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60 stories tagged Xbox
Xbox Insiders without Game Pass can now buy prepaid cloud streaming hours, from 10 hours for $3.99 to 50 hours for $11.99, ahead of a wider rollout in November.
Mike Klubnika's shotgun standoff has passed 10 million players, and CRITICAL REFLEX confirmed PlayStation and Nintendo Switch versions are in the works. No release dates have been announced yet.
ASUS's 20th-anniversary ROG Xbox Ally X20 is available now for $1,299.99, pairing the Ryzen AI Z2 Extreme with a 7.4-inch 120Hz OLED screen and a translucent gold-accented shell.
Microsoft has announced the Xbox Nano Controller, a 3.5-ounce pad with all 18 standard inputs, Bluetooth and a rechargeable battery. It costs $49.99, pre-orders are open, and it ships in November.
Xbox CEO Asha Sharma has formed Xbox Labs, a small team led by Scott Van Vliet that will build in the open around AI tools, game preservation and player creation, citing the recent wave of decompiled games and browser ports.
Xbox has formed XP, a new division for film, TV, merchandise, live events and brand partnerships, led by Minecraft's Kayleen Walters, while former Reddit CPO Maria Angelidou-Smith becomes CEO of Mojang on October 19.
Battlefield 6 and day-one Valor Mortis join Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass on October 13. Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, A Plague Tale: Requiem and seven more games leave on October 15.
IKEA and Xbox's nine-piece YXSTABY collection, including a stool built from the controller's original thumbstick design files, is in IKEA stores now, with online sales coming later this year.
Xbox's disc-to-digital program is rolling out to all players, turning most supported Xbox One and Series X discs into digital licences, as long as you keep the disc.
Xbox Insiders can now test Mythic Achievements, a badge for unlocking every original achievement in a game. DLC achievements don't count against it, and past completions, including Xbox 360 games, are already credited.
Microsoft is eliminating 268 roles across Xbox Game Studios and reorganising its studios: Activision takes Halo, Rare and World's Edge, Obsidian moves under Bethesda, and Playground and Turn 10 merge. Ninja Theory faces a proposed closure after two sale agreements collapsed.
Control Resonant's launch trailer is here seven days before release, and it spends its runtime outside: a warped Manhattan, gravity running sideways, and Dylan Faden's shapeshifting Aberrant doing the close-range work.
The Coalition confirmed Gears of War: E-Day is finished, set pre-installs for September 29 and published full Minimum, Recommended and Ultra PC specifications - including a hard ray-tracing requirement and a 115 GB SSD install.
Hideo Kojima used Xbox's Tokyo Game Show slot to confirm Bill Skarsgård in the lead role of PHYSINT, alongside a self-shot poster, a growing cast and a fresh performance-capture look at OD - KNOCK.
Blizzard announced Diablo V at BlizzCon 2026 for spring 2029, and the premise is that the heroes already lost - Diablo has ruled Sanctuary for seven years and turned Westmarch into an outpost of Hell. Towns are replaced by a travelling caravan, the Plague Knight joins Demon Hunter and Monk, and Diablo II-style Runewords and stat requirements are back. Diablo IV hits Switch 2 on 15 September alongside Season of Hell's Legacy.
Days after a mass Steam achievements leak surfaced the name, Nightdive Studios has officially confirmed The Tarnished Mirror, a new campaign for Thief: The Dark Project Remastered. The full reveal lands 2 November; the teaser opens by admitting the secret is already out.
Naoki Hamaguchi has confirmed that Kingdom Hearts IV is being made inside Creative Studio 1, the same Square Enix studio he runs and that is building Final Fantasy VII Revelation. Tetsuya Nomura still directs KH4 - but both of the company's 2027 tentpoles now ship out of one org.
Bulkhead's 100-player three-team shooter Wardogs has passed one million copies sold and 350,000 concurrent players within hours of its Steam early access launch, after a marketing run that included a trailer called '10 Reasons NOT to Buy' and refund offers to unhappy beta testers. PS5 and Xbox versions are not due until 2028.
