One of my favorite Xbox games this year has been, without a doubt, Monster Hunter Stories 3: Reflection, the latest entry in Capcom's JRPG series that combines the monster-capture gameplay of Pokémon with the action-hunting thrills and awesome beasts of Monster Hunter.

However, when Monster Hunter Stories 3: Reflection launched earlier this year on Xbox Series X|S, many of my Xbox friends (including Jez Corden) were sad it didn't have Xbox Play Anywhere support, as this game was made for gaming on the go due to it being on Nintendo Switch 2 and Steam.

However, Microsoft has come forward to rectify that missed opportunity by announcing via Xbox Wire that Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection will finally receive Xbox Play Anywhere support and also launch on 'Xbox on PC' on November 18, 2026.

With this, Xbox players will be able to play Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection on Xbox consoles, Windows 11 PCs, and compatible gaming handhelds like the Xbox Ally with just one purchase on Xbox digital storefronts at no additional cost.

Plus, Xbox players can carry over their save data, achievements, and DLC content seamlessly across all the aforementioned platforms, so they won't have to worry about losing progress.

Here's hoping Monster Hunter Stories 3 gets a DLC expansion in the future

As a longtime fan of turn-based JRPGs, Pokémon-likes, and Monster Hunter, I loved Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection.

It has an intriguing plot with charming characters, beautiful anime-style graphics that performed amazingly at launch, a fun turn-based combat system that isn't afraid to put the player in danger early on, and an incredibly addictive Habitat Restoration system that puts a unique twist on the monster-taming genre.

However, I was extremely annoyed that this game didn't come with a proper High Rank post-game like previous titles, and its post-launch support has been middling at best, with just cosmetics, beefier versions of regular monsters called Royal Monsters, and a single DLC quest chain.

I'm hoping that this game gets a proper DLC expansion like the mainline Monster Hunter games because Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection's base game has an extremely solid foundation that deserves to be expanded upon with more areas, challenges, gear, and playable Monsties.

So, if you've been holding out on Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection's Xbox version because of a lack of Xbox Play Anywhere support, you'll have no more excuses to sleep on one of my personal Game of the Year contenders when it receives it on November 18, 2026.

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In among the litany of failures across Xbox and Microsoft in general, there are at least a few dozen undeniable epic business wins. One of those is undoubtedly Minecraft.

The blocky craft 'em up adventure already had huge momentum when Microsoft acquired it, but the firm has since turned Minecraft into a cultural powerhouse, with a merchandising and licensing empire that is often overlooked in general gaming discourse. Microsoft thinks there are more opportunities like this ... and that's why it is creating a new division under Xbox today.

"XP" is a new department under Microsoft's gaming team, led by new XP CEO Kayleen Walters, former president of Minecraft.

During Xbox's internal Town Hall meeting this week, Xbox CEO Asha Sharma described "four Cs" of focus for Xbox, with the session focusing mainly on Core and Content, i.e. console growth and uplifting Xbox's first and third-party content. Sharma described XP forging ahead with the Creator and Connection segments of the plan, aimed at developing other Xbox franchises to the same heights as Minecraft itself.

Microsoft put out a blog post today outlining the vision for XP, which will essentially operate as a licensing pipeline across all of Xbox's major franchises.

"Xbox Pictures" will focus on opportunities to bring Microsoft gaming franchises to the big and small screen, in the forms of movies and TV shows. Microsoft has already revealed a range of content in this area, including content for Gears of War, Wolfenstein, Diablo, among others. Big wins here include the Minecraft movie and Fallout TV show, both of which were huge successes in their own right, and vastly boosted interest in the games.

"Xbox Products" will extend what Walters has already done for Minecraft in the form of merchandising and other product lines. Microsoft says that these will be "authentic" to the fandoms. Toys 'R' Us recently announced plans to open dozens of new stores, focusing on the new adult toy-collector cohort. I suspect Microsoft may seek to join in here ... perhaps we could see Skylanders return?!

"Xbox Places" will be a new division focusing on fan events and theme park experiences. Microsoft specifically referred to BlizzCon in the press release here, and I recently heard whispers that Microsoft was interested in extending the BlizzCon model to other major Xbox franchises. Microsoft also has a theme park for Minecraft going live in the UK next year, set as a test bed for this type of thing. Perhaps the Overwatch map "Blizzard World" will become a reality some day ...

Finally, we have "Xbox Partnerships," which will continue the work Microsoft already does bringing its universes into other brands. The recent IKEA Xbox furniture line is an example of this, as well as the Blizzard McDonalds promotion in the UK, and the recent Fanta Xbox Game Pass integrations.

Kayleen Walters spent 13 years at Lucasfilm doing the same kind of work between Disney's theme parks and merchandising empires for Star Wars, and delivered the same for Minecraft during her tenure at Xbox. Now, Microsoft is hoping to extend that even further to franchises like Fallout, Call of Duty, Candy Crush, and more.

Reaching Xbox fans outside of Xbox

Speaking on the appointment, Kayleen Walters had this to say about XP and the potential that exists in Xbox's franchises.

"XP was created from a simple but powerful belief: the world's most beloved gaming franchises have an opportunity to reach people far beyond the boundaries of the game itself. Fans don't just play our franchises. They watch them, wear them, attend them, celebrate them, and connect with them in countless ways. XP brings together the teams responsible for helping XBOX franchises show up in the world in bigger, more meaningful ways."

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Microsoft has also appointed former Reddit and Meta executive to run Minecraft in Walters' stead, with a goal of growing Minecraft's chops as a developer platform, taking on Roblox and the like.

This era of Xbox revolves around synchronizing and utilizing Microsoft's acquisitions of the last few years, identifying the clear opportunities that the Minecraft movie and Fallout TV show has presented. Other big media properties of recent years, spanning Cyberpunk, to Castlevania, to Resident Evil, have all seen significant uplift as a result of successful delivery of these shows and movies.

Of course, those movies and TV shows have to actually be good. And as the Halo TV show has taught us ... a flop can actually do more harm than good to a gaming brand and its potential. There's no guarantee Microsoft and its partners can easily emulate the success of the Fallout TV show and Minecraft movie with other properties. I would like to see them take another stab at a Warcraft movie, though.

In any case, Microsoft has explored this segment before with Xbox Entertainment Studios, which fell apart quite rapidly. Microsoft knew this segment was going to be big, as far back as 2012. Although it seems Microsoft now has the good sense to work with external experts (like Netflix and Amazon Prime) rather than try to develop some of these products in-house.

It remains to be seen if the results of this venture will actually deliver. There's definitely a clear and obvious opportunity here, and Xbox's primary competitors, Nintendo and PlayStation, are leaning heavily in this direction already.

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Splitting up with your partner usually leaves both parties on rather poor terms, or is that just me? In the case of Undead Labs, the developer behind State of Decay, that seemingly isn’t the case.

In a recent interview with Game File, Undead Labs Studio Head Philip Holt was asked why the studio is still sticking with Game Pass, and here’s what he said:

Shocking many I'm sure, as again another developer comes out in defence of Game Pass, but Holt does go on, stating:

"Even today, we have several thousand people coming through the door every day. The benefit of State of Decay is that it’s a very retentive game. Last time I looked, something like half of our monthly active users have been in the game for close to two years, and a quarter for more than five. A lot of players from Game Pass come in and they’re like ‘this isn’t for me’ and leave. There is a high churn rate. But of the players we capture, we capture for a long time. And then they become franchise fans and consume other titles, and they’re excited for State of Decay 3. It’s really helped us achieve scale."

He continues, lamenting Game Passes reach:

"How do we make the most of that for State of Decay 3? Our biggest investment by far is the four-player co-op shared world, so a large audience that comes through Game Pass becomes a huge benefit. They play State of Decay 3, it is a great experience with friends, they invite their friends, and many of them will be on other platforms. It is a vector of growth for us."

The full interview dives into a plethora of additional details, including how the studio is working with three co-development teams to keep the project on track, so I do suggest you dive in and read it yourselves. But it’s great for us Xbox fans to see Holt take this position and recognize the value of a service like Game Pass despite the split with Xbox.

Thankfully, State of Decay 3 is full steam ahead for next year. As quite the zombie fanatic, I’m excited and hopeful that the game does well. It remains the one game I wish Xbox hadn’t chucked out amid their restructuring, but alas.

Do let me know your thoughts on Holt’s comments down below!

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Xbox CTO Scott Van Vliet has taken to X (formerly Twitter) to confirm that more is coming to make development on the platform easier. Despite already rolling out numerous positive changes for developers, Van Vliet states that the company is actively working to remove further friction.

“We’ve heard the feedback from developers: bringing a game to XBOX should be easier than it is today. We agree, and we’re working to make it better. We care deeply about ID@XBOX and the developers who build for XBOX. We’re starting with some of the areas we know can create unnecessary friction, including our concept and publishing processes, and simplifying them so developers can spend less time navigating process and more time bringing great games to players. More soon.”

It’s great to see Xbox address developers directly here and whilst what exactly will change is kept rather vague for now, and doesn’t give much away, outside of simplifying concept and publishing processes, it's still nice to see acknowledged, and publicly no less.

Not long ago, I was getting quite giddy over changes made to PlayFab, specifically with the introduction of Foundation Mode. This gives developers access to backend services for free, including infrastructure for multiplayer lobbies and other essential features.

At the same time, Microsoft expressed confidence that developers could now get working within the Xbox development environment in about 30 minutes, making the onboarding process significantly simpler than before.

For folks like me, and you, it won’t really mean much if you just play games. But for developers, Xbox is making serious strides to lower as many barriers as possible. Eventually, maybe skipping Xbox won’t be an option anymore? Who knows?

Hopefully, we hear more soon about the specific changes Van Vliet is referring to. Despite not being all too technically inclined with game development, I do enjoy dabbling here and there, and as an Xbox fan, it’s exciting that more and more developers might see the platform as more viable in the future.

With that said, let me know if things like this excite you or not by commenting down below, and be sure to take part in our poll.

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After the double-whammy launch of Gears of War: E-Day and Minecraft Dungeons 2, things are quietening down for Xbox Game Pass as its next batch of new titles includes a mixture of older AAA titles like Battlefield 6 and intriguing new IP like the soulslike FPS, Valor Mortis.

Here's the full list of Xbox games coming and leaving Xbox Game Pass for the second half of October 2026.

Games leaving Xbox Game Pass (October 15)

• A Plague Tale: Requiem (Cloud, Console, and PC)
• Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (Cloud, Console, and PC)
• Crime Scene Cleaner (Cloud, Console, and PC)
• Donut County (Cloud, Console, and PC)
• Evil West (Cloud, Console, and PC)
• Nova Roma (Game Preview) (PC)
• Pacific Drive (Cloud, Console, and PC)
• Superball (Cloud, Console, and PC)
• The Casting of Frank Stone (Cloud, Console, and PC)

Windows Central's take

The biggest game on this list is Battlefield 6, the latest entry in EA's long-running military FPS series. The game has received generally favorable reviews, with critics praising its tight gunplay and multiplayer, but felt the single-player was lacking in the character writing and plot departments.

Battlefield 6 will arrive on Xbox Game Pass on October 13, 2026, which will be the same time the game launches its fifth season.

This season will have players battle in Las Vegas with several new maps, weapons, and vehicles, a new Operation, a Halloween event, a Server Browser, a #REDSEC: Rapid Royale mode, Platoons, and more.

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However, I'm not sure players will have time to play this game because three days after Battlefield 6's induction into Xbox Game Pass...will mark the launch of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4, one of the most anticipated Xbox titles of 2026.

Will Battlefield 6 manage to capture player retention away from its biggest rival in the military shooter genre with its Xbox Game Pass inclusion and Season 5 content? Will Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 sweep Battlefield 6 under the rug with its massive campaign mode, intense PVP modes, and new DMZ extraction mode?

Only time will tell next week.

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Xbox is about to celebrate its 25th Anniversary, and while there have been numerous brand collaborations to mark the occasion, the 8BitDo Xbox collection has actually been in circulation since November 2024. Inspired by the OG Xbox, the collection is a transparent-green dream consisting of a chunky keyboard, numpad, mouse, and even a controller.

I only got my hands on the set this year, which feels fitting with the Xbox anniversary about to be in full swing. While 8BitDo has just added a gorgeous Gears of War edition to the lineup, I'm firmly sticking with my bleed-green setup, which I've been using every day for around four months now.

The TL;DR of this review is that I absolutely adore this chunky, obnoxiously green keyboard, and I can't see myself using anything else, but read on if you need a little more swaying.

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8BitDo Retro 87 Mechanical Keyboard Xbox Edition: Price, availability and specs

The 8BitDo Retro 87 Mechanical Keyboard (Xbox Edition) retails for $119.99 in the US and £99.99 in the UK. However, it frequently sees discounts and at the time of writing, it is on sale for $89.99 on Amazon US.

