After looking at the math behind Xbox All Access earlier today it’s now time to decide whether or not you should get it. Hopefully my list will give you all the information you need, lets start with the cons shall we?
You need to go to a Microsoft Store
You might think this isn’t a serious problem if you happen to live near one but the list of Microsoft Stores where this applies is smaller than you may think. First of all it has to be a Microsoft Store in the United States so that means the rest of the world is out of the picture. Worse than that only 35 states actually have Microsoft Stores, leaving a huge portion of the population out unable to avail unless they have the ability to travel. On top of that when I went searching I saw that thirteen of these 35 states only have one store to service the entire state. Of course if you happen to have one near you this problem can be disregarded.
There’s a credit check
This probably won’t effect the majority, similar to a mobile phone plan you don’t really need to have super amazing credit to qualify for it. But just know if you do have bad credit you can save yourself the hassle of going to the store and might be better off working on improving your score.
It’s a long commitment
Similar to phone plans this probably won’t matter to a lot of you but it goes to mention that this is a two year plan and circumstances can change for people. If you wanna leave this plan early you will have to pay off the full 24 month bill. I am very aware however that a lot of people go into two year plans for new phones all the time and if you can handle that you can probably handle this too.
Lack of choice
With these bundles sadly you are forced into using Xbox Game Pass. Now while I believe the service is great I know its not for everyone. I know for a lot of people out there it would be more appealing if the bundle was cheaper and just included the console and Xbox Live.
The future of Xbox
It has been long rumored that the next generation of Xbox (which I will be calling the Xbox Two until Microsoft comes out of left field with something no one could ever possibly predict, yet again) will be coming in 2020. This means that not soon after you’ve finished paying off this plan there will be a new Xbox that everyone will be switching to, and if you wanna upgrade you’ll have to be willing to spend again.
Now it’s time to move onto the pros of this service.
Spread the cost
If you have a job or regular income but you don’t have the patience to save up for the full price this is an amazing way to get your Xbox one and enjoy it now while you slowly pay it off. It’s a lot more manageable to spend $35 a month for two years than to spend $500 in one go.
Save that money
As we discovered in our earlier article you do save some money by going with this service over just paying for everything separately. It’s not a lot however for the Xbox One X version of the bundle as you only save $20 but you do save a very satisfactory $132 with the Xbox One S bundle.
Gold and Game Pass are amazing services
While it is true that I used Game Pass as a con earlier I do also see it as a pro. Both Xbox Live and Game Pass offer an amazing value for money. With Games with Gold you get 4 free games every month which is amazing value for the $5 a month its costing you, although there is the caveat that if you stop paying for gold after your contract ends you lose access, and of course you don’t get to choose the games so some might not be as good as others or you could possibly own them already. Game Pass is amazing because not only does it give you access to over 100 games for free with your membership but it also offers you discounts on the games in the library and you get Xbox Exclusive games on the day they launch. It of course also has the caveat that similarly to Netflix some titles are removed at the end of the month to be replaced with others and that could happen while you’re still in the middle of that game. Don’t worry however, Microsoft always give plenty of warning before a game goes and sometimes even increase the discount for that game before it leaves the catalog.
If you’ve made up your mind and decided you want to go and get this bundle then I recommend you do it soon because Microsoft are advertising it as a limited time offer with no word on when it ends. I would also like to mention to anyone out there who is considering of availing of this service when the Xbox Two comes out, that as much as I would love for it to be available then it probably won’t be. This is the second time Microsoft has offered a service like this, they previously did it with the Xbox 360 coming towards the end of it’s generation. Sadly, even though I would definitely use it to get an Xbox Two at launch, it probably won’t be available again until it’s generation is ending. That is of course if it’s generation ever ends since Microsoft has said for years they want to end console generations. Let me know what you think down in the comments section below!