Type-Moon, French-Bread and Aniplex have dated Melty Blood: Twi-Lumina for April 22, 2027 across PS5, PS4, Switch 2, Switch, Xbox One and Steam. The release-date trailer confirms White Len, a new Gauntlet mechanic, a Kinoko Nasu story mode, and a beginner-friendly one-button Act control scheme.
Kojima Productions' action-espionage project Physint has moved from Sony Interactive Entertainment to Xbox Game Studios. Sony called it a difficult decision to step away; Hideo Kojima says PlayStation Studios sent notice in mid-June that it would cancel the project, and that he spent three months finding a new partner. The deal also extends to film and television.
Xbox announced a disc-to-digital programme at Gamescom 2026. Inserting a supported Xbox One or Xbox Series X disc and launching the game attaches a digital entitlement to your Microsoft account, unlocking Play Anywhere and Cloud Gaming where applicable - and the disc keeps working. Thousands of titles are supported at launch; original Xbox and Xbox 360 discs are not. Xbox Insiders start testing August 31, 2026.
Playground Games released an 18-minute narrated walkthrough of a full Fable quest at Gamescom 2026. The Mud and Death mission sends the Hero into a haunted mine with Heroes' Guild leader Humphry and demonstrates all three combat pillars - the two-handed Bower Hammer, seven spells including the chicken-transforming Befowl, and a bow-and-crossbow ranged layer with weak-point targeting. Fable still launches February 23, 2027 on Xbox Series X|S and PC.
Tim Schafer confirms Double Fine kept every IP and publishing right after July's Xbox split, covering Psychonauts 2, Kiln, Keeper and the older catalogue. Amnesia Fortnight returns August 31 as a Kickstarter-backed live game jam where backers vote on four prototypes - and on which one becomes a real game.
Mojang's Official Gameplay Trailer finally shows Minecraft Dungeons II in motion: a party of four stepping through a rift into a new dimension called the Sift. Armour splits into four independent slots, the Twisted Warden is waiting, and the whole thing lands on Game Pass on September 29.
Obsidian's Into the Abyss update opens Brookhollow Park's pond at 18:00 UTC on August 11, adding five regions, diving suits, a harpoon and the amphibious Toe-biter Buggy. Grounded 2 also hits PS5 early access the same day at $29.99, with crossplay and cross-progression intact.
The Coalition's prequel opens its multiplayer beta in two phases: a pre-order and PC Game Pass early access window from August 6 to 10 with Horde Siege only, then a free-for-all weekend from August 13 to 17 that adds 4v4 Versus. Horde Siege puts 12 players on one map as three squads of four, with pooled Energy, carryable turrets and independent extraction.
Konami's Master Collection Vol. 2 lands August 27 with Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots playable off the PS3 for the first time, plus Peace Walker and Ghost Babel.
ZeniMax Online Studios is delaying three major Elder Scrolls Online features - the long-requested Warden class overhaul, the Crimson Veldt Trial, and Update 52 - into 2027, after Xbox's restructuring laid off 213 ZeniMax Online staff, including the game's former director and studio head. New game director Nick Giacomini says Update 51 still ships September 28 and insists 'ESO is here to stay.'
Facing concerns that Xbox's latest round of layoffs would delay The Elder Scrolls 6, Bethesda told YouTuber MrMattyPlays directly: 'No, the roadmap is unaffected.' Jason Schreier's own reporting still pegs the game at two to three years from completion.
Tim Schafer confirmed Double Fine Productions has laid off 23 employees, just weeks after the Psychonauts 2 studio was spun off from Xbox as an independent company. Double Fine keeps its IP and catalog, with Xbox funding future projects, but the studio says it had to resize to survive on its own.
Xbox and Ubisoft have expanded their Console to PC program: owners of 13 Ubisoft titles on Xbox - including Assassin's Creed Valhalla, Far Cry 6, and Rainbow Six Siege - now get the PC version at no extra cost. New purchases get both instantly; existing owners roll out through August 4.
