Over the weekend we reported on the FTC putting a fresh legal filing before the US Court of Appeals that argued Microsoft’s price hike for Game Pass Ultimate, its new Game Pass Standard tier, and its rescinding of day one game additions unless gamers paid more represented a “degraded” form of the service and “the hallmarks of a firm exercising market power post-merger.”
Microsoft has now put forth its own response to the argument, which essentially boils down to the company saying “nuh uh”: The Verge senior editor Tom Warren first spotted the legal response by Microsoft, which opens by claiming that the FTC’s case “presents a misleading, extra-record account of the facts and is a continuation of the agency’s attempts to reinvent its case on appeal.”
The corporation’s letter argues that its new standard tier isn’t a degradation because it also includes multiplayer functionality for included games, which was not a feature of the discontinued Game Pass for Console offering. It also points out that “it is common for businesses to change service offerings over time.”
Finally, the letter argues that the FTC’s original argument against Microsoft’s buyout of Activision-Blizzard wasn’t predicated on changing subscription service prices, only that Microsoft would make the latest Call of Duty game available on multiple platforms, which the company says it’s doing through the added “value” of Game Pass Ultimate making the next shooter available day-and-date to those who pay the new sub price.
“[T]he FTC’s case in all of its alleged markets has always been premised on vertical foreclosure, i.e. that Microsoft would withhold Call of Duty from rivals,” the letter closes. “Call of Duty is not being withheld from anyone who wants it.”
Microsoft has responded to the FTC's filing about Xbox Game Pass price increases. It calls the FTC's letter a "misleading, extra-record account of the facts" and says the FTC is wrong to call Game Pass Standard a “degraded” version because it includes multiplayer https://t.co/ocS9yfwSix pic.twitter.com/QXUoViUpoL
— Tom Warren (@tomwarren) July 19, 2024