Out of the box, the keyboard includes 8BitDo’s iconic Dual Super Buttons, a pair of massive, programmable arcade-style macro buttons that plug directly into the back of the board via 3.5mm jacks without needing extra software configuration.

If you are a sane person who enjoys using a Numpad, rejecting all minimal keyboard ideology, then 8BitDo also offers a matching standalone Retro 18 Mechanical Numpad (Xbox Edition), which retails separately for $44.99 / £39.99.

The main tech specs you need to know are:

• Layout: 87-key Tenkeyless (TKL) with top-mount design
• Switches: Kailh Jellyfish X linear/clicky switches (Hot-swappable PCB, full N-key rollover)
• Keycaps: Double-layered ABS with a matte UV coating
• Connectivity: Tri-mode (2.4GHz wireless via magnetic dongle, Bluetooth 5.0, wired USB-C)
• Battery: 4,000mAh rechargeable Li-ion (rated for up to 280 hours on 2.4GHz / 300 hours on Bluetooth)
• Lighting & controls: Customisable RGB backlighting, dedicated volume dial, and connection mode knob
• Included extras: Dual Super Buttons module, USB-C charging cable, 2.4GHz dongle, and 1 month of Xbox Game Pass for PC
• Dimensions & weight: 376.6 x 169.6 x 46.8 mm; 1,100 g
• Software support: 8BitDo Ultimate Software V2 (Windows & Android)

8BitDo Retro 87 Mechanical Keyboard Xbox Edition: What's good

Unboxing this was an experience in itself; the box was roughly twice the size of any keyboard package I’ve opened before. Coming from the Roccat Vulcan I’d been rocking (or should I say Roccing hur hur), I expected it to be chunky, and while it was different for sure, I'm kind of loving that 8BitDo has embraced the maximalist approach. To be honest, as I get older, I’m really appreciating the larger keycaps and moving away from that classic all-black "squint at the keys" aesthetic.

The green design is unabashedly Xbox of course, but with a lot of small, thoughtful touches. Like the A/B/X/Y colored arrow keys that mirror the OG controller and the glowing Xbox home button (which matches the look on the new 25th Anniversary Series X console.) This is a hell of a lot cheaper than that console too!

If the Xbox Duke controller were a keyboard and mouse, this would be it.

Even before typing a single sentence, the convenient design details impressed me. Having a dedicated magnetic compartment built into the base to store the 2.4GHz receiver is a godsend; I’ve lost count of how many wireless dongles I’ve misplaced over the years.

Connectivity is versatile, offering 2.4GHz wireless, Bluetooth, or a wired USB-C connection. I wouldn't normally dedicate a sentence to a cable, but 8BitDo even made the braided wire matching Xbox green. Talk about attention to detail!

The board itself feels incredibly hefty, solid, and durable on the desk. That robust build quality is a major plus for me: regardless of how gentle I may be with the keyboard, my son also loves gaming at my desk and is considerably heavier-handed. This chassis easily withstands the enthusiastic key-slams of a kid navigating mods in Wobbly Life. The physical dials at the top for adjusting volume and switching connection modes feel equally premium and far from flimsy.

The box includes 8BitDo’s famous Dual Super Buttons. At first, I had no idea what to do with them other than getting my cat to play the bongos, but they plug in via a 3.5mm jack on the rear. You can map them on the fly directly from the board without software, though downloading the 8BitDo Ultimate Software V2 is essential if you want to set up complex macros or multi-key shortcuts.

While I didn't get overly creative with my bindings, mapping the giant "A" button to instantly grab screenshots is super handy during streams.

If you love RGB backlighting, the board comes packed with bright lighting modes and a full spectrum of color profiles. I usually keep the backlighting on boring white as I think having multi-colours looks a little 'busy' through the green casing, but the customization options are there if you want a full rainbow light show (I do not, and prefer less visual noise).

The stock switches deliver a wonderfully satisfying clickety-clackety feel (that’s a technical term), offering great audio and tactile feedback. I also didn't note any input lag even over wireless. For tinkerers, the PCB is fully hot-swappable if you ever want to pull the stock switches and experiment with custom ones later on. Finally, if you opt for the matching standalone numpad, it snaps flush against the side of the board with a deeply satisfying magnet click, just another detail that makes this feel pretty premium.

8BitDo Retro 87 Mechanical Keyboard Xbox Edition: What's bad

As I said, I love this keyboard, and I'm hard-pressed to find anything I don't like about it, but if I had any criticisms at all, I'd start with the fact that I have to clean it more often!

The super-matte, double-layered ABS keycaps tend to show finger oils and shine much faster and more noticeably than keycaps on previous boards I’ve used. I find myself wiping the keys down more often, but that's a small price to pay for how good the setup looks on my desk.

Second, while I appreciate that 8BitDo made the matching Numpad an optional extra, it's a bit frustrating that both the keyboard and the numpad require their own separate 2.4GHz USB dongles. USB ports on my dock are always at a premium, so I’ve ended up running the main keyboard wired most of the time. Given that the keyboard sits stationary on my desk anyway, it’s hardly a dealbreaker just a minor setup niggle to keep in mind if you are beholden to getting the Numpad too.

8BitDo Retro 87 Mechanical Keyboard Xbox Edition: The competition

You'll only be reading this if you're already interested in grabbing a very in-your-face Xbox fan-themed keyboard, in which case, it's worth mentioning that Razer have released the Xbox 25th Anniversary Collection just recently, and within that, a Black Widow V4 75% keyboard.

At $209.99 / £199.99, it carries a distinctly "Razer price tag" compared to 8BitDo’s accessible $119.99 MSRP.

However, that higher price tag gets you a sleeker, smaller frame and quieter tactile switches.

If you prefer a more subtle, understated tribute to the original Xbox without the chunky retro footprint (and don't mind waiting for pre-orders to ship on October 20), the Razer option is a gorgeous alternative. But for that loud, unapologetic early-2000s green Duke-style aesthetic at nearly half the price, 8BitDo is a no-brainer for me.

8BitDo Retro 87 Mechanical Keyboard Xbox Edition: Should you buy it?

You should buy this if ...

✅ You want a nostalgia-packed OG Xbox aesthetic

This board is certainly cheaper (and easier to buy) than the Xbox Series X25, and it nails the retro 2000s theme

✅ You love big keycaps and clicky switches

The keyboard is just as loud as the design

✅ You want versatile wireless options and handy extras

With built-in magnetic dongle storage, 2.4GHz/Bluetooth toggles, a dedicated volume dial, and programmable Dual Super Buttons, it’s packed with great quality-of-life details.

You should not buy this if ...

❌ You want a silent, low-profile keyboard

The stock switches are loud and proud, and the chunky retro frame takes up a good chunk of desk space.

❌ You need a built-in numpad without extra dongles

It’s a Tenkeyless layout, and while 8BitDo sells a matching separate numpad, taking up two separate USB ports for two wireless dongles can quickly clutter up your hub or dock.

The 8BitDo Retro 87 Mechanical Keyboard Xbox Edition is just perfect for anyone who holds a soft spot for early 2000s gaming tech, translucent and chunky. I can't wait to sink many hours of WoW Forever on it and live my millennial retirement home dreams.

It looks like a collectors edition item without the price tag you would normally expect, while managing to also be built to last and something I want to keep on using (not just take pretty pictures of for Instagram). If you want a desk setup that brings a smile to your face every time you sit down to type or game, this obnoxiously green and thicc beast is worth every cent.

Yesterday, Xbox CEO Asha Sharma spoke to Microsoft employees in a big Town Hall meeting, covering a variety of topics.

Xbox's gaming org has undergone vast restructuring this summer leading to thousands of job cuts via layoffs and divestitures. The reorg is designed to reduce costs and shift as much of its business as possible out from underneath Microsoft U.S. corporate structure. More of Microsoft's game studios have been moved under purpose-built publishers like Activision and Bethesda, as the AI buildout continues to dominate Microsoft U.S. overall bureaucracy and legal apparatus.

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Xbox stated recently that its restructure is "75% complete," with staffers still wondering what additional layoffs might be on the table. But for now, Asha Sharma took to the internal airwaves to give Xbox staffers an update on what to expect in the coming months from Xbox's overall plan. The quotes below were transcribed to us and verified with multiple sources.

Xbox's big plans for PC and gaming in general: easier publishing, and a Battle.net boost

Sharma spoke on a range of topics at the event, some of which we covered yesterday which you can read up on here. There, Xbox's Asha Sharma spoke on the need to strengthen Xbox's core user base: console users, with plans to boost Xbox Series X|S and the next-gen Xbox Helix "family of devices." But today, I'd like to highlight her comments on Xbox PC and its future, which includes boosted publishing powers for developers, more support for Battle.net, and more.

"On PC historically, we've taken a one-shot approach. We've had one app, and that's what we've focused on. As we have dug in, we're leaving a lot on the table," Sharma said. "It turns out that Battle.net supports an audience that we're not reaching outside of it, and it is awesome at it. The retention is nearly as good as Steam's retention, and we've never really put any work behind it as a platform. And so, we are doing that. We are doing it the right way for that community. It'll be great for our first-party games, and great for select third-party games too."

Indeed, Battle.net recently picked up its first third-party game in the form of The Witcher 3. Activision previously experimented with Battle.net, putting Call of Duty and Tony Hawk's Pro Skater up on the service, and Xbox chimed in with DOOM and Avowed, among others. Blizzard seems to be taking a more curated approach to content on Battle.net, as opposed to opening the flood gates Steam or Xbox PC-style. Retention refers to return users, and not necessarily total users. Sharma is saying that once they're in the ecosystem, Battle.net users stick around at a rate almost as good as Steam.

It'll be interesting to see what publishers show up there next in any case. I could see Battle.net focusing more on AAA type stuff, but it also seems to be designed to help Xbox boost Xbox Play Anywhere. Indeed, The Witcher 3 is now Xbox Play Anywhere on Xbox Series X|S consoles and cloud as a result of this partnership, even if you grab it via Battle.net on PC.

None of this means Xbox plans to ditch Steam, though.

"We will continue to invest in other PC apps as long as they reach distinct audiences," Sharma emphasized. "The Windows app [Microsoft Store] reaches a lot of people around the world. In fact, in China, it is the number one store," Sharma said, although it's unclear by what metric they're measuring this. It's true that Fortnite, Roblox, and some other major service-type games are available on the Windows Microsoft Store, and not on Steam. I'm told many users in China access Steam via a VPN, which probably clouds some of these figures.

"We're collaborating across the board," Sharma said, "we're doing a lot this fall [in terms of offers] through OEMs. We have an offer going out to 14 million OEMs. I saw some great pre-install work that's happening for [World of Warcraft], and some great conversion numbers. We will continue to succeed on Windows. There are a billion Windows PCs. There's no reason we shouldn't be serving our audiences there."

OEMs refers to companies that build and ship Windows-based devices. It sounds to me like Sharma and Xbox are working to bundle other content with upcoming laptop launches. Many laptops come with PC Game Pass codes these days, for example, and it sounds like World of Warcraft may come with launchers and gametime pre-installed on some devices to celebrate the launch of WoW: Forever and further boost Battle.net in general.

Finally, Sharma spoke about making it easier to "work with Xbox," echoing complaints I've heard from developers big and small about building games for the Xbox ecosystem.

"Right now, it is simply very hard to work with Xbox," Sharma admitted. "So, we are simplifying the targets, we're moving to a headless partner center, we're taking the cruft out of our APIs, and we're making them machine-readable. There's a lot of work here. We need developers to be able to work with us, understand how they are performing, and have tools that actually grow their business. There's a lot we can do here. I'm encouraged by the work happening."

The idea here is to make Xbox's publishing programs as simple and automated as possible, reducing the need for human-intervention and bottlenecks. You might notice on Metacritic that PS5 and Steam reviews of games often vastly outstrip their Xbox counterparts. One reason for this is that developers' games often seem stuck in certification until the last minute on Xbox, with reviewers and content creators opting for PS5 and Steam versions as codes usually come in much earlier there.

More problematically, Microsoft's publishing requirements often just see indie developers rejected without providing any clear reasoning, despite obtaining clearance on Steam and PS5. It's often only when the Xbox community gets involved and makes noise that some publishers get their work cleared through cert, which is absolutely stupid. It sounds like there's an effort to fix this, thankfully.

PC gaming is a huge opportunity for Xbox, both on and off Steam

Microsoft's core focus is rebuilding its Xbox Series X|S console business ahead of the Xbox Helix launch, but it's encouraging to see they're not abandoning efforts to strengthen their PC offering.

