July 31 is not going to be a good day for Xbox Game Pass, much like 2026. This whole year has been underwhelming for the Microsoft subscription service. Outside of Forza Horizon 6 and Hades II at day one of its Xbox Series X release, there haven’t been many pops for the Microsoft subscription service. There have been some great games added, but not day-one games, the subscription service’s bread and butter. The day one games have predominantly been indie games, and they haven’t exactly been the most noteworthy indie games. The highlight in this regard is Denshattack, which was just added and is one of the better indie games so far this year. Before this week, though, it was the highly contentious Mixtape. Alas, it’s been the type of year that makes you question the future of the subscription service, and it’s about to get worse.
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On July 31, the subscription service is losing eight games across Xbox Game Pass and PC Game Pass, and this list is littered with great games. For example, this includes one of 2018’s best games, the 92-rated Celeste. It also includes one of the best strategy games of the 2020’s, Crusader Kings 3. There are also three 2025 games: Back to the Dawn, Sniper Elite: Resistance, and Whiskerwood. The former, Back to the Dawn, was notably a surprise sleeper hit last year, and a game that left a very strong impression on subscribers. Beloved indie game My Friendly Neighborhood and indie hit Rain World are also on the list. And rounding the exodus out is Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord, one of the more popular persistent online games available via the subscription service.
“Such a Loss for Game Pass”
Since the inception of the subscription service several years ago, there haven’t been many worse departure updates than this one, and subscribers are feeling it over on the Xbox Game Pass Reddit page.
“That’s a great batch of games leaving, writes one subscriber of the announcement. Another adds: “Damn, this month has been vicious for me, a lot of my favourite games coming off Game Pass.”
A third subscriber further adds: “I feel like the ratio of good games leaving to good games being added lately is lopsided.” And in case there was any doubt, a further subscriber drives the point home: “Such a loss for Game Pass.”
Among the responses are even some subscribers saying they are about to cancel their subscription service, which they feel has lost momentum and appeal over the last year or so. Of course, this may just be fan semantics, but the longer the year goes on, the sentiment among subscribers has been more and more that this is the worst for XGP to date.
All of that said, and as always, feel free to leave a comment or two letting us know what you think, or join the video game conversations happening over on the ComicBook Forum.
