Ex-Sony Chairman Shawn Layden Criticizes Game Pass Again, Calling Developers “Wage Slaves”

Shawn Layden on Xbox Game Pass.

Former Sony Worldwide Studios chairman Shawn Layden has once again voiced strong criticism of subscription models in gaming, singling out Xbox Game Pass as a threat to how the industry values its work.

Speaking in a recent GamesIndustry.biz interview, Layden made it clear he is not convinced that subscription-based distribution can sustain developers in the long run.

“I’m not a big supporter of the ‘Netflix of gaming’ idea,” Layden said. “I think it is a danger.”

Drawing comparisons with the music industry, he argued that streaming devalued creative work there. “Look what happened to music. In the popular mind, music costs nothing. Music should be free. Spotify, what is that? It’s 15 bucks a month or something, but virtually no one buys music anymore.”

He highlighted the stark difference between musicians and game developers when it comes to alternative revenue. “The one silver lining is that music artists have an adjacent market in touring. The problem with gaming is all we have is launch. That’s it. No one wants to pay money to come into the studio and watch people code.”

Because of this, Layden insisted that releasing games on subscription services from day one is “bad for the business.”

Layden even pointed out that Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick has firmly rejected the idea of putting Grand Theft Auto on such services at launch, suggesting that once the industry normalizes this model, it would be impossible to reverse.

While Microsoft recently revealed that Game Pass had generated billions in revenue, Layden dismissed the debate over whether the service is profitable.“You can do all kinds of financial jiggery-pokery for any sort of corporate service to make it look profitable if you wanted to… The real issue for me on things like Game Pass is, is it healthy for the developer?”

It was at this point that Layden made perhaps his most controversial statement. “Under the subscription model, the developer essentially becomes a wage slave,” he said. 

He claimed that by taking upfront payments instead of relying on traditional sales, studios risk losing out on value, innovation, and the chance to share in the rewards of a successful release. “It’s just, ‘You pay me X dollars an hour, I built you a game, here, go put it on your servers,’” Layden said, adding that he finds the arrangement "not inspiring" for game developers.

Layden’s words underline a broader clash of philosophies in modern game publishing. For critics like him, subscription models erode long-term value and alter consumer expectations. For others, they provide stability and visibility in a marketplace where countless titles struggle to break through.

The most recent example is Remedy's first self-published title, FBC: Firebreak. Despite its ambitious scope, the game failed to gain significant traction in sales. However, the company confirmed in its latest earnings that day-one deals with Game Pass and PlayStation Plus contributed to most of the early revenue.