Game Pass Isn't Hurting Xbox Sales, So Is AI To Blame For Layoffs? - Next-Gen Console Watch

Welcome back to Next-Gen Console Watch! This week Ryan and Max try and make sense of the latest round of layoffs from Microsoft, which saw the company dismiss over 9,000 staff across multiple subsidiaries. Arkane Studios founder Raphael Collantonio recently blamed Game Pass for the publisher's financial tightening, but recent sales data suggests Game Pass isn't hurting game sales; in fact, five of the top seven best-selling games of May 2025 were Microsoft-published titles, all available on Game Pass. This suggests those games are selling very well on other platforms, like PlayStation. So what's really to blame?