r/Stadia

It's a series of baby steps spread across many years, but I do feel that eventually both of these services are basically going to become what Stadia offered:

• Buy your games and stream them at little/no extra cost

That's according Windows Central's Jez Corden who, in a  discussing Game Pass' future, claims to have heard from sources that Microsoft's is "working towards" a cloud-only version that would be "cheaper and more approachable" than Game Pass Ultimate.

The aim is said to be two-fold, with Microsoft hoping the tier will appeal to those put off by the upfront costs of a console, as well as to existing owners of competing consoles who don't want to buy an Xbox but might find the Game Pass catalogue appealing. It's reportedly also intending to monetise the cloud-only service further by offering digital ownership of individual games in its catalogue, should a user wish to buy something outright.

On the Sony side things are moving MUCH more slowly, with the one point being that they do offer PS5 games that AFTER PURCHASE can be played over Cloud even if they are not part of the PSPlusPremium Library. One such example:

If you own this game, you can stream it from cloud... but for now you STILL need to pay for PSPlusPremium (the highest tier). So Sony has already been dipping their toes into this model, they just need to create some lower cost cloud-only tiers. Or perhaps some day just make it FREE to stream these games if you already own them.