Days after Halo: Campaign Evolved's early access launch, players beating it on Legendary and completing the credits found two hidden scenes that strongly hint at a Halo 2 remake - including Sergeant Johnson telling the camera 'See you in the sequel.' Neither Halo Studios nor Microsoft has confirmed anything.
EA officially revealed FC 27 on July 23 with a reveal trailer, confirming Kylian Mbappe and Jude Bellingham as Ultimate Plus Edition cover stars. The headline new feature is The Grounds, a social football open world with three districts. FC 27 launches worldwide September 25 on PS5, Xbox, PC, and Switch.
Gearbox detailed Bounty Pack 4: Murders and Acquisitions on its latest DevCast - a repeatable mission set in the Toxic Scowl with a new Pearlescent weapon, six Legendaries, and a refreshed Vault Card. It arrives July 30 alongside the V1.9 update, with Story Pack 2 already teased for September.
Avatar Legends: The Fighting Game launched July 23 on PS5, PC, and Switch - but the Xbox Series X|S version was pulled with almost no warning, delayed six weeks to September 3 over what the team called 'unforeseen circumstances on a backend feature.' The Switch version also shipped without crossplay.
Game PassMicrosoft has launched Xbox Backward Compatibility on PC, letting four original Xbox classics - Conker: Live & Reloaded, BLiNX: The Time Sweeper, Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge, and Fuzion Frenzy - run natively on Windows with upscaling and modern display support, included with every Game Pass tier.
2K has unveiled its NBA 2K27 cover lineup: Victor Wembanyama fronts the Standard Edition, Caitlin Clark becomes the first WNBA player on her own global cover on the Deluxe Edition, and Derrick Rose headlines the Ultra Edition. The game launches September 4 across PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Steam, and Switch 2.
Joe Ziegler, the public face of Bungie's Marathon reboot, confirmed July 17 was his last day at the studio after nearly four years. Del Chafe III steps up as game director alongside creative director Julia Nardin, as the team pushes on following a launch that fell well short of Bungie's sales expectations.
HoYoverse detailed ZZZ's second-anniversary update in a July 17 Special Program. Version 3.1 'The Long Goodbye' arrives July 29 with new S-Rank Agents Remielle Dan and Sigrid, a permanent new mode, a free limited S-Rank of your choice, and a same-day launch on Xbox PC.
Ubisoft's remake of the beloved 2013 pirate adventure is a runaway success: 2 million copies sold on day one, more than 3 million in its first week, a record concurrent-player peak on Steam, and the best reviews an Assassin's Creed has earned since the original Black Flag.
Pocketpair's monster-collecting phenomenon has finally exited Early Access. Palworld 1.0 launched July 10 as a free update with a 27-page changelog - adding the long-teased World Tree, the Sky Islands, 20-plus new Pals, water-based building, reworked tower bosses, and a breeding-defining new system called Genetic Recombination.
Game PassThe full remake of the 2001 original lands July 28 on Xbox, PC and — for the first time in franchise history — PlayStation 5, packing a brand-new three-mission Master Chief arc and day-one Game Pass access.
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 World Update 22 is live and free, celebrating the United States National Parks for the country's 250th anniversary. It adds 31 photogrammetry-rebuilt landmarks, 46 points of interest, nine discovery flights, the debut of guided tours, and a free Goodyear Blimp, with National Championship Air Races due in Fall 2026.
Palworld's 1.0 release lands July 10 on PC, PS5, Xbox and Game Pass, nearly doubling the map with a World Tree and Sky Islands, adding PvP and its biggest wave of new Pals - free for owners.
Ubisoft's ground-up Black Flag remake, rebuilt on the latest Anvil engine with ray tracing, dynamic weather and new pirate storylines, launches July 9, 2026 on PS5, Xbox and PC.
