(Image credit: Patrick T. Fallon / Bloomberg / Getty Images)

Microsoft's controversial Xbox Game Pass Ultimate price increase is now in effect, with new and existing subscribers facing much higher monthly bills for the gaming service. It's now £22.99 per month in the UK, $29.99 in the States, and €26.99 in most EU member states.

I say "most" as it's been revealed that some regions are unaffected by the hike – or at least, existing subscribers in those countries.

The gaming giant has confirmed that current Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscribers in Austria, Germany, Poland and Ireland, along with those in Indonesia and India, will stay at the previous fee for the foreseeable future.

That's dependent on staying with the service and paying automatically on a rolling subscription. Otherwise, as with new members in those locations, they'll have to pay the new price like the rest of us.

"At this time, these increases will only affect new purchases and will not affect your current subscription for the market in which you reside, as long as you are on an auto-recurring plan," said Microsoft in an email to subscribers (via VGC).

The most likely explanation for this is that there is specific regulation regarding subscription fee changes in each of the affected zones. Sadly, this does not apply to the UK, US, most of mainland Europe, or Australia.

Admittedly, Xbox Game Pass Ultimate now includes Ubisoft+ Classics for free – a curated collection of games from the publisher – and will soon add a Fortnite Crew pass, too. However, this change has not passed without a huge segment of the gaming community calling foul.

It also lead to a fair amount of voucher stacking, with subscribers buying vouchers at the previous price point and adding them to accounts before the hike arrived.

One other option is to drop your subscription to one of the other two tiers, which cost less than half as much. Xbox Game Pass Premium, for example, still enables access to 100s of games and Xbox Cloud Gaming, but not not day one releases. You don't get EA Play or Ubisoft+ Classics either.