Square Enix’s decision to release Guardians of the Galaxy on Xbox Game Pass reportedly earned the company a one-time payment of R70 – R150 million.

This figure comes from David Gibson, a Senior Analyst at MST Financial, and has not been officially confirmed by Square Enix or Microsoft.

Gibson has covered Square Enix for over 15 years and regularly communicates with them.

Keep in mind that MSFT paid about US$5-$10m for Guardians of the Galaxy to be on Games Pass… that is like $2 per game when retail is $29. Ok that is all profit but not too many publishers will be doing that given the low economics from Game Pass.

— David Gibson (@gibbogame) March 26, 2022

His estimate means that Square Enix was paid around R30 for each game copy that can be played on Game Pass. Although profitable, it is not something many developers would be happy to do.

Read: PS5’s Spartacus won’t offer best Xbox Game Pass feature