For many, Xbox Game Pass has been a huge reason to buy an Xbox Series X or Xbox Series S console. The subscription service offers a vast library of games all for a monthly fee, and the rotating roster of titles means that there's something new to play on a near-weekly basis.
In 2019, Microsoft also introduced Xbox Game Pass Ultimate , a higher, expanded tier that grants players access to not just the base library of Xbox games, but also PC Game Pass , Xbox Live , the Xbox Cloud Gaming service, and EA Play for just a few dollars more.
The Xbox Game Pass service, as a whole, has been so successful as to cause actual shifts within the games industry. Sony, for example, is now rumored to be working on its own subscription service for PS5 , separate from PlayStation Now , currently codenamed Project Spartacus .
If you're not familiar with Xbox Game Pass, though, or at least with the differences between its two tiers, then we've prepped a guide listing all the major benefits of each. Read on to find out which Xbox Game Pass subscription tier is right for you.
What do you get with Xbox Game Pass?
Xbox Game Pass is the base version of the subscription tier, and the only one that was available before the introduction of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate. It costs $9.99 / £7.99 a month, making it the cheaper of the two tiers.
The base Xbox Game Pass doesn't feature many of the bells and whistles found in its more expensive Ultimate counterpart, but you do get access to the entirety of the Xbox Game Pass library on console. That includes any and all first-party Microsoft Game Studios titles like Forza Horizon 5 , Sea of Thieves and Halo Infinite alongside the likes of Skyrim, Doom Eternal and Psychonauts 2 .
You're also getting loads of quality third-party AAA titles, as well as some of the best indie games around. From Yakuza: Like a Dragon and Mass Effect Legendary Edition to Hollow Knight and Outer Wilds , there are games to suit the tastes of pretty much everyone.
The base Xbox Game Pass tier is ideal if you've just bought a new Xbox Series X/S or older Xbox One console. If you just want to get stuck in and try out a huge range of games without the need for extras like PC Game Pass, online play or cloud gaming, then Xbox Game Pass is a solid option.
What do you get with Xbox Game Pass Ultimate?
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate will likely be your first port of call if you're checking out the service for the first time. Microsoft really wants players to subscribe to the higher tier, it seems, as brand new players get access to a 14-day free trial for Xbox Game Pass Ultimate.
Beyond that, players can claim their first paid month of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate for just $1 / £1. Every month after that will cost $14.99 / £10.99, so a bit of a jump from the cost of the base Xbox Game Pass subscription.
With that in mind, you'd expect Ultimate to come with its fair share of advantages over its cheaper counterpart, and you can rest assured that it absolutely does. Xbox Game Pass Ultimate bundles in Xbox Live Gold, giving players access to online play and monthly Games with Gold titles.
But there's more on top of that, too. Ultimate grants access to PC Game Pass, a fantastic service if you own even a half-decent gaming PC . PC Game Pass also includes some PC exclusive games like Age of Empires 4 as well as the upcoming Total War: Warhammer 3 .
For those of you who like to game on the go, Xbox Cloud Gaming is also included with the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate package. This allows subscribers to play certain titles on a device other than console or PC, such as a tablet or your smartphone.
Xbox Cloud Gaming now streams most games at 1080p, so if you've ever wanted to play Dragon Quest 11 on the toilet in high definition, you can do so with Game Pass Ultimate assuming you've got a decent internet connection.
Rounding out the Ultimate package is EA Play, an additional roster of titles from publisher Electronic Arts. These include the big sports hitters like FIFA and Madden to games like Titanfall 2, Need for Speed Heat, and Mirror's Edge Catalyst.
Lastly, Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Perks offer monthly rewards such as free add-ons for various games like Halo Infinite, and free trials for apps like Crunchyroll, Spotify, and YouTube Premium.
Our recommendation
While the base Xbox Game Pass subscription tier is fantastic, offering a vast library of games at a low monthly cost, we wholly recommend subbing to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate for sheer bang-for-your-buck value.
Yes, Ultimate is slightly more pricey than the standard Game Pass subscription, but you get so many perks in return that it's difficult to recommend the base tier to anyone other than those who can't or don't want to pay extra.
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate includes the standard Game Pass library but adds in so much more like PC Game Pass, Xbox Cloud Gaming, EA Play, Xbox Live Gold, and extra monthly perks for a variety of games.
At just a few dollars more, we'd absolutely go with Ultimate if you can afford it. Even if you don't own a gaming PC to make use of PC Game Pass, Ultimate still rolls in the cost of Xbox Live Gold online play, making it a good option if you want to consolidate your Xbox memberships into a single monthly price.
New Chord Mojo 2 DAC promises to make any headphones sound incredible
The best portable DAC we've tested has been given a follow up, and it could easily steal the crown from its predecessor if it lives up to its specs.
The Chord Mojo 2 picks up where the original Chord Mojo left off, and comes with what the company calls a "world-first technology". Its lossless DSP (digital signal processor) apparently allows you to adjust the tone of the DAC to suit any pair of headphones without any degradation in audio quality. Using the DAC's new interface, you'll be able to fine-tune the different frequency bandings yourself (lower bass, mid-bass, lower treble and high treble) for a really personalized sound.
So, if you want to upgrade your audio setup, the Mojo 2 should be able to improve the sound of headphones you already own – no need to shell out for a pricey pair of over-ears to go with your new DAC.
