> Doesn't Apple's family sharing have a big problem with IAPs not being shared?

It's up to the developer as of iOS 14: https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/4/22154178/apple-family-sha...

> The consoles all have a pretty similar system at this point.

Not on Xbox, which is my primary gaming device. Here's how the "home console" feature works today:

> "Xbox home console is an existing feature that allows you to share games and content with other people who sign in to your home console with their profile. However, it’s limited to that device, so friends and family must sign in to the console you identify as your home Xbox to access those benefits."

On the bright side, something new called "Xbox Game Pass Friends & Family" is coming. It provides an Apple-like experience for games on Game Pass, which is a good start:

> "When you share with Friends & Family, the primary account holder and up to four additional members each get their own unique access to all Xbox Game Pass Ultimate games, content, and benefits, regardless of what device they play on. All the people you invite can play at the same time, even the same game."

https://support.xbox.com/en-US/help/subscriptions-billing/ma...

Isn't Xbox home console exactly what I described as a master console? That console can play whatever offline and other users can use that content linked to that account. Then you can login into that account on a friend's console or a second console and use that accounts games while online? So you can have two games from one account being played simultaneously online which is not doable on Steam.

> Then you can login into that account on a friend's console or a second console and use that accounts games while online?

As the FAQ I quoted above appears to confirm, you can share games with other profiles, but only on the single device blessed as the "home console".

Of course, you can always pass physical discs around. IIRC, for digital purchases there's a convoluted way to use a single purchase with multiple profiles on multiple devices, but not at the same time. In other words, co-op requires multiple copies of a game. If purchased digitally, they must be bought using separate profiles since one profile can't buy a game twice.

It's quite possible I'm wrong about some facet(s) of this. Hopefully "Xbox Game Pass Friends & Family" fixes this, but if it only fixes the problem for Game Pass games I'm not sure how much value it'll have for me.

Yes, but you can log into another console with the same account and play the titles you own so long as you're online and logged in. So you can play a game you bought on your account while someone else plays a game bought on your account on the home console. So two consoles simultaneously.

What some people do is they set their friend's Xbox as their home console and their friend sets their Xbox as their home console and then they both just stay logged in and online on their respective consoles. This lets them play all their friend's games but they can still play their own.

I think if you try this for a co-op scenario you'll find that it will fail, but it's possible it just failed for everything we tried. In any case, setting someone else's device to be our home console is a non-starter for me. Thanks for digging in with me on this, though!