In years past, Microsoft earned itself a reputation of hostility among PC players, with services like Games for Windows Live remaining notorious to this day. As of 2026, Xbox's offering on PC is far far better. The Xbox PC app is in a much better place (although could still be better), the Xbox Ally X handheld is a fantastic console companion for Xbox Play Anywhere fans. And perhaps ironically, Microsoft's disc-to-digital program on Xbox consoles is offering a way to acquire physical PC games for the first time in years, strangely.

Microsoft still has a way to go on building trust with PC gamers for sure. I would argue having more open dialogue with the community there and having a more public, prominent feedback program similar to what we've seen on Xbox Series X|S would help. PC Game Pass is still a very strong offering, and Battle.net is arguably the best of the publisher-focused launchers, vastly outstripping stuff like Ubisoft Connect and EA Play.

PC gaming is a very different culture to console gaming, and arguably more competitive. Steam is absolutely beloved, and outside of that, we have an arrangement of publisher-focused launchers like the Riot Client and HoYoverse launchers. Xbox PC still needs a lot of work on the performance side, especially on handhelds, and the integrations with external launchers like Battle.net itself aren't always the best. But as an Xbox-first, Xbox PC-second gamer, I've been encouraged by the work here. I'd love to see Xbox boost publisher relationships and discoverability for indie games, improve the search functionality on Xbox PC, and also streamline processes for getting Xbox Play Anywhere functional.

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You can now beat the scalpers and ensure that you get what I believe is the most stunning Xbox controller ever made. Pre-orders for the Xbox Wireless Controller X25 Special Edition are live right now!

A translucent green design lets you see the internal components of the controller while also giving you a shot of nostalgia. Fans have wanted a green controller like this for years, and Xbox finally delivered.

An ode to Xbox

Microsoft announced the Xbox Series X25 earlier this year. While that console is gorgeous, those who already have an Xbox Series X may not buy another console just for a refreshed look. But you can celebrate the 25th anniversary of Xbox without spending $899.99.

The Xbox Wireless Controller X25 Special Edition is "OG Green" and has a translucent body. Small touches such as the ABXY buttons matching the original Xbox controller add up to make a stunning controller. The bumpers are even black and white similar to the black and white buttons of the "Duke" controller.

The black Xbox button shines a green light as a throwback to the early days of Xbox. The back of the controller has a see-through panel featuring the classic XBOX logo.

Unfortunately, as with most collectible hardware, scalpers will gobble up a lot of the stock of the Xbox Wireless Controller X25 Special Edition. Locking in a pre-order early is your best bet to avoid inflated resale prices.

Whether you're enjoying the new games that were just announced at the Future Games Show at Gamescom 2026 or playing games you just converted through the Xbox disc-to-digital program, the Xbox Wireless Controller X25 Special Edition will be a gorgeous companion.

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Today, Xbox CEO Asha Sharma addressed all of Xbox in an internal town hall, the transcript of which was shared to Windows Central and verified by trusted sources.

Xbox has been undergoing something of a reset this year, with divestitures, layoffs, and structural changes. Xbox Game Pass removed Call of Duty and picked up a big price cut, Xbox also returned to exclusive games and content, and began investing in marketing and features for its Xbox Series X|S consoles again for the first time in years.

"Why do we exist?" Sharma said, "We exist to be where the world plays, we will know when we have a billion daily active people, and we have a right to win because we're now focused on our fans and franchises."

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Sharma noted that Xbox was declining in hours spent, players, and revenue at the start of the year. She now says Xbox has stabilized in hours spent, and she's now said after year-over-year first party declines, Xbox has now returned to growth in this area. She reiterated that the previous Xbox Game Pass strategy sent Xbox into "freefall" declines on the balance sheet, likely referring to the damage at both ends to Call of Duty and Xbox Game Pass.

UPDATE: To clarify, when speaking about growth here, I'm told Asha Sharma was using a chart referring specifically to first party growth, i.e. games that Xbox owns and publishes. I've updated the text to clarify this.

"We're making the right decisions to reinvest in the business, after an all time low, we've started to return to growth, more than 2 to 3 times what we were, and we expect that continue." Asha Sharma also called out Gears of War: E-Day, Minecraft Dungeons 2, and World of Warcraft Forever for having "strong" starts, and noted that Xbox has seen a 30% increase in positive brand sentiment over the past year.

Growing Xbox Series X|S, leveraging Xbox Helix, Xbox Game Pass, and more handhelds?

Core, content, creation, and connection, are the "four C's" Asha Sharma described as leading Xbox forward. She said that Xbox's market position suggests it needs to invest more in Xbox console, despite the fact the segment overall isn't growing in the gaming industry — she says Xbox still has an opportunity to grow in the space. She also said Xbox doesn't have "the right" to grow beyond console if it can't serve their "most valuable players the right way."

Asha Sharma says strengthening Gen-9 (Xbox Series X|S) is key to this, calling out innovations like Xbox Cloud Gaming, Xbox's disc-to-digital program, and Xbox Play Anywhere growth. She also hinted that Xbox Game Pass will get more "flexible for more players" in the future, reiterating previous hints that users will be able to tailor exactly what types of content they want to access in the service.

Asha Sharma also called out Gen-10, Xbox Helix, describing it as a "family of devices."

"We are moving to a family of devices for Gen-10. There is not one device that fits all. We will certainly have a great console first, but we also know that many players will be on the go. There are some things that we are the best in the world to manufacture, and there are other things that will we partner on. So, we will be sharing more about that as our plans develop. The operating system is starting to look really good. We're very excited about this."

Asha Sharma also spoke about Xbox PC and Battle.net, talking about an intention to grow Battle.net as a platform. She said Battle.net is almost on-par with Steam for user retention, and the recent partnership to bring CD Projekt RED's games like Witcher 3 to Battle.net will grow further. "We will do it the right way for those communities," she said, hinting that Battle.net will remain a more curated store compared to the likes of Steam or Xbox PC.

On further opportunities, Asha Sharma also revealed that Xbox PC is, in fact, the number 1 PC gaming storefront in China (although, it has been suggested to me that this claim likely excludes China-based Steam users using a VPN — I'm exploring this comment a bit more.)

Update: I'm told Asha Sharma was referring to the Windows Store here, not necessarily the Xbox PC store, which while linked are indeed separate technically. For context, he Windows Store is installed by default on Windows 10 and 11 PCs, and contains many games that aren't available on Steam including Fortnite and Roblox.

Asha Sharma also stated that they'll continue to invest in other PC apps where there's a distinct audience, i.e. Steam in general.

Sharma also said that Xbox is "simplifying" the target and streamlining APIs for publishing on Xbox to make it easier for developers to ship on Xbox Series X|S, Xbox Helix, and Xbox PC — which has long been a sore point.

Xbox's strategy looks like the right one, for now

Xbox has seen tons of layoffs over the summer in a big effort to restructure more of the business away from the ballooning costs of Microsoft bureaucracy. To that end, it has shifted some Xbox studios under purpose-built subsidiary publishers like Activision and Bethesda, divested some, and shuttered others.

Microsoft has also doubled down on its core audience, Xbox console players, whose neglect became untenable at the start of the year as Microsoft seemed to focus on future-facing telemetry data at the cost of the current reality.

Indeed, I wrote two years ago that Xbox was neglecting its core at the cost of growth that might never materialize, and it seems that growth indeed never did materialize in the previous strategy.

There are positive shoots throughout Sharma's pitch to Xbox staff, but she still noted upon caution with regards to the state of the economy, the RAMpocalypse, and generalized disruption in the entertainment biz.

How are you feeling about Xbox's new strategy so far? Let us know in the comments.

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We've been hearing bits and pieces about the new Xbox Elite Controller (Series 3) for some time now, and this latest leak is the biggest one yet.

It initially leaked as part of the big Xbox documents drop during the Activision-Blizzard acquisition hearings, and then later via the Brazilian equivalent of the U.S. FTC. But wait, there's more!

During the summer, an early Xbox Elite Controller Series 3 unit leaked in full on social media, giving us full pictures of what to expect. Now, we might even have its full spec sheet.

Shared by the fine folks at /r/GamingLeaksAndRumours on reddit, it seems the Xbox Design Lab itself might've just giving us the best glimpse yet at what to expect in the new Xbox Elite Controller, and it sounds rather enticing.

Although the APIs were already taken down by the time I saw the listing, it seems reddit was able to scrape the providers of the Xbox Design Lab storefront and discovered a variety of information about what to expect.

The highlights includes "advanced haptics," PlayStation-style, as well as full Design Lab integration for customization. It also comes with options for silent sticks, swappable d-pads as is typical, an adjustable scroll wheel (confirming previous leaks), and full TMR anti-drift Hall Effect thumbsticks — which is great news for accurate movement and aiming.

Here's the Xbox Elite Controller Series 3 spec summary in full from the reddit post.

The post alleges that there were four SKUs listed. Two with, and two without the full haptics motors, split between base models and "complete" models that likely come with additional bells and whistles like charge docks, carry cases, and so on. Other features I've been hearing about include direct-to-WiFi connectivity to minimize Xbox Cloud Gaming latency, as well as easier device switching and management between Xbox, Bluetooth, and other sources.

I had heard that the Xbox Elite Controller Series 3 was imminent for a reveal. If this API leak is indeed true, its addition on the Xbox Design Lab suggests Microsoft may want it out in time for Christmas and the holiday shopping season.

Although, the leaks make no mention of price ... and that'll be the big kicker for many.

The new Xbox Elite Controller (Series 3) is doubtlessly imminent

I teased on the Xbox Two Podcast last week that I was expecting the Xbox Elite Series 3 out before Christmas, and this leak aligns with what I've been hearing.

I really enjoy the Xbox Elite Controller Series 2 for the convenience of having a permanently-charged controller. The battery life on the Series 2 is truly absurd, and the convenient and weighty charge dock beats all the other options I've seen on the market. Although ... the Series 2 is indeed notorious for quality issues. I've gone through at least two of them, maybe even more, with issues ranging from shoulder button failures to rubber grips falling off.

From speaking with sources about the Xbox Elite Controller, quality control and repairability has been a priority for the Xbox Elite Controller Series 3. It remains to be seen of course how it functions in practice. I'll be eager to get my hands on it and do a full review and teardown video so you guys know whether or not this is the one to buy.

I, for one, am pretty excited. Although there's no information yet on price, and the split between haptic and non-haptic versions makes me wonder just how pricy the haptic-based version will be if they're going as far to split them into separate SKUs. 🤔

Take this all with a pinch of salt for now, of course, but it probably won't be long until all of this is confirmed by Microsoft itself.

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Acclaimed gaming journalist Destin Legarie recently spoke with the developers of Gears of War: E-Day about behind-the-scenes development, story elements, audience expectations, and more.

During this conversation, Destin asked the developers how they felt about Gears of War: E-Day being an Xbox console exclusive title.

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The developers responded by saying that they were "proud" to be one of Xbox's pillar titles, "We feel great that they feel great because Gears is like part of Xbox's DNA. It's woven into it. And at The Coalition, we feel honored to have Gears and be the ones bringing that legacy forward."

The developers mentioned they know Xbox means so much to a lot of people and that they're proud to be one of Xbox's main console-exclusive titles, filling that role again with Gears of War: E-Day.

RELATED: Gears of War: E-Day review

Of course, this isn't full exclusivity, as the game is still available on Steam for PC, as has been tradition for Xbox for many years now. As of writing, Gears of War: E-Day has achieved its highest franchise concurrency figures on Steam at around 20,000 users in the early access period, and has become the top-selling Steam game in the United States ahead of its official October 6, 2026 launch. The game is also of course available on Xbox Game Pass and PC Game Pass, where I suspect many will be opting to play over an out-right purchase.

Will Xbox exclusivity pay off for Gears of War: E-Day?

Personally, while I prefer games being available on any platform (especially these days when people can't afford to buy every console at once), I can't deny the power exclusivity brings to a console and a game series' brand.

For example, I bought a Nintendo Switch many years ago just to play Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate, simply because I knew it wasn't going to be made available on any other console.

So I'm guessing at least some will have the same sentiment for Gears of War: E-Day, which will ultimately be beneficial for Xbox in the long run. Having exclusives will give Xbox its own unique identity and entice console players to play their games not found anywhere else (besides Windows PC, which is also a part of the Xbox ecosystem).

But this is all speculation on my end. Only time will tell if this console-exclusivity strategy pays off financially for Gears of War: E-Day when it leaves early access and launches for the general public on October 6, 2026, for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox Game Pass, PC Game Pass, and Windows PC (all with Xbox Play Anywhere support).

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One of my favorite things about the Xbox ecosystem has historically also been one of its most frustrating. Why? Primarily due to a "lack" of adoption.

Xbox Play Anywhere is by far and away my favorite thing about being an Xbox owner. As a heavy (figuratively and literally) Xbox gamer with hundreds upon hundreds of owned games, I'm always excited to see when one of my games supports Xbox Play Anywhere — a feature that allows me to take my game to Xbox Cloud Gaming or Windows PCs or gaming handhelds on the same license, with the same save file.

