Subscriptions are everywhere, and many of us use them to consume games, music, and TV shows. But we can’t expect that content to be around forever.
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As promising as the subscription world can be – pay a small fee every month and get access to a large library of content – it also has its downsides. Apple Arcade, Apple’s iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple TV game subscription service, recently made several titles unavailable for the first time after contracts with developers expired. It shocked subscribers, but it probably shouldn’t have, as this is nothing new. Netflix, Spotify and other streamers routinely remove content from their services.
How big of a problem is disappearing content? That depends on your point of view. "I'm not necessarily interested in removing content, but as a parent I am a little bit more interested," Richard Devine, a veteran games and technology writer at XDA Developers, told Lifewire over email. "[Xbox] Game Pass has already lost a few games that the little one hasn't finished, so of course he wants me to buy them now so he can do that."
A lot of the issues customers have with subscriptions and how content disappears is that they don’t always know when it’s going to happen. Xbox does warn players when a title is about to expire, but it doesn’t give gamers more than a week or so.
