Microsoft and Nintendo both sold their games a new way. Neither got a stream.
Game Pass reached nearly $5 billion in annual revenue, then shed millions of subscribers after an October 2025 price hike. Nintendo's Mario movie grossed $1.36 billion, then its IP revenue fell 27%. Test the repeat, not the launch.
Transcript
Two game companies tried to earn from their games beyond the one-time sale. Both made real money. Neither got a steady stream from it.
On June 1, 2017, Microsoft launched Xbox Game Pass at $9.99 a month, with over 100 games. In May 2015, Nintendo announced its first-ever theme park deal, with Universal, and it later licensed Mario for a movie.
Microsoft's revenue bet paid. In 2025, Game Pass annual revenue reached nearly $5 billion for the first time. Xbox content and services revenue rose 13%, while hardware revenue fell 22%.
But Microsoft stopped reporting subscribers. The last confirmed count was 34 million, in February 2024. After an October 2025 price hike, the service shed millions of subscribers. In April 2026, Microsoft cut Ultimate from $29.99 to $22.99 a month.
Nintendo's Mario movie, released in 2023, grossed $1.36 billion worldwide and returned $559 million in net profit. Nintendo and Universal split the $100 million production cost 50-50.
Nintendo's mobile and IP revenue jumped 81.6% to 92.7 billion yen, credited to the movie. The next year, it fell 27% to 67.6 billion yen as the movie's revenue faded.
A hit movie is not recurring revenue, and a subscription is only recurring while the price holds. Two cases do not settle the question. But both say: test the repeat, not the launch.
The records behind this video
Every figure in the video comes from these Decision Records, each with its sources.
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