The Save File
G’day Gamers,
Between Windrose, the Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag remake, and my current deep dive into One Piece, you’d think I’d be well and truly over pirates by now. Turns out, not even close. I’m still keen as ever to pour a glass of rum, squad up with the boys, and die repeatedly to Dodos.
We’ve got a bit to discuss this week.
Let’s dive in.
In A World Where Prices Are Rising..
The Game Pass U-Turn
Microsoft has cut the price of Game Pass Ultimate from $35.95 AUD a month to $25.95 AUD a month, a $120 annual saving, and quietly walked back one of the decisions that justified the hike in the first place. New Call of Duty games will no longer arrive on Game Pass at launch, and will instead join the service roughly a year after release during the following holiday window. PC Game Pass is also dropping from $19.45 AUD to $16.45 AUD, while the cheaper Essential ($12.95 AUD) and Premium ($17.95 AUD) tiers stay where they are. Existing members had the lower rates applied on April 22.
This is a reversal of the pitch Microsoft made in October 2025, when it jacked Ultimate from $22.95 AUD to $35.95 AUD right before Black Ops 7, a 57% overnight increase. The argument then was that you were paying more because you were getting more, with the day one Call of Duty release doing most of the heavy lifting to justify a price that had roughly tripled from the service's 2017 launch cost. Six months later, the head of Xbox is saying the opposite in writing.
Asha Sharma, who took over as Microsoft Gaming CEO in February, told staff in an internal memo earlier this month that Game Pass had become too expensive and needed a better value equation. One leaked estimate from last year put the cost of Call of Duty being on Game Pass at around $300 million in lost sales, a number that matters a lot more now the company is no longer treating subscriber growth as the only priority.
A day after the price cut, Sharma posted that Xbox and Discord are "teaming up again" to make Game Pass "more flexible," hinting that subscribers might "start to see some code in the wild." Details are thin, but reports point to internal experiments with a first-party-only tier codenamed Triton and a bundled tier codenamed Duet that could pair Game Pass with something like Netflix or Discord Nitro.
In Case You Missed It
The Worst Kept Secret In Gaming Finally Announced
Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced lands on July 9 Ubisoft finally lifted the curtain on gaming's worst kept secret this week, with Edward Kenway returning to modern hardware.
Asha Sharma has killed off the Microsoft Gaming brand Microsoft Gaming is out, Xbox is back, and the office walls at Redmond are now covered in "return of Xbox" slogans.
Yoshi and the Mysterious Book previews landed this week Critics came away unusually positive, suggesting it might be the first Yoshi game in a decade with actual depth.
Project Helix will still be a first-party Xbox console Xbox VP Jason Ronald shut down leaks claiming Microsoft was handing the next Xbox off to Asus and MSI.
He-Man's Dragon Pearl of Destruction has been pushed to summer Limited Run Games pulled the April 28 date two weeks out, conveniently landing the brawler closer to the June 5 Masters of the Universe film release.
Releasing this week
Diablo IV Expansion Incoming
Diablo IV: Lord of Hatred (PS5/PS4/Xbox/PC) – April 28 The second major expansion for Diablo IV adds the Skovos region, the Paladin and Warlock classes, a level cap bump to 70, and a campaign that closes out the Mephisto arc that began with Vessel of Hatred.
MotoGP 26 (PS5/Xbox/Switch 2/Switch/PC) – April 29 Milestone's annual MotoGP sim returns with the full 2026 season roster, a new rider-based handling model, and a 3D paddock career mode built around press conferences and contract negotiations.
Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era (PC, Early Access) – April 30 The first new mainline Heroes game in over a decade, a prequel set in Jadame with six factions and a map editor, launching day one on PC Game Pass.
Invincible VS (PS5/Xbox/PC) – April 30 A 3v3 tag fighter set in the Invincible universe, built by a studio of ex-Killer Instinct developers and voiced by the animated cast.
inKONBINI: One Store, Many Stories (PS5/Xbox/PC/Switch/Switch 2) – April 30 A slice-of-life narrative sim set in a small-town 1990s Japanese convenience store, stocking shelves and following the regulars through their small everyday dramas
Best Deals I’ve Seen This Week
Bloodborne — $12.47 AUD, down from $24.95 (50% off). Still the high water mark for FromSoftware a decade on.
Alan Wake 2 — around $27 AUD, down from $90.95 (70% off). Cheapest it's ever been, and good horror prep if you missed Silent Hill f.
Kingdom Come: Deliverance II — $44.97 AUD, down from $89.95 (50% off). First discount the game has seen on Steam since launch.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Complete Edition — $15.79 AUD, down from $78.95 (80% off). Base game plus Hearts of Stone and Blood and Wine, which is about 150 hours of RPG for less than a round of beers.
Did you Know: “The term "Easter egg" in gaming traces back to Atari's 1979 Adventure, where developer Warren Robinett hid his name in a secret room as a protest against the company's no-credit policy, and when a teenager found it after launch Atari kept it in because reprinting the cartridges would have cost more than letting the surprise stand.
If you’ve been enjoying The Save File, the best thing you can do is forward this to a mate who’d get something out of it.
Till next time,
Jayden
P.S. Got thoughts on the issue, or feel like telling me your favourite Pokemon? Drop me a line at [email protected]