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However, in years past, adoption was pretty anemic. Xbox's first-party titles (mostly) came to the service, but third-party games generally turned their nose up at it. What's worse, the idea of older games getting support was almost unheard of. That changed in a big way in 2026.

Games both old and new are getting Xbox Play Anywhere support out of the blue

I will remember 2026 as the year Xbox Play Anywhere really saw a watershed moment.

Previously, it felt like AAA developers simply didn't care or want to work with Xbox Play Anywhere. I wrote an opinion piece complaining about Xbox Play Anywhere adoption back in January, but almost a year later, things have done an almost total 180.

Before, it felt like to expect Xbox Play Anywhere, Microsoft had to drop an Xbox Game Pass deal on the game in order to acquire the rights and convince the developers to play nice. But this year, we've seen a steady cadence of games both large and small hitting Xbox Play Anywhere without any form of Game Pass integration.

Yes, many AAA games still aren't arriving as part of Xbox Play Anywhere (notably ones from the "bigger" publishers like EA and Ubisoft), but it seems even they are coming around to the idea. A few weeks ago, Ubisoft began offering some of its games on Xbox PC "for free" if you own the Xbox console version, making them Xbox Play Anywhere in all but name. Now if we could just get Star Wars Zero Company too ... if you're listening, EA.

Other publishers have been sporadic. Capcom brought Onimusha: Way of the Sword to Xbox Play Anywhere, but not Resident Evil 9 or Pragmata, for example. Others have been fully on board, with Square-Enix pledging virtually every new release, including re-releases like the upcoming Kingdom Hearts remasters and Final Fantasy Resonance.

Indeed, one of the bigger issues with Xbox Play Anywhere revolves around gaps in the overall content line-up. It reminded me a bit of the Windows Phone app gap ... wherein developers didn't see enough users to justify the port, and users didn't see enough content to justify using the store. But somehow, Xbox seems to have overcome this issue with Xbox Play Anywhere.

Witcher 3 recently got retroactively updated with Xbox Play Anywhere support, for example. Today, Metro 2033 and Last Light were announced with HD refreshes, complete with Xbox Play Anywhere support. Baldur's Gate 3 too, also grabbed Xbox Play Anywhere support, with Larian remarking that it's just "a cool part of the ecosystem." Even some of the more obscure games like Tainted Grail: Fall of Avalon, a game I was secretly hoping would grab Xbox Play Anywhere, just randomly got certified today. I also had no idea other viral indie hits like TCG Card Shop Simulator were Xbox Play Anywhere until I checked what was available today.

What's going on here?!

There's been a huge, generalized sprint of solid Xbox Play Anywhere support recently. Blood of Dawnwalker, Control Resonant, Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy, Aliens Fireteam Elite 2, Beast of Reincarnation, Dispatch, 007: First Light, Subnautica 2, Vampire Crawlers, RuneScape: Dragonwilds, Replaced, Monster Hunter Stories 3, Deep Dish Dungeon, Clive Barker's Hellraiser Revival, Demeo x Dungeons & Dragons, and many more — have all hit the service in recent months, or will in the near future.

There are tons more as well, on top of first-party titles which are all but guaranteed to hit Xbox Play Anywhere by default. Crucially, all of the games play incredibly well natively on Xbox Ally X, optimized for handhelds out of the box in most cases.

Microsoft hasn't been shy about its intentions to improve the Xbox back-end systems to facilitate these kinds of features. But I'm curious what is driving this increased adoption of late ... could it be the Xbox Ally and Xbox Ally X effect? Is it simply a no-brainer if you're also moving copies via Xbox Cloud Gaming? Is the Xbox PC store seeing more rapid adoption than people think?

Whatever the cause is, as an Xbox Ally X gamer, I'm loving it.

Now if you don't mind, I'm going to rock up with some more Deep Dish Dungeon for a bit while the WoW: Forever servers are in maintenance ...

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Gears of War: E-Day has finally launched on Xbox Series X|S and PC via early access for players who pre-ordered the Premium Edition.

While the rest of the world waits for its public release on October 6, 2026, players can look up whether Gears of War: E-Day is up their alley by checking the mountain of critic reviews now available online.

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Sure enough, critics are absolutely adoring this epic prequel to the iconic Gears of War series, as it's scoring high ratings of 88 on Metacritic and 87 on OpenCritic.

Here's what some of the top reviews had to say about this new entry in Xbox's flagship shooter franchise.

Note that all these reviews only cover the single-player campaign, as the multiplayer modes were unavailable to test during the review period.

Gears of War: E-Day Reviews

• IGN (9/10): "E-Day pulls off the tightrope act of giving us a heartfelt prequel with strong characters even when we know how it ends. On a more mechanical level, it also evolves the enemies, weapons, and combat you’d expect to deliver a Gears of War campaign that stands toe-to-toe with any of the others."
• GameSpot (7/10): "For better or worse, E-Day is distinctly Gears, and I had a good time with it, even if the story is disappointing and the open areas are fairly dull. But that’s all it is: a good game, propped up by combat that hasn’t changed all that much over the past 20 years. That’s enough to skate by, but I wish Gears of War would dig deeper."
• VGC (4/5): "Gears of War E-Day's campaign offers balls-to-the-wall action and rarely lets up, but that means the story takes more of a back seat than I'd like. It's good that time is given to the backstories of new protagonists Mags and Lucas, but given that the game is literally the playable Marcus and Dom backstory fans have been waiting decades to see, more time could have been spent on their relationship. In terms of pure gunplay, however, very little beats it this year."
• GamingBolt (9/10): "It stumbles sometimes with its story, but thanks to new and improved movement mechanics, Gears of War: E-Day ends up delivering some of the tightest combat and one of the series’ most excellently paced campaigns in a long, long time."
• Voxel (90/100): "Gears of War: E-Day hits the mark by getting the basics right: embracing its identity as a Gears of War game and elevating the strengths inherent to the series. The game doesn't revolutionize the genre, but it delivers a fun gameplay experience featuring a cinematic narrative and local multiplayer support."

Gears of War: E-Day returns to the series' roots while having some odd, out-of-place open-world elements.

Overall, it seems the general sentiment around Gears of War: E-Day is that it doesn't try to reinvent the wheel, but returns to the series' roots with a solid, harrowing war story while refining the core gameplay loop that made Gears of War the household name it is today to great effect.

However, our own Jez Corden was more critical in his review-in-progress article on Gears of War: E-Day. While Jez praised the game's gorgeous visuals, stunning performance, and solid gunplay, he felt like let down by the game's poorly designed open-world-lite elements that break the game's pacing and uninteresting, damage-spongy boss fights.

The real make-or-break point for Gears of War: E-Day, to me, will be its PvP Versus Modes and its much-anticipated PvE Horde Siege mode, where you will be pitted against dozens of Locust enemies and boss monsters at once with 12 players.

If The Coalition can nail the gameplay of its multiplayer modes and its post-launch content, people will be sticking around for Gears of War: E-Day long after they beat the campaign. I know I'll be playing Gears of War: E-Day's Horde Siege mode over Grand Theft Auto 6 any day.

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Today's the day: Gears of War: E-Day, the most anticipated Xbox exclusive in years, has launched in early access for players who pre-ordered the Premium Edition of the game. Earlier, Jez Corden called it "gorgeous but undeniably messy" in our review-in-progress, looking forward to future content additions.

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Still, to celebrate this momentous occasion, Gears of War: E-Day's developers, The Coalition, have released an extensive blog post detailing their plans for updating the game's multiplayer content, balance changes, and more.

Here's what you can expect from Gears of War: E-Day's post-launch updates.

Gears of War: E-Day Season 1

First off, The Coalition states that Season 1 of Gears of War: E-Day's multiplayer content, titled Season 1: Emergence, will be running from today all the way up to December 1, 2026.

Season 1 will include all the game's launch maps, games, cosmetics, and three limited-time events called Halloween, 20 Years of Gears, and Thanksgibbing. Each event will last for two weeks and will feature a Versus Event mode, a Horde Siege Event mission, and exclusive, limited-time rewards.

Additionally, Season 1 will include:

• Ranked: Versus Ranked will officially launch one week after launch on October 13, giving players crucial time to get up-to-speed with all our maps, modes and sandbox before jumping into competitive.  
• Weekly Challenges: The weekly challenges Premium Edition owners receive on October 1 are the same challenges all players will receive at launch on October 6, weekly challenges will then refresh on October 13.
• Shop: Shop offers will rotate every Tuesday. Be sure to check every week for free featured gifts.
• Never Fight Alone Charity Bundle: 100% of net revenue of the Never Fight Alone Year 5 bundle, which includes an exclusive skin and weapon skin set, and the Never Fight Alone Legacy set, goes to our partner Crisis Text Line in our mission to prevent suicide.
• Promotional Items: Cosmetic items available exclusively through limited time partnerships will become available in the Barracks for Coins and Iron after the partnership exclusivity term lapses. 
• Gears of War: Reloaded Rewards: To celebrate the release of the original Gears of War 20 years ago, we’re offering exclusive rewards to commemorate players’ engagement with Gears of War: Reloaded. 
• Fire and Fenix Pose: Complete the “Prison Breakout” XBOX Achievement in Gears of War: Reloaded.
• Old Guard Medal & “Locked n’ Reloaded” Title: Complete the “Re-Up” XBOX Achievement in Gears of War: Reloaded.

Gears of War: E-Day Season 2 and beyond

Season 2: Legacy will begin at a later date after Season 1 and will feature content themed around the Gears of War franchise's 20th anniversary. The Coalition has also prepared a birthday gift for players to open on November 7, the day when the original Gears of War launched two decades ago.

Additionally, The Coalition has announced that Season 2 will include a Dead Serious Achievement. Any players who obtain it will be rewarded with exclusive cosmetics like a Medal, a Player Title, a Banner, an Emblem, an Icon, and a Legendary Character skin.

Lastly, Gears of War: E-Day has been confirmed to receive at least five post-launch seasons. The names of future seasons after Season 2 are:

• Season 3: Infiltration
• Season 4: Pendulum
• Season 5: Devotion

Gears of War: E-Day Multiplayer Balance changes

Moving on from seasonal content, The Coalition then lays out its plan for updating Gears of War: E-Day's gameplay based on feedback from the multiplayer betas.

Their first move is to change the Gnasher, Gears of War's iconic shotgun that is regarded as one of the best weapons to use in PvP and PvE content throughout the whole franchise.

The developers noticed that during Gears 2 to 5, firing the Gnasher from the hip has often resulted in some shots missing when they clearly should've hit the target. So, The Coalition has decided to finally fix that by introducing a new hybrid muzzle and camera-oriented shooting mechanic.

This means that when you fire the Gnasher, the game will check both the camera and muzzle shots and apply whichever angle is better suited for the shot, which should (hopefully) result in more accurate hits.

Next up, The Coalition states that iconic gameplay features from past Gears of War titles, like Meat Shields, Chainsaw Duels, select fan-favorite weapons, Private Lobbies, and Leaderboards, are being considered to be added to Gears of War: E-Day in post-launch updates or the next game.

Right now, the developers are focusing on making sure Gears of War: E-Day has the most stable launch experience possible.

