10 Features That Will Define Next-Gen Gaming

9. Subscription Services Reach Fever Pitch

The latter half of this generation in particular has already seen the makings of a gaming landscape becoming increasingly dominated by recurring subscription services over one-off fees for games.

Between PlayStation Now, Xbox Game Pass, EA/Origin Access and Stadia's upcoming service, clearly the prospect of guaranteed revenue from players every month is mightily appealing to just about every company in the business.

As such, don't be surprised if, within a year or two, we see the likes of Ubisoft, Activision, Square Enix, Sega and Capcom launching their own subscription services. In many ways this may start to replace loot-boxes and intrusive micro-transactions - or at least keeping them somewhat at bay.

These individual services will certainly present value for those pouring dozens of hours per month into live-service games, but it may also result in frustration for players who end up juggling numerous subscriptions per month.

In much the same way that many cable cutters are now faced with signing up to endless VOD subscriptions of a near-equivalent value, the hardcore gaming contingent could end up paying a premium price for the convenience of having every major AAA game at their finger tips (with no real ownership, no less).

Xbox Game Pass has become a market leader in proving how to offer up a competitively-priced service with a shocking amount of value, so hopefully any prospective "competition" follows suit.

Though with the current success of Sony's first-party output, they'll likely be the last major company to place their AAA tentpoles on a subscription package.

Above all else, there's only so much time we all have to play games per month, and an over-the-odds price tag is an easy way to kill a promising subscription service right out of the gate.