Xbox Game Pass For PC has launched with a £1 trial month

Including Metro Exodus

News by Alice O'Connor Former Associate Editor

Published on June 9, 2019

The Xbox Game Pass For PC, Microsoft's clumsily-named subscription service which lets you play a library of games without buying 'em as long as you're paying the monthly fee, launched in the middle of tonight's E3 blast. For the curious, it's only £1/$1 to try the Pass for one month right now. The lineup will grow over time and is due to be 100-strong within a few weeks. Along with Microsoft's own games, such as Forza Horizon 4 and Sea Of Thieves, the library contains games from other publishers, like Imperator: Rome and Metro Exodus. Everyone who wished for Metro to escape Epic Games Store exclusivity will notice one finger has now curled on their cursed monkey paw.

The regular price for the Windows 10 Pass will be £7.99/month, getting you unlimited play of the stock library games - including all off Microsoft's own games on the very day they launch. The Pass also offers discounts on games if you want to buy them for keepsies. It'll initially only cost £3.99/month while the Pass is in "beta", and as an introductory offer you can get one month for only £1. Hell, I've signed up for that out of curiosity.

This all runs through a new Xbox client on Windows 10, which is far less awful than the old Xbox app (now renamed the Xbox Console Companion) and slightly less awful than the Windows Store app. It's a long way behind the best game store clients but I guess Epic have lowered the bar for everyone.

Head on over to the Game Pass site for more info and to start that £1 trial. You'll need Windows 10, obvs, as well as the big v1903 update released this week. And remember to turn off recurrent billing so you aren't automatically charged again next month.

Microsoft have also launched the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, which for £15/month includes the pass for both PC and Xbone as well as Xbox Live Gold membership for your console.

The Xbox site has the list of PC games in the Xbox Game Pass but that site's kinda cruddy (which doesn't fill me with the utmost enthusiasm) so hey look, here's a simple list of everything they say will be in the Pass now or "in the coming weeks.":