Finally, The Coalition has laid out a series of patch notes for Gears of War: E-Day's early access launch, which include bug fixes, balance adjustments, Quality-of-life improvements, and more:

• Tuning:
  • Weapon Tuning: 
    • Adjusted Prototype Lancer damage to a value in-between Beta weekend 1 and 2
    • Reduced Lancer Mk1 damage
    • Reduced Vulcan damage
    • Increased Hammerburst damage 
    • Increased damage of the Gnasher while ADS at range
    • Improved Gnasher hipfire consistency
    • Reduced rate of fire for the Snub
    • Reduced the Gut-Puncher spare ammo amount
  • Movement & Cover Tuning: 
    • Improved strafe movement responsiveness
    • Adjustments to cover enter speed and distance of cover-enter cancel
    • Reduced Cover Slip speed
    • Reduced Slide distance
  • Horde Siege Tuning:
    • Adjustment of brightness and opacity of Energy icons
    • Adjusted the difficulty of Repair objectives 
    • Decreased the health threshold at which a Boomer, Flayer, or Grinder can be executed with a Prototype Lancer
    • Reduced Weapon Part Rewards for participation in invasions
    • Reduced Weapon Part Rewards for Weapon Part Stockpiles
    • Increased the difficulty of all Invasions
    • Increased the difficulty of Commander and Allfather difficulties
    • Adjusted the Medic’s stim duration
    • Increased equipment costs
    • Reduced the impact of some Squad Perks
    • Increased the Energy cost of Squad Perks
  • Versus Tuning: 
    • Reduced the wave respawn time
    • Reduced frequency of trading to feel more fair and consistent
    • Adjusted Scoring in Demolition 
    • Adjusted Scoring in Crucible
• Bug Fixes: 
  • Across PC, XBOX and handhelds, we made numerous improvements to stability, performance and optimization across applicable hardware configurations
  • On PC, we addressed a bug causing graphics settings to reset between launches
  • Made adjustments to prevent macro abuse of semi-automatic weapons
  • On PC, we addressed an issue causing missing VFX on explosions when set to Low quality settings
  • On “Legacy” control settings, fixed an issue causing an inconsistent Sprint release delay
  • On PC, fixed an issue causing additional input delay when playing on mouse and keyboard
  • On PC, fixed an issue causing mouse & keyboard lighting effects to not display properly
  • In Horde Siege, fixed an issue causing Tickers not to be properly flung when kicked
  • In Horde Siege, fixed an issue causing blast charges delivered during the Corpser Invasion Event to not register
  • Fixed an issue allowing players to shoot enemies not in front of their barrel when aiming down sights
  • Fixed an issue causing versus ranked or social players to get stuck at the “Waiting for Other Players” screen
  • Fixed an issue causing destructible assets to ‘stick’ to players
  • Fixed an issue where Marksman UAV visual effect might persist
  • Improved the reliability of starting objectives in Horde Siege
  • Improved the reliability of switching which squadmate you are spectating when cog tagged in Horde Siege
  • Fixed an issue where Tickers were immune to Gorehooks
  • Fixed an issue allowing more than four squad members in Versus
  • Fixed an issue where abandoned turrets could not be interacted with
  • Fixed visual issues with ranking up from Onyx 3
  • Fixed an issue where boss health bars and locators could scale incorrectly
  • Fixed multiple issues where specific enemies may not be able to path at certain objectives
  • Fixed multiple issues that would prevent objectives from completing in Horde Siege
  • Fixed multiple inconsistencies and interaction errors in the Horde Siege lobby and Barracks
  • Fixed multiple scoring inconsistencies and errors
  • Fixed multiple matchmaking errors and timeouts
  • Fixed an issue where Mortar strike vfx could appear without cause
  • Fixed an issue where TDM matches would end too early
• QoL & Feedback: 
  • On all platforms, we added an FOV slider 
  • On all platforms, we improved HDR calibration, made UI paper-white adjustment independent
  • On all platforms, we added the ability to disable Chromatic Aberration
  • On all platforms, we added the ability to disable Film Grain 
  • On PC, Max FPS can be set to 30, 60, 90, 120, 144, 240, or Unlimited 
  • On PC, setting Max FPS to “Unlimited” will not cap your framerate
  • On PC, multi frame generation is now optionally supported
  • On PC, we added a setting to allow players to enable or disable Lamp device support for mouse and keyboard lighting  
  • On XBOX, “The Lucky Ones Died on E-Day” achievement has been removed in order to support the upcoming Mythic Achievements feature. Players will still earn the “I AM A GEAR” Player Title upon completing all other achievements and the achievement remains on Steam
  • In multiplayer, adjusted Player XP to better align the rate of progression across Horde Siege and Versus
  • Made improvement to Backfill AI bot behavior 
• Advanced Shader Delivery (ASD): 
  • On PC, Advanced Shader Delivery (ASD) is a new feature that significantly reduces the time spent compiling shaders across different PC hardware configurations. It benefits Gears of War: E-Day and other supported games across the Xbox PC app
  • For launch, ASD will be supported on AMD hardware, with NVIDIA support coming later in October
  • Playing E-Day outside the Xbox PC app? You may still benefit from ASD if the Xbox PC app is installed on your Windows 11 PC, allowing the required shaders to be pre-installed
• LAUNCH KNOWN ISSUES:
  • Playing through the entire length of the game without reloading checkpoints or restarting may cause memory issues. Please reload a checkpoint if you get blocked at an encounter or objective
  • Performance Overlay in Benchmark mode does not include generated frames, and can report a lower than accurate FPS 
  • Game process may continue to run after closing, can be viewed and shut down from task manager 
  • New clients joining a lobby working through an existing save will receive all prior secondary objective and hardcase progress in the War Journal and all relevant Forge rewards 
  • On PC, offline play is unavailable until October 6

Are you ready for Gears of War: E-Day?

If you're a fan of Gears of War or third-person shooters, then you won't want to miss out on Gears of War: E-Day when it leaves early access and launches for the general public on October 6, 2026, for Xbox Series X|S and PC.

It's turning out to be one of the best games in the series just from the campaign alone, and judging from these long-term plans for its exciting multiplayer modes, Gears of War: E-Day is going to satiate your craving for video game violence for a long time.

Before heading off to buy a copy, I'd recommend upgrading your Xbox Series X's storage to fit Gears of War: E-Day, as the base game's 115GB install requirement is going to take a huge chunk out of it long before its post-launch updates arrive.

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As I write this, I just wrapped up my run-through of Gears of War: E-Day, start to finish. Although, I have yet to experience the full actual game.

For the review build, Gears of War: E-Day's new siege mode is disabled, as is versus multiplayer. It felt odd to me to score a game I haven't fully played yet; as such, this will be a review-in-progress pending the launch state of versus and siege mode, which I presume goes live with the game itself on October 6, 2026.

Gears of War: E-Day is something of an important game for Xbox. It carries the flag for Microsoft's return to exclusive Xbox Series X|S games, and likely has some oversized pressure upon it to deliver. We're not here to review that aspect of the product, though — only what is here sitting in front of me.

And my feelings are a bit mixed.

Gears of War: E-Day has some of the most stunning visuals I've ever seen committed to the medium, with absolutely immaculate lighting treatment, immense and meticulous city detailing, and gorgeous character work. The gunplay is also fantastic, smoothing off some of the series' rough edges with boosted mobility, without sacrificing the Gears feel.

But the overall gameplay structure does the overall game a pretty sizeable disservice in my view, preventing it from reaching its full potential.

Gears of War: E-Day review — Story, Art, and Tech

Gears of War: E-Day takes place over a decade before Gears of War 1, offering us a front-row seat to the brutal and genocidal opening to the Locust's attack on humanity.

The city of Kalona serves as ground zero for that invasion. Kalona is known as a city of science and technological progress, and was instrumental in developing the COG's weapons tech and industrial war economy during the civil war against the UIR. E-Day takes place six weeks after the UIR surrenders, and Dominic Santiago and Marcus Fenix are picking up the pieces and mourning lost friends and family.

The character work on offer in E-Day is absolutely top-shelf. The trauma of loss and the shock of the Locust invasion comes through incredibly well in every single aspect of the game's delivery. The cityscape is immaculately detailed, with interiors fully rendered with a lived-in feel, complemented by some of the best lighting I've ever seen in a video game. Well and truly, Gears of War: E-Day is at the absolute apex of Unreal Engine technological prowess, and the game deserves awards on that basis alone, most likely.

Rendering the city in so much detail really helps serve the story. Gears of War's more recent games take place in a ruined world, where the Locust have effectively already won and decimated humanity and most of its cities. For E-Day, The Coalition had to show a city that was still thriving and populated, and the horrors therein.

From the very first cutscene, The Coalition pulls no punches: this is a horror story, a war story, and a tale of survival and desperation. The COG army is decimated and blindsided, besieged by an unknown threat that they immediately underestimate as monsters without a plan, only to discover later just how smart and organized the Locust actually are.

Civilian NPCs litter the city, sometimes fleeing, sometimes in dismembered puddles on the ground. The reactions from the characters and their development throughout the game really help to elevate that sense of loss and fear — they're not the battle-hardened survivors of the original Gears trilogy. They're young, war-weary from fighting the UIR, and in some cases wholly traumatized already.

I don't want to give too much away about the story, but this very much felt like the first game in a new planned trilogy ... there were aspects of the delivery that suffered as a result. Some plot threads felt designed to be resolved in future games (or DLC?), leaving me wanting somewhat. But the fact that I am eager to learn more about this Emergence Day story arc is probably a plus. It would be far worse if I didn't care, and I find myself caring a lot about the new characters, their struggles, their past lives, and what will ultimately end up happening to them ... given that some clearly aren't present in future installments.

Gears of War: E-Day's setting, visuals, and story delivery represent its best aspects. The game's performance on Xbox Series X is top-tier, with slowdown only occurring during some particularly heavy sequences towards the end. I didn't experience a single crash, and it's great to see a modern game offer split-screen co-op in the modern age as an option.

The new characters are interesting and engaging, and finding out new layers of existing characters is also rewarding as a long-time fan. I think Gears of War: E-Day could've benefitted from leaning more into civilian-oriented side stories potentially ... but as I'm going to explain in the gameplay section, Gears of War: E-Day is let down a fair bit by its gameplay structure all up.

Gears of War: E-Day review — Campaign Gameplay

Let's get the good stuff out of the way first: this is still very much Gears of War. Everything you've loved previously about Gears is still here, and in most cases, elevated to the 11th degree.

E-Day boosts the player character's mobility by a huge amount. Sprint is now more instantaneous and on the left stick like a standard modern shooter. Cover is far more dynamic than it was previously, with the ability to take cover in lower spaces than before, making environments feel more varied and natural. You can now also climb and vault, allowing The Coalition to build on the game's verticality. Given that Kalona is a city-state with large buildings and urban environments, having these features serves the game incredibly well.

The gunplay is also very polished. Chainsaw-ing dudes in half is more rewarding than ever, with almost embarrassingly satisfying sound treatment and chunky gore physics. Watching a severed torso flip onto the floor never gets old.

There's a variety of new weapons which are also instant classics. The Locust have been scavenging the battlefields of the Pendulum wars, adapting old UIR guns with horrifyingly inhumane enhancements. As such, that satisfying M1 Garand "ping" returns from the UIR Markza, repurposed into the axe-hilted Locust Breechshot rifle, for example.

The gunplay lets itself down a bit when it comes to fighting some of the game's bigger enemies, though. Drones, wretches, and some of the earlier enemies are by far the most satisfying to fight, reacting to your bullets and even having destructible armor that makes combat feel more dynamic and modern. I'm not sure why The Coalition didn't extend this gameplay style to some of its bigger enemies, which is where I would argue it'd be far more crucial.

Indeed, in Act 1, Gears of War: E-Day starts so strongly, and I was sitting there wondering if this was going to end up being the best game Xbox ever shipped, but over time, that feeling began to unravel.

Reavers, Brumaks, and other larger enemies barely react at all to gunfire, making them feel like robots or bullet sponges — something Gears 4 was heavily criticized for. You end up just watching the enemy's health bar in some cases for at least some semblance of reactivity, instead of the visuals The Coalition's art team painstakingly worked towards. Towards the end of the game, these types of enemies become more common too, robbing the game of some of its dynamism.

Another irritating aspect of Gears of War: E-Day pertains to its open-but-not-actually-open world design, which to me smacks of rushed or changing game design priorities throughout development.

Kalona is a fully realized 3D city, with a huge variety of urban exterior and interior locations. It's a great canvas that The Coalition can build upon when designing future content, potentially both for Siege and Versus mode. The problem is, it doesn't lend itself particularly well to the campaign mode.

Gears of War: E-Day starts incredibly strongly, with a linear cinematic segment that really sets the tone for the game. Then, it opens up into this odd semi-open world structure that seemed interesting in previews, but in practice, it doesn't really reach further than the glimpses we got over the summer.

There's a map that offers the illusion of large explorable spaces, but in practice, all the segments are very linear. Even the side objectives take place in a structured way, undermining the need or desire to really explore. It felt like The Coalition tried to shoehorn in more reasons to explore by spreading weapon mods and collectibles around, but I just found this aspect of the game to be irritating and pace-breaking.

There's dozens upon dozens of weapon mods to find in the field, but half the time it'll be for weapons you don't really want to use. The game pings you with an annoying pop-up every few seconds saying "hardcase nearby," which just served as a distraction given that the reward was mostly just junk items. Even the collectibles were annoying to find, given that you had to jump through several menus then go manually searching for the item you just found from a huge list. There were more mods to find than there was gameplay canvas upon which to place them ... E-Day really would've benefitted from some kind of vendor system instead here, allowing you to buy mods at your leisure, rather than feeling forced into boring hide-and-seek gameplay every 3 minutes.

These might seem like minor gripes, but given that there's not much else "new" here on offer across the general Gears formula, they stand out a bit like a sore thumb.

It doesn't help that, as a result of the game's structure, you end up revisiting the same locations multiple times as part of the story, which felt anticlimactic and choring, particularly towards the end of the game.

