the game is a terrible idea. Most people will pick $26 to own the game on Steam.

The Xbox version being behind is just the certification process of consoles being more stringent.

It always has been a shitty proposition and it always will be.

People have their games on Steam, they ain't changing to other platforms.

Epic is always offering shit for free & Steam keeps growing, Gamepass is paid, which makes things worse.

 

[BennyBlanco]

The Xbox PC launcher is so incredibly busted. Across 2 different machines as well so it’s not my hardware.

- games take forever to update and it never goes smoothly. Half the time it will simply fail to update and I have to start over.
- some games will only install on the C drive
- some games refuse to install at all
- every game you launch has to launch a popup tying the game to your account. Playing on a controller on a TV? Get fucked. You need a mouse.


It’s easily worse than UPlay, EGS, Origin, etc. Those launchers are bare bones and dated feeling compared to Steam but they are completely functional at least. I tapped out and canceled gamepass early last year even though I kind of liked the service. I resubbed to play Forza late last year and all the same issues persist. It’s a fucking mess.

 

[Fredrik]

GP is not the cheapest way for playing the game. Paying $120/year to “rent” the game is a terrible idea. Most people will pick $26 to own the game on Steam.

The Xbox version being behind is just the certification process of consoles being more stringent.

Depends if you already have a subscription running or not. You’re not going to start calculating the real cost for playing one extra game through an already active sub. It’ll always be the cheapest entry point.

 

[Ar¢tos]

Don't tell Banjo, but he's been buying all these games and then clicking on the wrong button to play.

What does this mean?
I've never seen Steam or MS store.

 

[JohnnyFootball]

This is mostly an article venting frustration that all Paleworld's love is coming from people playing Steam and not being able to claim it as an Xbox exclusive.

Having said that I agree with much of the Windows Store/PC Gamepass complaints and its a big reason why PC Gamepass will never be a money machine. People would rather pay to play on Steam

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

This is mostly an article venting frustration that all Paleworld's love is coming from people playing Steam and not being able to claim it as an Xbox exclusive.

bingo-bango.

Jezzz desperatly wants MS to have a win.

 

[demigod]

Yes, apart from the dozens of reasons outlined in the article.

But if you want to be a marketing bot on behalf of Microsoft then may I suggest you vary your prompts every now and then?:

Bro, you don’t believe these xbox fans? All of them are pc gamers since they were born.

 

[JTCx]

No reason to not take advantage of gamepass on PC ...

Great ad attempt but there's no advantage.

 

[Freelance Yakuza]

As I said in another thread: HALO MCC was better on Steam than on the Xbox Horror Store
Their flagship was better on the competitor's platform, ffs.

At the end of the day, Game Pass on PC acts like a paid demo service.
If you really like a game, you'll get it the Complete/GOTY/Gold/Director's Cut edition on Steam later