Seeing big games appear on subscription services like Xbox Game Pass or PlayStation Plus is almost the norm nowadays, but it won't happen with the acclaimed Baldur's Gate 3.
Larian Studios' CEO and Baldur's Gate 3 director Swen Vincke explained the reason why on his personal X (formerly Twitter) account.
Vincke believes that if subscription services become the dominant business model, it'll be a lot harder to get good games.
According to Vincke, subscription models encourage cost/benefit analysis, and that causes projects fueled by idealism to be almost impossible to get greenlit.
While he respects the fact that subscription services help many developers with an opportunity to actually make their games, he wants to make sure the alternative remains viable.
Below you can read his opinion in full.
Whatever the future of games looks like, content will always be king. But it’s going to be a lot harder to get good content if subscription becomes the dominant model and a select group gets to decide what goes to market and what not. Direct from developer to players is the way.
Getting a board to ok a project fueled by idealism is almost impossible and idealism needs room to exist, even if it can lead to disaster. Subscription models will always end up being cost/benefit analysis exercises intended to maximize profit.
There is nothing wrong with that but it may not become a monopoly of subscription services. We are already all dependent on a select group of digital distribution platforms and discoverability is brutal. Should those platforms all switch to subscription, it’ll become savage.
In such a world by definition the preference of the subscription service will determine what games get made. Trust me - you really don’t want that.
TLDR ; you won’t find our games on a subscription service even if I respect that for many developers it presents an opportunity to make their game. I don’t have an issue with that. I just want to make sure the other ecosystem doesn’t die because it’s valuable.
So there you have it: if you want Baldur's Gate 3, you should likely simply consider purchasing it. According to our review, which awarded the game with an enthusiastic score of 9.5 out of 10. It's definitely worth it.
If our opinion isn't enough, the game won Game of the Year honors at The Game Awards, the Golden Joystick Awards, and even the Steam Awards.
That being said, Circana Analyst Mat Piscatella appears to believe that Vincke's worries are premature. He explains that subscription services on console and PC platforms account for only 10% of total video game content spending in the US and the idea that they will become dominant is unsupported by data.
He also opines that they "have been more additive than cannibalistic" and "Fear mongering on this topic is quite unnecessary."
Baldur's Gate 3 is currently available for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S. For now, it's only in digital form, but a physical Deluxe Edition will be released on all platforms in the first quarter of this year.
