I think those talks already happened and ABK is the best answer they possibly could muster. Their content is much more popular in Europe than Xbox + Bethesda + Mojang so their best bet is still to get ABK content on GamePass ASAP. Their recent role assignment shift is also a hint they were already actively addressing concern IMO.

Also, their renewed initiative for Japanese content will surely help too for European market.

Fortunately, though -52% year/year yet -20% October 2023 vs 2022 means things are already stabilizing even without any ABK impact as of yet.

Also fortunately this drop is far from being as significant when looking at overall gaming revenue for MS, which should help MS satisfy their shareholders without generating much negativity for the Xbox division. 

I just started playing it the other day. Very early in but I can tell it's a great game already. I'm on Thanksgiving vacation, it's the perfect game for xcloud on the go. 

Battle.net players getting shafted

Oh wow, I thought it was just Spyro getting added. Nice surprise. I hope this is the first ABK game that gets added to Game Pass lol. It needs all the help it can get.

Oh shit!  Now I'm even more curious to see how it's improved since release.

Just talking with a buddy of mine about this too.  Couldn't get to Game Pass sooner imo.

Probably because MS already conceded the console war as Phil already stated. Its not about how much Xbox hardware anymore its about eco system.  Meaning, MS is not looking at just console marketshare as it will take a lot of years to dent Sony dominance.  Its about building an eco system where at some point whether you are on PC, console or mobile, you are using or within MS eco system playing their games or subscribed to GP.  There are many different paths to winning and its not a one way street.  You guys focus to much on one area which can make you blind to overall strategy.  Stop thinking about MS games division as console only because MS has not been console only for a while and they continue to tell you their plan to diversify constantly.

Xbox sales may be 1/7 of PS in Europe but Xbox players will be much closer to Playstation players. I don't own any current console and I'm still an Xbox player and with MS releasing their games day one on PC they are much more player friendly as Sony who deliberately release their games later on PC. Sure, that pushes their hardware sales a lot but is that really more in the interest of gamers?

MS has obviously also more reasons to take this way but in the end they still give more people the chance to play their games day one even without investing extra money in even more hardware.