Koei Tecmo and Omega Force host the Next Scouting Report broadcast for Attack on Titan 3 today, July 1 - the deep dive expected to finally reveal a release date, show off the overhauled ODM combat and confirm that the Final Season and Rumbling are playable for the first time.
Season Meltdown is now live across PC, console and mobile - Delta Force's largest update yet brings the AZ3 Nuclear Plant Operations map with a multi-ending mechanic, control Operator N-TWO, the Coliseum Warfare map, two new weapons and a Rainbow Six Siege crossover.
Microsoft is hiking Xbox Series X and Series S prices worldwide from August 1 - up to $799.99 for a disc Series X and $499.99 for the Series S - while discontinuing the 2TB model, blaming a 2.5x surge in memory and storage costs.
Halo Studios confirms Halo: Campaign Evolved launches July 28, 2026 at $49.99 - with five-day early access on July 23 for Premium/Collector's buyers, day-one Game Pass, and the series' first-ever PlayStation 5 release.
EVO 2026 opens in Las Vegas on June 26 with 5,774 entrants across 12 games. Riot's 2XKO storms into the Arena Finals in its Vegas debut, Marvel Tokon offers playable Magneto demos ahead of its August 6 launch, and Capcom is widely expected to hold its biggest Street Fighter 6 news for Sunday's finals.
Riot Games' free-to-play 2v2 fighter 2XKO has earned a spot in the EVO 2026 Arena Finals in its Las Vegas debut, drawing 1,080 entrants chasing a $135K+ pot. Newest champions Senna and Thresh are tournament-legal, and top names like SonicFox headline a scene that has matured remarkably fast since the game's January launch.
Season 20: Custom Seas launched June 18, 2026, giving Sea of Thieves players a full level editor to build and share their own game modes - from Rowboat Royale to flame-cannon deathmatch - plus new cinematic camera tools, free for all owners on PC, Xbox and PS5.
Monument of Triumph, Destiny 2's final major content update, has arrived - reviving the Sparrow Racing League, adding the Pantheon boss-rush and new Distortions, refocusing the Director and Portal, and dropping Legendary Marks and Exotic overhauls as Bungie ends active development to focus on Marathon.
Microsoft's Xbox division is bracing for another wave of layoffs and studio closures as its fiscal year ends June 30. Ninja Theory (Hellblade) is reportedly being shut down, while Compulsion Games and Double Fine negotiate to spin off - and XGS head Craig Duncan is said to be stepping down.
After a decade of fan demand and licensing limbo, the Friday the 13th icon arrives in Dead by Daylight on June 16, 2026 as The Slasher - the game's 10th-anniversary killer, wielding Omnipresent Evil and Improvised Carnage.
Owlcat Games' third Rogue Trader expansion launched June 11, 2026, pulling the von Valancius dynasty into Trazyn the Infinite's legendary vault with a new companion, an implants augmentation system and roughly 15 hours of Necron-focused story.
In a post-reveal Q&A, producer Yoshiaki Hirabayashi confirmed Capcom will make some story changes to Resident Evil Veronica so it fits cleanly into the modern remake timeline - sitting just after RE2 and RE3 and leading into RE4 - with the acclaimed RE2 remake team developing the 2027 release.
Marvel Rivals Season 8.5 launches today with Cyclops, a 275 HP Duelist whose optic beams ricochet off walls and chain between enemies, an Optic Fury ultimate that removes his visor for a devastating line blast, and a new Blast Slash team-up that supercharges Wolverine's claws.
Riyo Games and Balor Games returned to Day of the Devs: Summer Game Fest Edition 2026 with a fresh trailer for Threads of Time, an era-spanning, turn-based JRPG that wears its Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy influences proudly. It's in development for PC and Xbox Series X|S.
Xbox celebrated its 25th anniversary at the Xbox Games Showcase with the X25 Anniversary Collection, headlined by the Xbox Series X25 Limited Edition - the first-ever translucent Series X in 'OG Green' with a light-up green X, 1TB of storage, and a matching X25 Special Edition controller. The collection arrives in November 2026.