In a recent investor call Vulture Capitalist Strauss Zelnick was asked whether the arrangement with Microsoft’s Game Pass had helped or hurt the success of the franchise (that they don’t own). What followed the question was a jumbled non-answer littered with buzzwords and concepts that didn’t address the issue.

The news was picked up by VideoGamesChronicle.com, where Zelnick said…

It’s hard to say. I think what we’ve said all long is that generally speaking, we want to be where the consumer is.

 

Generally speaking, we think subscription offerings to the extent they exist are probably better suited to catalogue, but we’re willing to take experimental chances when it makes sense for a particular title and when the deal underlying that option also makes sense for us.

 

And we’re pleased that we have a great partnership with Microsoft and we’re mostly pleased that the title is such a big hit, it’s sold in more than two million units and it’s won 75 game awards.

 

So, it’s early days for all these platforms. It’s obviously early days for many technologies including streaming technology. Our goal is to be where the consumer is. We are ecumenical and we are open-minded.

That is an answer from a man who either does not want to answer the question because internal projections show the short term infusion of cash was not worth the long term potential sales loss or it is by a man who has no idea what he’s doing. Considering the slue of underperforming titles, as reported by TheGamer.com, an inability to keep up with trends, the next Bioshock years in development already now stuck in development hell, and only Rockstar and sports gambling mechanics keeping the company afloat I would lean more towards the latter than the former.

Especially since not every Game Pass download can be equated to a lost sale. Nor can the volume of sales generated from the word of mouth marketing from users who acquired the game through Game Pass be calculated. Further answering in the affirmative that it had hurt sales would also then bring into question the competency of his Epic Games Store exclusivity and denying access to the Steam marketplace.

Speaking of which Zelnick’s statement is interesting considering 2/3s of Epics sales volume are generated by first-party titles, AKA Fortnite. Leaving the location where the consumer is at still being Steam. Fortunately for him, investors are not terribly clever creatures as no one called him on this disparity.