The campaign does have some incredibly epic, cinematic, and deeply emotional moments — don't get me wrong. There are some fantastic sequences spread throughout the game, showcasing Emergence in all of its reptilian, subterranean horror. I just wish they'd doubled up on these moments instead of trying this odd "open" world experiment, which seems ill-conceived and poorly executed, with features that detract rather than elevate the overall experience.

Gears of War: E-Day review — Conclusion (so far)

I thoroughly enjoyed Gears of War: E-Day overall, and am already enjoying my second playthrough on a higher difficulty, but I would be lying if I said the game didn't have large issues — particularly given how easily avoided many of them could've been.

Kalona is an immaculate canvas ripe for telling epic stories. The new, horror-laden tone is absolutely the right direction for Gears of War: E-Day. The existential dread oozes throughout every character delivery, and the city design is among the best the medium has ever seen.

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The gameplay structure placed on top of it becomes the problem, that could've used a lot more iteration and forethought. It felt a bit like E-Day was originally intended to be some form of open-world, but at some point, they retreated, leaving it feeling disjointed. The "open world" exploration aspects are unrewarding and more often than not simply frustrating, and a lot more work could've gone into making boss-level enemies more dynamic and interesting to fight.

If I were to score the game based on the campaign alone, I'd probably give it an 8/10 overall — it's still incredibly fun, and the downsides are frustrating but not game-breaking. In any case, we haven't experienced the full package Gears of War: E-Day represents. We still have Siege and Versus to talk about, and it remains to be seen how fun or even functional those will be at launch. Stay tuned.

Gears of War: E-Day launches October 6, 2026, exclusively on Xbox Series X|S on console with Xbox Play Anywhere for PC, it's also coming to Steam and Xbox Game Pass.

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For many years, people have wondered what it would be like if World of Warcraft, one of the most iconic MMORPGs in history, became playable on both PC and home consoles, like its biggest rival, Final Fantasy XIV.

Recently, those pipe dreams may have the potential to come true if the latest rumors surrounding the upcoming World of Warcraft: Forever turn out to be true.

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On September 29, 2026, Reddit user 'Rychillie' discovered that on the website for Brazil's Ministry of Justice, it stated that World of Warcraft: Forever was being classified for use on Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, PC, and Mac.

However, another Redditor 'birizinho' in the comments did a quick check on the gov.br listing and discovered that these console classifications had been quickly taken down within a few hours.

Could WoW finally be coming to consoles?

Now, as with any rumor, this should be taken with a huge grain of salt. This is especially apparent considering this console classification list for World of Warcraft: Forever has the PlayStation 3 on it, a console that Sony is trying to kill off by closing down the PS3/PSVita PSN store and discontinuing future physical PlayStation games.

Plus, since World of Warcraft: Forever has only been confirmed for PC, it is 99% likely this was just a typing mistake on the Brazilian Ministry of Justice website's part.

However, there is a very unlikely chance that a console port of World of Warcraft: Forever could become real sometime in the far distant future, as this game features full Xbox controller support.

Personally, even if any version of World of Warcraft came to consoles, I'd stick with playing it on PC with my dedicated MMO mouse and keyboard combo, as that control scheme feels the most natural way for me to play MMORPGs.

I can't imagine how cumbersome it would be to target players and mobs during hardcore raid dungeons and boss fights, especially for healer classes.

But then again, if players are able to clear the hardest Raid content in Final Fantasy XIV (that being Ultimate Raids) using controllers, then I'm guessing the same could be possible for World of Warcraft players using controllers, provided they get enough practice and set up the right keybinds and macros.

Either way, we'll have to wait to see what the future holds after World of Warcraft: Forever releases on November 4, 2026, and if it can survive releasing in the same month as Grand Theft Auto 6.

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The last couple of Xbox events I've attended, including BlizzCon, I noticed I was getting the same question from industry figures and fans alike: is Microsoft gearing up to sell Xbox?

Microsoft's vast layoffs across the summer have hit Xbox in their thousands, with studios like Ninja Theory on the path to being closed, and others like Double Fine being divested completely. Microsoft has effectively shut down Halo Studios itself and handed off the franchise to Call of Duty showrunners instead, as Xbox aggressively seeks to restructure for its next decade.

A decade that might not arrive, that is, if these "sell off" rumors turned out to be true. Many analysts and industry figures have opined that the cuts are designed to make Xbox "leaner" and more attractive to a potential buyer. When you dig down into it, these commentaries don't make a lot of sense; why would Xbox keep smaller franchises like Age of Empires even at a reduced clip, or try to rebuild Halo at all if it was indeed looking to sell?

Regardless, even senior industry figures like Shawn Layden of PlayStation fame described Xbox as being in its "Dreamcast phase" recently, referring to the time Sega exited the hardware business. A lot of these comments tend to emerge from industry figures who seem particularly aggrieved by Xbox, though, regardless of actually being a customer or not.

Indeed, actual Xbox customers have been generally optimistic about the way Xbox has been heading. Nobody (sane) revels in layoffs, but purely mathematically speaking, it was unclear how some of Xbox's 'niche' kind of games like Keeper, Kiln, or Hellblade 2 were going to be self-sustainable for the studios that produced them. There's a lot of valid criticism to be levied at the leadership figures that allowed for projects that were quite obviously going to be unsustainable.

Sharma has promised deeper investment in the very-long-dormant Fallout franchise, promised to restructure and rebuild Halo, and continues to promise Xbox Helix, the long-awaited next-gen console. Sharma has declared intent to invest in Xbox's biggest brands, leveraging TV shows, movies, and other transmedia opportunities to find new users. Despite this, there still runs the idea that Xbox could end up being divested from Microsoft itself, owing to a report from The Information earlier in the summer that Microsoft was exploring the idea.

The NYT interviewed (paywall) Sharma recently covering the Xbox layoffs generally. The outlet said that Asha "did not stall" in declaring Xbox not-for-sale.

"Xbox is not for sale. [...] We will do whatever it takes to set the company up for success, and we will look at the right partnerships, the right operating model and everything needed to achieve that. [...] We’ve got a long way to go with Microsoft and we’re going to take the long-term view."

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is to blame for the lack of faith in the Xbox business from mainstream figures

The NYT quite patronizingly called the comment a "bob and weave" seemingly unwilling to let go of the idea of divestiture. It's great shareholder bait; Xbox has long been an aspirational type of product, and it has been a loss leader in some regards. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has remarked in the past about how, despite the fact Xbox isn't a huge profit generator, fandom of the brand has led to lucrative deals for Azure on the business side of things. Yet, shareholders would love nothing more than for Microsoft to quit the difficult and risky game industry to dive all-in on AI psychosis products instead.

Indeed, under Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, the company has seen a near total retreat from consumers in general. Surface is on its death bed, Windows Phone was killed off, all consumer hardware products were effectively shelved. Microsoft's retail stores were closed, customer support is anaemic to non-existent, and Windows itself has seen huge declines in popularity and trust. Even Microsoft Copilot has undergone a work-focused update, ditching their (admittedly terrible) consumer-oriented features.

Nadella is absolutely not consumer-savvy in general. Nadella's Microsoft strategy paints the Xbox business as a sore thumb on a very boring, cold, sad, and business-oriented IBM-style Microsoft — a Microsoft chasing cultural irrelevancy.

RELATED: To save Xbox, Asha Sharma needs to defeat Microsoft itself

It's no wonder that mainstream media can't understand why Xbox could exist in this current incarnation of Microsoft, and it's through no fault of previous Xbox leaders, Asha Sharma or Xbox in general.

The one saving grace here is that Nadella has, for some reason, continued to allow Xbox to exist — likely against the wishes of shareholders and his generalized anti-consumer and anti-customer instincts. Nadella claimed in an internal meeting that Microsoft will "always" be in gaming, and will take a "long view" on its future. But it's really, really easy to understand why the trust isn't there. We wouldn't even have this commentary from Nadella if I hadn't literally leaked the meeting's audio myself.

The NYT noted that Nadella declined to participate in the interview. He really should have participated in my opinion, because this generalized lack of faith comes from his strategies and public-facing comments.

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ORIGINAL ARTICLE:

Microsoft's moves over Xbox Cloud Gaming in recent months have painted a picture of a company that isn't entirely sure of its long-term viability.

At one point, it seemed like Microsoft was all-in with Xbox Cloud Gaming, building up marketing campaigns like "This is an Xbox" that actively told consumers that Xbox consoles were stupid, and that in fact, devices like the Samsung Smart Fridge was a far better option for gaming instead. The landscape looks very different in 2026.

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Thanks to the RAMpocalypse and the apparent "demand" for data center space for AI tokens, it seems Microsoft has soured on cloud gaming in general as a viable option.

Microsoft has an Xbox Cloud Gaming controller in production according to leaks, and the next-gen Xbox controllers were also supposed to have direct-to-WiFi support to reduce latency. Microsoft has also put thousands upon thousands of games onto Xbox Cloud Gaming, allowing you to stream them to a variety of devices like phones, tablets, low-power PCs, and even smart TVs.

At the same time, Microsoft has also opted to limit Xbox Cloud Gaming to 15-hours a month at the highest tier, down from unlimited, with piecemeal hourly passes to be sold separately. And today, Microsoft announced quietly to some users that Xbox Cloud Gaming will vanish entirely from some devices.

In an email sent to myself earlier today, Microsoft says its first batch of third-party supported devices, 2020 Samsung Smart TVs, will lose access to Xbox Cloud Gaming from November 3rd.

Microsoft claims that its due to a compatibility issue, but I don't see how that's really possible given that it's literally a web app and a video feed. It would be like Netflix or Prime TV retiring on those Samsung smart televisions, which is obviously not going to happen any time soon.

Color me cynical as a 2020 Samsung TV owner, but it's hard not to wonder if it is in fact these devices that see the highest use out of all the third-party screens attaching to Xbox Cloud Gaming. Perhaps Microsoft has discovered a way to quickly and easily save bandwidth by screwing over thousands of existing users in the name of "compatibility," given that Xbox Cloud Gaming is reportedly simply unable to make money in the current business model.

RELATED: Xbox Cloud Gaming grabs hourly limits from November 3

For a while, the conspiracy theory was that Microsoft and other companies wanted to shift us all over to cloud gaming services to deprive us of any form of ownership. But ironically, it seems that providing these services in the RAMpocalypse era is too for Microsoft and NVIDIA to even run. Both Xbox Cloud Gaming and NVIDIA GeForce Now have pretty stringent restrictions upon them, and both platforms are exploring ads as a way to try and boost revenue.

First it was upgrade your console, now it's upgrade your TV? Maybe it's just going to end up being smarter to unsubscribe to Xbox Game Pass instead ...

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For a month, players in the Xbox Insiders program (including our own Jez Corden) got an early look at Xbox's intriguing new Xbox Disc-to-Digital feature. This program lets players gain digital entitlement rights to Xbox Series X|S and Xbox One games if they own their physical disc copies.

Now the general public will get to test this feature for themselves, as yesterday, September 29, 2026, Microsoft rolled out the Xbox Disc-to-Digital feature for all players to use on Xbox Series X|S.

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For those who need a refresher, the Xbox Disc-to-Digital program takes an Xbox Series X|S or Xbox One disc and creates a digital license for it as if it were bought on the digital Xbox Storefront.

Once the digital license is made, you can install and play a game without needing the disc inside the Xbox Series X|S.

What's more, the digital license will allow you to play the game on any platform within the Xbox ecosystem, stream it via Xbox Cloud Gaming, or even play it on compatible handhelds like the Xbox Ally with Xbox Play Anywhere support.

Do note that if you sell an Xbox game disc or lend it to someone else, they will claim the digital license for that game after installing it. Your digital rights for that game will be revoked until you get the disc back or re-buy it.

Also, not every Xbox game is eligible for this Xbox Disc-To-Digital program. However, Microsoft has stated on its website that this may change over time due to "technical, licensing, publishing, manufacturing, and other factors."

Will Xbox's Disc-to-Digital improve game preservation?

I'm not going to lie, my faith in digital media has taken multiple stabs to the heart this year, with Sony discontinuing physical PlayStation games, then deleting hundreds of movies from people's accounts, along with Microsoft blocking people's game libraries if their accounts got hacked, and Xbox suffering an outage so bad it stopped physical Xbox games from working.

With that said, I see some potential within this Xbox Disc-to-Digital feature when it comes to helping improve digital game preservation and ownership.

For example, games that have been delisted years ago from the Xbox Digital Store, like Deadpool, Transformers: Devastation, and Minecraft: Story Mode, have become playable digitally again thanks to this program, so long as you have their physical disc copies.

Plus, recently, Sega is adding its games to the Xbox Disc-to-Digital program, following Ubisoft's support for it. With this combined with Xbox's library, the XCT.live Community Disc-to-Digital Database website has confirmed that 1,578 Xbox games are fully compatible with Xbox Disc-to-Digital.

