Xbox has collapsed console sales, but Game Pass showed explosive growth thanks to Call of Duty: Black Ops 6

In the course of the report, according to the results of the II quarter of the 2025 financial year (ended on December 31), Microsoft dwelled in detail on the results of the game unit, the revenue of which was reduced by 7 % of the year by the year. Xbox content from content and services showed an increase of 2 %, which was associated with good results of the Game Pass. But the revenue from the sale of XBOX devices compared to the same period last year collapsed by 29 %.

Image source: Billy Freeman / Unsplash.com

This is the first quarter for the full year, when the Xbox does not have a significant increase in revenue on paper – all because the effect of the absorption of Activision Blizzard King has come to naught with the Microsoft corporation, and the last big leap came on the first quarter of the financial year.

The best -selling game on the Xbox and PlayStation platforms was Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, said Microsoft CEO of Satya Nadella. He also noted “enthusiastic reviews” about the game Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, which was released in December, and now its audience has reached 4 million people.

The success of the Xbox Game Pass was largely due to the release of Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, which on the first day appeared at the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass. But even being included in the subscription, it became the most sold game of 2024 in the United States. The impressive results were achieved by the Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, which showed an average of 87 points for Opencritic and Metacritic. “In general, the Game Pass set a new quarterly income record and increased the subscribers on the PC by more than 30 %, since we focused on attracting paid subscribers,” said Nadalla.

Microsoft has the opportunity to maintain the Xbox Game Pass to growth and 2025, which will facilitate the projects Activision Blizzard, Bethesda SoftWorks and Xbox Game Studios. In the first half of the year, Obsidian, South of Midnight from the Compulsion Games and Doom: The Dark Ags from ID Software, will appear in February, April and May, respectively. They will be followed by Fable from PlayGround Games, The Outer Worlds 2 from Obsidian, as well as Ninja Gaiden 4.

Microsoft also noted the successes of the Cloud Game Service Xbox Cloud Gaming, which at least formally continues to remain at the beta testing, but has already attracted a lot of users. Valla said that over the last quarter, users played 140 million hours in a streaming service.

Microsoft revenue in general amounted to $ 69.6 billion, operating profit – $ 31.7 billion, which is 17 % more than a year earlier; The income of Microsoft Cloud amounted to $ 40.9 billion, which is 21 % more than in the previous year, and all thanks to Openai products in the Azure infrastructure.