According to Chord, the new Mojo 2 "offers greater depth and detail perception, lower distortion and noise, plus greater neutrality" than the original Mojo, which means it should help you to squeeze out every last drop of information from your music files while maintaining a clear sound.
We were mightily impressed with the original Mojo's clear, expansive sound, so any improvement in the audio quality could make the new DAC an incredible purchase for anyone that wants to hear every detail in their music, from subtle harmonies to the intake of breath before a singer launches into the chorus that you may not have noticed before.
The new DAC looks pretty similar to its predecessor, with an anodized aluminum case and four ball-shaped control buttons that light up as you interact with it. Like the original Mojo, the Mojo 2 looks fairly large, stretching the limits of how big a truly portable DAC can be. In other words, you'll probably struggle to fit it into your pocket compared to competing models like the Audiolab M-DAC Nano or the Audioquest Dragonfly Red/Black.
You can hook the Mojo 2 up to your laptop , phone , or tablet , and it now comes with a USB-C port on top of the optical, coaxial, and micro-USB ports features on its predecessor, giving you greater flexibility with the devices you use it with. And if you want to listen with a friend, there are two 3.5mm audio ports so you can hook up two pairs of headphones at once.
With support for the add-on Poly streamer/serve module (available to buy separately), there's also the option of wireless streaming or playing music from two microSD card slots.
Battery life has been improved, with Chord claiming over eight hours of playback thanks to a new processor-based battery system that also allows the Mojo 2 to charge more quickly than its predecessor.
So, how much will that set you back? The Chord Mojo 2 is on sale now in the UK for £449, and while global pricing is yet to be confirmed, that works out at around $600 / AU$860. The previous version cost $399 / £399 / AU$799 when it launched, and while that might seem like a bit of a price hike, the original Chord was released way back in 2015, so you can expect the cost to have risen a little bit since then.
Analysis: are portable DACs really worth it?
For the uninitiated, the prospect of buying a portable DAC may seem puzzling. After all, a decent pair of headphones plugged into a laptop sound fine, right?
If 'fine' is what you want from your music listening experience, then a portable DAC probably isn't for you – but if you want to hear every last detail from your favorite songs, an external DAC will vastly improve your setup.
From laptops to phones, every source device comes with its own DAC built-in, taking the bits and bytes stored in a digital music file and convert them into something a headphone or speaker (analogue devices) can play back. However, these DACs are rarely high quality, and can be a bit of an afterthought for manufacturers of all-round media devices that need to do much more than just play your music.
Adding in an external DAC – whether you go for one that sits on your desktop or a portable model that can be slipped into a pocket – should make your music sound clearer, crisper, bassier and altogether closer to what the artist intended when they were sat in the recording studio.
External DACs are also necessary if you want to use a pair of high-impedance headphones. These audiophile-focused headphones require more power through the headphone jack on your music source in order to work properly. The general consensus is that the harder a pair of headphones is to drive, the better they will eventually sound when paired with the right equipment – and plugging them straight into a laptop isn't going to cut it.
Witcher 3 card game Gwent receiving a new standalone spin-off
The Witcher 3’s competitive card game Gwent is being adapted into a new, single-player, standalone game for release later this year.
The card game, codenamed Project Golden Nekker, is in development at CD Projekt Red’s in-house Gwent team, and aims to be notably different from past iterations of the card game, IGN says in its reveal of the game.
That description sounds similar to 2018’s Thronebreaker: A Witcher Tale, another standalone Gwent game, but CD Projekt Red claims the two will be distinct.
“It’s not another Witcher Tales [game] but something different,” Paweł Burza, communications lead for the Gwent team, told IGN. “We’re aiming to provide a captivating single-player for players who prefer it over competitive multiplayer Gwent.”
Several pieces of concept art have been revealed, including the titular Golden Nekker, a Fire Elemental, Living Fire (which looks like a burning skull), and The Barbarian, which has only now been revealed by IGN. Two other artworks show environmental areas, rather than characters, including a marketplace and a library containing a hiding Golden Nekker.
Although there’s no word yet as to exactly when the game will release, in a developer update stream for the existing Gwent multiplayer game from last December, game director Vladimir Tortsov mentioned the new title and said the team wants “to announce stuff that we’re working on when the time is right”.
IGN also points out that when Thronebreaker was released, its new cards were added to the main, multiplayer version of Gwent. With new cards expected to be released for Gwent in April, July, October, and December this year, Golden Nekker might release in one of those months.
Analysis: Gwent is The Witcher’s legacy
Gwent has gathered quite a following since The Witcher 3 released all the way back in 2015. Mentioned in Andrzej Sapkowski's original novels, the card game’s inclusion wasn’t a novel idea, but followed a long tradition of RPG designers sticking gambling minigames among epic quests and open worlds.
Unlike Fallout’s Caravan and Star War: Knights of the Old Republic’s Pazaak before it, however, Gwent was able to foster an entire community around itself. The fact CD Projekt Red has been able to spin a full multiplayer game, a single-player title, and now a second standalone release out of the card game says a lot about the loyalty of its players.
With no rumors of The Witcher 4 circulating, and CD Projekt Red still developing the next-gen ports of Cyberpunk 2077 , this is likely the only new Witcher content we’ll be seeing for a while. When it comes to the world of video games, the little card game of Gwent has done a lot to keep the world of Geralt relevant.
As for what, exactly, Golden Nekker will be, it sounds remarkably similar to Thronebreaker in form, if not content. A standalone, single-player Gwent experience, it might take a different format to The Witcher Tales game, but is certainly catering to similar players.