Personally, if this program means I can play Transformers: War for Cybertron and Transformers: Fall of Cybertron (two of my most requested Xbox backwards-compatible titles) again on modern Xbox consoles, then I hope this Xbox Disc-to-Digital ends up being successful and that Microsoft will support it for years to come, and possibly carry it over to whatever Project Helix ends up being.

But what do you think of the Xbox Disc-to-Digital program? Do you think it will help improve digital game preservation and ownership? Are there any Xbox games you want to see added to this program?

If you have any thoughts on the matter, let us know on our Reddit page, in the comments section, or in the poll.

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After decades of requests, Microsoft has finally announced (via Xbox Wire) that Mythic Achievements are rolling out for Xbox consoles and Windows PC.

It's currently available to Xbox Insiders and will be released to the general public at a later date.

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For those unaware, Mythic Achievements are a new special kind of Xbox Achievement rewarded to players who manage to obtain every single regular Xbox Achievement in an Xbox game.

It's worth noting that Achievements added through an Xbox game's paid DLC or free updates aren't required for the Mythic Achievement, only the base game's achievements. Once you gain a Mythic Achievement, it's yours to keep forever.

What's cool is that these Mythic Achievements don't just apply to current Xbox Series X|S titles; they apply to all eligible Xbox games from multiple console generations, including the Xbox 360.

To help players keep track of Mythic Achievements, a new Gaming Tab has been added to their Xbox profile.

Within it, Xbox players can see their Achievements, track Gamerscore milestone badge progress, revisit past games they've completed, and visit their friends' Gaming tabs to compare their Mythic Achievement collections.

Additionally, a new progress bar has been added to each game's Achievement list to show how close a player is to obtaining a Mythic Achievement, with an option to focus on Achievements required to obtain it.

Get out there and grab those Xbox Mythic Achievements

Now, while I've personally never been interested in Xbox Achievement hunting, I know plenty of my friends have wanted Xbox Mythic Achievements ever since the late 2000s.

It's a great way to challenge Xbox completionists, show how much they love particular Xbox games, and provide bragging rights for players to impress their friends online.

But what do you think? Are you happy Xbox Mythic Achievements are finally happening? Are there any Xbox games you've 100% completed in the past that have now retroactively granted you Mythic Status?

If you have any thoughts on the matter, let us know on our Reddit page, in the comments section, or in the poll.

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Most game developers have adjusted their release schedules, moved launch dates, or cleared entire launch windows just to avoid being anywhere near the new Grand Theft Auto release. But Coffee Stain North isn't most developers.

While everyone else has seemingly run for cover Goat Simulator 3 knows who the real GOATS of gaming are and they have announced today that the third major expansion for Goat Simulator 3, titled Ticket to Dizzyworld, is set to launch on November 19, 2026.

Yes, that's the exact same day Rockstar Games is set to launch Grand Theft Auto 6. And Coffee Stain couldn't care less; in fact, they have turned it into a marketing tactic all in itself.

"We launched Baadlands on November 19th last year, and we are releasing Dizzyworld on the same date this year. And we dare anyone to put a game out on the same day. You’ve been warned!"

— Santiago Ferrero, Creative Director at Coffee Stain North

Move over Lucia and Jason: Pilgor the Goat is back and bringing the carnival.

Welcome to Dizzyworld: Rollercoasters, river rapids and bumper cars

Following up on last year's post-apocalyptic Baadlands: Furry Road expansion, Ticket to Dizzyworld swaps the rusty sand-pocalypse for an unregulated theme-park sandbox playground.

The expansion drops players into a massive new map filled with amusement rides, carnival games, and new opportunities to torment unsuspecting NPCs. Some of the standout features coming in the DLC include:

• Custom rollercoaster construction: Create your own physics-defying, health-and-safety-violating rollercoasters for the ultimate theme park experiment.
• First-Goat perspective: Experience rollercoasters, river rapids, and bumper cars directly through Pilgor's eyes.
• New Goat Gears & collectibles: Packed with new physics-warping carnival gear to cause maximum havoc, alongside collectible Dizzy Tokens scattered across the park to redeem for rewards.

The real kid-friendly GTA

Now there's a genuine irony to this showdown of the titans: while my partner queues up his GTA 6 download, my son will be fighting for the TV screen because he wants to play this DLC as soon as he finishes school. He absolutely loves sandbox games, and Goat Simulator 3 is one of his favourites. He's logged hundreds of hours in the game on multiple platforms at this point.

In many ways, Goat Simulator is like Grand Theft Auto with more Goats and less gun crime, and watching Pilgor ride a bumper car in first-person view will beat a Vice City car chase in this house, hands down.

When and where can I get my hands on Goat Simulator 3: Dizzyworld?

Goat Simulator 3: Dizzyworld launches on November 19, 2026 for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, PS5, PS4 and PC (Steam, Epic Games Store, Microsoft Store) and Coffee Stain North has also announced that there are future plans to bring the game to Nintendo Switch 2.

Will Pilgor dethrone GTA 6? Probably not, but in this house it certainly will and I commend the nerve.

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Given the absolutely astronomical hype of GTA 6, the headline here might read as crazy. Madness, INSANITY! ... But it's only crazy if you're living within a particularly specific social media bubble, in my humble opinion.

Last week, buddy o' mine Tom Warren made waves by mentioning nerves at Xbox HQ over the potential sales viability of Grand Theft Auto 6 on Xbox Series X|S. It led to Xbox CSO Matthew Ball coming in to deny the rumors, stating that GTA 6 is "creating records" for Xbox preorders.

Even if that's true, GTA 6 presents something of a headache for Xbox. Thanks to an astronomical marketing deal with PlayStation, Xbox isn't even allowed to formally mention the existence of GTA 6 on its Xbox Series X|S consoles. All of the GTA 6 marketing is flowing directly towards PlayStation 5, and there's no guarantee GTA 6 Online will feature cross-play either, much like its predecessor.

Whether it's the PlayStation's marketing deal or the simple lack of available Xbox Series X|S stock to sell through (due to the RAMpocalypse), GTA 6 is shaping up to be something of a missed opportunity for Xbox this autumn.

... But does it even matter?

Perhaps out of nowhere, an unexpected savior has emerged. A savior from our past ... a video game that may well and truly last forever.

World of Warcraft: Forever can beat GTA 6

The hype around GTA 6 has seen publishers desperately swerve to avoid the Vice City-shaped train about to plow through the games industry. I've been inundated with games to review between September and October, and there's simply no time at all to realistically play through all of them. Blood of Dawnwalker, Control Resonant, Gears: E-Day, Star Wars: Zero Company, Valor Mortis, Sinking City 2, Onimusha, Minecraft Dungeons 2 ... dozens of great indie games, and even more AA and AAA titles ... all swerving to avoid GTA 6.

Yet, there are two games from Xbox that are launching close to or even on top of GTA 6, in the form of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4, and perhaps more importantly, World of Warcraft: Forever.

MW4 hype does seem muted this year, likely in part because of GTA 6 and maybe generalized franchise fatigue, but the same absolutely cannot be said for WoW: Forever. Even as an unashamed WoW fanboy, I've been utterly stunned by the popularity of the beta, which generally requires a purchase to even access. It doesn't come out until November, yet it seems to be breaking franchise records already for Blizzard, and by extension, Xbox.

Blizzard devs have said they haven't seen the game this busy in 17 years, and my own sources within Blizzard have echoed similar. Perhaps crucially, I've been told that WoW: Forever is not cannibalizing WoW: Retail either. These are all new or long-dormant returning players, buoyed by hype from massively influential streamers like Asmongold. The servers are struggling under the load, as players new and long-dormant return in their hundreds of thousands to march upon Azeroth once again.

WoW: Forever is basically a remaster/remix of the OG WoW from 23 years ago ... and it's going to take on GTA 6 in the same launch window, which isn't yet on PC. WoW: Forever will have a near-blank runway on PC as a result of multi-platform games swerving to avoid Grand Theft Auto 6.

For Xbox's quarterly projections, it couldn't have come at a better time from a corporate perspective. Asha Sharma has promised shareholders that Xbox will return to growth this year, and that was without factoring in their thoroughly unexpected projections for WoW: Forever.

Xbox is far, far bigger now than people seem to realize

Indeed, if you're in the Xbox discourse bubble, it's potentially easy to forget that World of Warcraft: Forever will feed that bottom line. Minecraft also announced a new dimension in "The Sift," coming to the game in 2027. I can see from Windows Central's traffic that this is also going to be a huge deal for the game, but also Xbox as a business unit.

So, even if GTA 6 was a flop on Xbox (and there's no evidence to suggest it would be, really), Xbox has a variety of backup plans on the docket. Some intentional, some not-so-intentional.

This is the thing about modern Xbox. A lot of the commentary tends to focus on console — it ignores mobile, it ignores PC service games like WoWF, and other revenue streams Xbox is setting up with TV and movie licensing. There's even the Minecraft theme park coming to the UK, which will be a test bed for broader expansion across the world in the coming years. Could we eventually see "Blizzard World" set up shop next door to Minecraft World? I mean, it's not entirely outside of the realm of possibility. There's even been internal chatter about an "XboxCon" in a similar vein to BlizzCon in the future ...

Yes, GTA 6 is important for Xbox ... but there's also a component crisis. PS5 and Xbox Series X|S are not overstocked. They're selling every box they can muster even without GTA 6. Perhaps if the RAMpocalypse wasn't ongoing, GTA 6 would be more crucial than it otherwise is. But Xbox is stronger than ever off Xbox Series X|S hardware right now.

Xbox CSO Matthew Ball said GTA 6 is breaking records for Xbox regardless, but even if that wasn't true ... the Xbox operation is so, so much bigger, and has so, so much more potential beyond the traditional box these days. This is before Xbox has even announced the console versions of World of Warcraft: Forever, which you just know are undoubtedly on the way. World of Warcraft has never been on console. WoW:F as a timed console exclusive would drive more sales to Xbox Series X|S than GTA 6 with PlayStation marketing ever could, in my humble opinion.

But I digress. The point is simple. GTA 6 is only the cherry on top for the modern Xbox business; it's not the entire cake.

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Xbox’s disc-to-digital feature has been in testing for insiders for about a month now, and the momentum is picking up. Ubisoft joined the program not long ago, and SEGA has now seemingly followed suit.

Beyond the new publisher participation, there have been some tweaks to how the feature actually works. So, let’s go over what’s changed.

If you’ve been living under a rock and aren’t sure what this fabled feature is, I’ll quickly explain. Disc-to-digital allows you to insert participating discs into your Xbox One or Series X console to obtain a digital license. Once you have that license, you can keep playing the game without the disc even being inserted. It also unlocks access to the game on other platforms if it’s a Play Anywhere title, as well as through cloud gaming.

With that out of the way, how exactly is the experience changing? The digital entitlement is now granted automatically when you insert a disc, rather than requiring a manual step from the menu. Additionally, the service will only provide a full-screen explanation on your first digital entitlement. For any subsequent games, you’ll just see a simple toast notification.

Perhaps the biggest update, however, is that fans have started noticing select SEGA games allowing digital entitlement. Titles like Persona 5 Royal are already in. If all SEGA games work out similarly, that would add another 44 games to the program.

For those keeping count, or if you follow @XCTdotLIVE on X (formerly Twitter), that brings the current disc-to-digital count to 1,585 games, with 205 games currently not in the service. Considering the feature is still in testing, I’m personally expecting that figure to grow, especially as more publishers get on board.

Currently, publishers who aren’t participating include Bandai Namco and Square Enix. While I can’t speak much for Bandai Namco, I do presume that, given Square’s fondness for Xbox as of late, we’ll at the very least see them get on board at some stage.

Xbox’s disc-to-digital feature continues to impress. At least, I’m impressed anyway; in fact, it even got me buying physical games again. It’s a bit of a shame to think we could have had such a forward-thinking feature as far back as the Xbox One, but I digress.

Let me know your thoughts on disc-to-digital, what games you want to see enter the service that haven’t already, and anything else that comes to mind in the comments.

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Get ready, players, because Gears of War: E-Day is nearly here, and it’s shaping up to be one of the best games in the Gears of War franchise and the biggest gaming blockbuster of the year, second only to Grand Theft Auto VI.

However, there is one caveat Xbox players must be aware of before buying it on October 6 (or October 1, if they've secured early access via pre-ordering the game), and that is its required install space of 115GB (as confirmed on its Steam page).

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That’s about one-tenth of a standard Xbox Series X’s 1TB storage space, and that’s just for the base game alone without any DLC. Plus, the developers plan (confirmed by GameSpot) to update Gears of War: E-Day’s Horde Mode with new classes, missions, modifiers, and seasonal content, along with adding other in-game items like gun cosmetics and character skins, so that 115GB install requirement is going to bloat fast.

