🔗 Share this article

Following Microsoft's recent announcement of Game Pass membership changes, featuring a cost hike for the top tier to $30 per month, numerous members are looking for new methods to maximize their subscription. If you holding onto their subscription or thinking about signing up, here are this week's recommendations.

This weekend's games feature a acclaimed Japanese role-playing game, a charming independent journey, and a brilliant puzzler scheduled to leave the platform shortly.

Persona 4 Golden

Among the top ways to maximize value from Game Pass is by immersing yourself in a extensive, engaging role-playing game — and Persona 4 Golden matches that bill exactly. You take on the part of a teenager who has just moved to the sleepy rural town of Inaba. By day, your goals include making friendships, working part-time jobs, and keeping up with studies. At night, you investigate a chilling string of murders by exploring strange locations based on your friends' inner fears.

With a unforgettable group of heroes, strategic turn-based combat, flawless visuals, and a plot packed with surprises, Persona 4 Golden is considered a classic for many reasons. It also features a highly addictive gameplay loop that will keep you up past bedtime, repeatedly.

Sopa - Tale of the Stolen Potato

While big titles like Ninja Gaiden IV are a key attraction for Game Pass, the subscription also highlights smaller games. A great instance of this is Sopa: Tale of the Stolen Potato. Drawing from Spirited Away, this charming indie game is a magical realist journey steeped in Latin American traditions. Players follow Miho, who, after assisting his grandma make soup, is pulled into a vibrant world populated by potato-nabbing frogs and various eccentric creatures.

Sopa: Tale of the Stolen Potato unfolds similar to an learning-focused PC game from the 90s, as Miho solves puzzles and aids the world's residents by gathering an assortment of objects. Though it's a little rough around the edges, Sopa: Tale of the Stolen Potato is a heartwarming little experience that openly celebrates its love for South America.

Cocoon

Cocoon: A Puzzle Adventure is scheduled to exit the service on October 15, giving you only a few days to play it via subscription — and you definitely should. Developer the creators designed one of the finest puzzlers of this generation in 2023's Cocoon. Its core puzzle mechanic revolves around moving among worlds inside other worlds, and frequently you'll carry those realms, in the shape of colorful orbs, with you.

While it lacks direct instructions, everything about Cocoon: A Puzzle Adventure's challenges is built in a very natural manner, though they can challenge you as well. 2023 was a massive year for video games, so it's understandable if Cocoon: A Puzzle Adventure was somewhat missed by many players. We should correct that while we can.