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Over the last few weeks, we have been sharing weekly recommendations for what we're playing on the Game Pass service. This is a chance for us to highlight underrated titles or simply to talk about our preferred titles. This time around, however, we have to kick things off by tackling the obvious issue: the latest anti-consumer updates to the Game Pass subscription.

On Oct. 1, Microsoft announced a series of adjustments to the service, with the most notable affecting the service's Ultimate tier — which offers the most games available plus immediate availability to latest releases from Xbox Game Studios. It'll now cost $30 monthly, increased from $20. As expected, subscribers were not happy, and numerous voices on social media and in discussion forums about how they were going to cancel their subscriptions.

It's the end of an era for the service as the former “best deal in gaming” is no more. Instead, players must consider if $360 a year for Game Pass's top tier is worth it to them, particularly when everything else in life continues to rise.

Should you maintain your membership, or seeking justifications to continue justifying it, read on for this week's recommendations. They include a top-tier exploration-platformers of recent years, a 2025 Game of the Year contender, and a charming role-playing game follow-up. Alternatively, if you're inclined to cancel your subscription, refer to instructions on how to change or cancel your membership.

The Lost Crown: A Prince of Persia Adventure

If you do happen to stick with your Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription, you might require more excuses to justify it. The best case for the higher fee is that it includes to a collection of Ubisoft titles. You’ll get multiple Assassin's Creed games and Far Cry games for your $30 a month, but the standout benefit is Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown.

This side-scrolling adventure makes fantastic use of the franchise, returning to its origins in a dangerous maze that’s a thrill to mantle around. Pair that with exceptionally rich, most varied combat the category includes, and it creates a top-shelf Metroidvania. Add in both Hollow Knight: Silksong and The Rogue Prince of Persia and you’re already breaking even on a quarter of your annual fee.

Blue Prince

This investigative puzzle title Blue Prince debuted to strong sales and a dedicated community on PC platforms, but console adoption was supported initially by subscription services (it also appeared on PlayStation Plus). Player recommendations combined with its ease of access eventually helped the game reach 2 million players.

Checking out a game for a few hours to discover if it's your jam or not is one of the core appeals of the service, and those seeking immersion in a puzzle should check out Blue Prince. You play as the inheritor of a property and large inheritance, but only if you can locate the hidden chamber. The catch? The building's design is ever-shifting, making Blue Prince a procedural game with new information to discover every day. After several sessions with it and have been drip-fed secrets and hints surrounding the mystery at the core of the story, and I'm eager to discover where the game goes as I uncover more.

The Prince's Edition: Ni no Kuni 2

Am I recommending Ni No Kuni 2: Revenant Kingdom simply since the version included on Game Pass is the Prince's Edition version and that makes it tonally consistent with our preceding two recommendations? That remains unconfirmed. What I can share, however, is that Ni No Kuni 2 is delightful follow-up to one of the best JRPGs of all time. Despite the whimsical Ghibli aesthetic and focus on younger characters, Ni No Kuni 2 doesn't shy away from heavy topics, opening with an apparent terrorist attack on a contemporary metropolis before quickly transporting the protagonist (the literal president) into an other world where they end up smack in the middle of a historical power struggle. Compared to the first game, the battles are real-time — resembling a Tales game than a Pokémon one — and features a genuinely deep and detailed simulation in which you must oversee a kingdom. It might be the Prince's Edition, but that sounds more like king shit to me.