So, we have sought out the best Xbox Series X|S storage expansion devices, from external SSDs to plug-and-play SSD cards, to help you fit in Gears of War: E-Day while having tons to spare for its post-launch updates and other awesome Xbox Series X|S titles for your Xbox.

External hard drives

Now, granted, finding Xbox external storage upgrades is a lot harder these days thanks to the ongoing RAM crisis, jacking up the prices of all things tech-related while making their availability scarcer.

One of the more affordable and available options is external hard drives, which can offer tons of storage space ranging from 512GB, 1TB, 2TB, and even 4TB. In addition, they can be formatted to store all kinds of media, not just Xbox games, depending on what platform you intend to use it for.

The drawback is that you can’t play Xbox games directly from an external hard drive, you have to manually transfer them from the hard drive onto your Xbox’s internal hard drive if you wish to play them.

Plug & Play expansion cards

Plug & Play expansion cards are scarcer and more expensive, but more convenient Xbox storage expansion units compared to external hard drives.

They fit easily into an Xbox’s dedicated expansion card slot, so they don’t take up desk space, and they let players play games installed on the cards directly without needing to shuffle them into the Xbox’s internal SSD, saving you from tedious file management.

However, you can’t reformat these Plug & Play Xbox expansion cards for other devices, as they were purely designed for Xbox consoles.

Are you ready for Gears of War: E-Day?

And there you have all the best options to upgrade your Xbox’s Storage size in time for Gears of War: E-Day. Are you looking forward to playing Gears of War: E-Day? Will you be sticking around to play its Horde Siege mode months after launch to see its post-game updates?

If you have any thoughts on the matter, please send them to the comments section below, or our Discord, Reddit, or cast a vote in the poll above.

Gears of War: E-Day is scheduled to launch on Xbox Series X|S (with Xbox Play Anywhere support), Xbox Game Pass, and PC via Windows and Steam on October 1, 2026, for early-access players who pre-ordered the game, and then October 6, 2026, for everyone else.

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I’m sure it needs no recap at this point, but Halo Studios is no more. Well, mostly no more, as the studio has reportedly been left with just 20 or so employees, while Activision has now taken on the mantle of responsibility for Halo.

Regardless of your thoughts on the matter, @Mr_Rebs_, a prominent leaker within the Halo community, has spoken out about what he alleges Halo Studios had planned for the franchise’s future. Despite my grievances with Halo Studios and its poor management of the franchise, one of these plans actually doesn’t sound too bad.

However, given the letdown of Campaign Evolved, I personally have very little faith that Halo Studios could have seen these ideas through. So, without further ado, let’s dive into it.

According to Rebs, Halo Studios was reportedly working on Halo 2 and Halo 3 remakes, as well as Halo 7. However, these projects were apparently still years away.

More interesting to me, though, is the fourth project: a standalone spin-off campaign based on Halo: First Strike, a genuinely great novel by Eric Nylund.

First Strike, for those unaware, fills in the gaps between Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 2, which genuinely would have been great to see adapted into a game. Apparently, the project was targeting a release next year, although development was still in its early stages.

Given the state Campaign Evolved was in, I really doubt we would have seen it within that timeframe, especially considering the reported plans to include around five campaign missions alongside a Firefight mode.

The Halo 2 and Halo 3 remakes, though, were almost a given and something we’ve reported on before, with Halo 2 even being teased at the end of Campaign Evolved.

Halo 7 was actually in the conceptual stages, with a concept for the game apparently presented to Matt Booty and other Xbox executives shortly before the recent changes at Halo Studios. According to Rebs, the plan was for Halo 7 to launch with Campaign, PvP, PvE, and Forge from day one.

Of the remaining staff at Halo Studios, Pierre Hintze (Studio Head) does remain, a figure of controversy within the community and according to Rebs, Pierre still has a plan, Rebs states:

If this is the case, I do hope Pierre is unsuccessful in these endeavors; the last thing Halo needs right now is AI slop.

As for the future, there are still a lot of unknowns, and I imagine it will be that way for a while; however, one rumor floating around suggests a reboot of sorts might be on the cards now that the IP is under Activision.

I’m personally happy with the changes being made to Halo. While I do have my reservations regarding Activision, there’s no doubt it has the infrastructure to support an IP as big as Halo.

And while my long-dreamed-of wish to see Halo’s books adapted into games is probably dead for the foreseeable future, I’d still much prefer a future where Halo Studios is no longer making Halo. Because yes, things really were that bad.

If you feel differently about everything, do let me know in the comments. I’ll be sure to respond, and as always, don’t forget to take part in our poll!

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Is it likely? Probably not, but as a Killer Instinct fan, one can hope.

Despite backlash to some aspects of the console, the Xbox One had arguably one of the strongest launch line-ups in the platform's history, with titles like RYSE and Titanfall from first-party, and games like Battlefield 4 and Assassin's Creed: Black Flag from third. For me, the best launch title was Killer Instinct, however, which revived Rare's classic fighting game for a new era.

Killer Instinct is a combo-heavy fighting game that is easy to play, and difficult to master. Breaking enemy combos with a satisying "C-C-C-C-COMBO BREAKER" announcer effect elevated the game to its legendary status, atop its violence and creative character line-up.

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PlayStation cornered the fighting game audience pretty hard in the years to follow, landing exclusivity for Street Fighter for a time, alongside other major fighting games.

Killer Instinct struggled to maintain pace, and ultimately fell into maintenance mode not long after, although it had strong post-launch support bringing in fan-favorite fighters alongside various new ones. It even picked up combatants from other Xbox franchises, such as RAAM from Gears of War and the Arbiter from Halo.

Aside from the occasional update and balance change, Killer Instinct has remained largely dormant over the last few years. There is a small team at Xbox who works on maintaining the game, but the player base is miniscule, likely in the dozens rather than hundreds going from Steam stats.

Could it be revived, though? Mortal Kombat creator Ed Boon has once again polled users on the state of the fighting game industry, and it's not the first time Boon has spoken about interest in picking up Killer Instinct.

He asked users to vote on which recent fighting game should grab a second chance, including Riot's ill-fated 2XKO, Rumbleverse, Warner Bros' cancelled Smash-clone MultiVersus, and Xbox's dormant Killer Instinct.

As of writing, Killer Instinct leads by a sizeable margin with over 50% of the vote.

Microsoft's gaming portfolio is currently undergoing a lot of upheaval, with Obsidian moved to Bethesda to work on Fallout, and Halo Studios practically shuttered, with the franchise handed off to Call of Duty producers at Activision.

There's probably not a ton of bandwidth at Microsoft right now to explore what a new Killer Instinct might look like ... but what if Warner Bros' studio NetherRealm and Ed Boon's Mortal Kombat team picked up the flag?

Killer Instinct always had huge potential in my view, it was always my personal preferred fighting game. There are major influencers who often advocate for its revival, like Maximilian_Dood.

As a Spinal enjoyer, I still had a ton of fun playing it despite how invariably poor I was at PvP. It would be intriguing to see a Mortal Kombat-style cinematic take on Killer Instinct's lore and universe — which is undeniably intriguing. It's unclear whether or not Warner Bros. would have appetite for involvement here too, given its attempts to turn Mortal Kombat into a viable movie franchise.

There's probably a universe where Killer Instinct could be revived as a high-quality fighting game, with a cinematic single player experience, with franchising potential into TV and movies. You could draft characters from Blizzard games, or Fallout, and beyond too ... alas, it's probably unlikely.

Still, it's fun to dream, no? What IF?

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Rumors about Xbox's deal with Hideo Kojima's upcoming "Action Espionage" title have been swirling recently.

Xbox is undergoing "restructuring" over the past few weeks, leading to thousands of layoffs and staff reductions in the form of divestitures. Microsoft's new gaming CEO Asha Sharma has made no secret of the intent to focus on big-name franchises like Fallout and The Elder Scrolls, and less time on smaller projects like those produced by Double Fine or Compulsion — both of whom are now fully independent teams. Existing studios like Obsidian have been moved to be closer to the Fallout franchise for example, and Halo Studios itself was recently shuttered (in essence) with the franchise handed off to Call of Duty publisher Activision.

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There have been some questions about the timing of Xbox's announcement in partnership with Hideo Kojima's "PHYSINT," as a result. With some (erroneously) speculating that the closures have been designed to fund Kojima's long-awaited return to the espionage genre. Metal Gear Solid is arguably among the top 5 (or maybe even top 3) most legendary franchises of all time. To get the spiritual successor to that on Xbox is a pretty huge coup, considering it was originally announced by PlayStation.

But uh, is this project going to cost almost half a billion dollars? And did it lay off thousands in order to do it? The answer is "no," trusted and verified sources tell me.

Speaking on his podcast, Chris Dring of The Game Business reported that Xbox's budget for PHYSINT is at $400 million. He has since walked back the claim after Bloomberg's Jason Schreier poured cold water on the figure.

I was told similarly by first-hand sources with direct knowledge of the contracts that the figure for PHYSINT is far lower than what is being reported here. It has been suggested to me that the "$400 million" figure is potentially what Sony and PlayStation might've been on the hook for until they cancelled the deal. Xbox and Kojima are building towards their Xbox projects on a "fraction" of this reported figure.

I'm told Xbox negotiated a deal with Kojima Productions that includes both movie and TV licenses for PHYSINT, and it also included enhanced terms for OD — Kojima's anticipated atmospheric horror game for Xbox.

We're seeing a more thrifty Xbox, and a more thrifty AAA industry in general

There has been a lot of discussion about budgets in recent years. Some estimates suggest Grand Theft Auto 6 has had a budget upwards of a billion dollars, for example. Developers from the likes of Saber Interactive, Remedy, and Bloober Team have all commented on building AAA-grade experiences on budgets in the tens of millions, rather than hundreds of millions.

Game development in the United States has become incredibly expensive. I'm told part of this revolves around salary competition for AI-adjacent software engineering disciplines, that often share cross-over hiring processes and salary scales with gaming companies. The closer you are to an AI development hub (like Microsoft HQ in Redmond, WA), the greater the competition for salaries becomes ... making game development potentially unviable from a purely fiscal perspective in some regions.

Microsoft has been exploring outsourcing in Eastern Europe, the United Kingdom, and other regions where game development is more "affordable" to that end. PHYSINT might have spendy Hollywood actors tied to the project, but Xbox CEO Asha Sharma has quite loudly stated goals around cost-saving and cost-cutting.

Movies and TV shows are also becoming an increasingly crucial tool for both marketing and offsetting costs for gaming projects. Selling the rights to streaming platforms like Netflix and Amazon Prime can feed back into game development budgets, and creates a symbiotic marketing beat (if indeed, the content is actually good). Given Kojima's penchant for cinematic games, PHYSINT should be at least one project that pays dividends if everything is executed well.

... I suspect Xbox will have to give Kojima more flexibility than they may want to if they do want the game to hit that coveted quality bar.

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It's that time of year again. A chill in the air, pumpkin lattes on repeat, and Minecraft Live, of course! Today we got a first look at new Minecraft content, including Minecraft Dungeons 2, launching on September 29.

Here's everything announced at this year's Minecraft Live.

Deep dive into Minecraft Dungeons 2

Ahead of next week's launch, the development team gave us an extensive look at what is coming in Minecraft Dungeons 2. The sequel features a bigger, interconnected world with expanded combat, deeper character customization and better multiplayer.

The segment also spotlighted the Sift, a mysterious new dimension with distinct environments, inhabitants, dangers, and gameplay. Developers shared insights into the creative process of designing and introducing an entirely new dimension to the universe.

The Fourth Dimension: The Sift coming in 2027

The Sift isn't just for Minecraft Dungeons 2 players, it's officially coming to Minecraft Java and Bedrock editions in 2027.

This will be a huge milestone for Minecraft as it's the first new dimension added in over 14 years joining the Overworld, The Nether and The End as places for the player to discover and explore.

Yep, that statement made me feel ancient too, and I felt like the Nether was much more recent, but it was actually added in 2010 and just updated in mid-2020. This is legitimately the first brand new dimension in over a decade!

Ice Caves, new zombies and new combat mechanics

Mojang teased the next upcoming vanilla game drop too, as we were shown around the Ice Caves, an all-new, rare underground extension of cold biomes filled with glowing ice crystals.

The ice crystals can be placed both vertically and horizontally for building and decoration, or even as just a light source.

We also got a whole new mob! The frozen zombie if encountered will apply a stacking freezing affect to the player with melee attacks, and he throws ice balls that deal knockback. Normal zombies can also become Frozen variants if exposed to powder snow.

Ice balls are dropped upon the death of a Frozen Zombie, or can be crafted by players and used as a weapon to deal damage and knockback, or brewed into an ice cold freezing potion!

Minecraft coming to Nintendo Switch 2

Such an absolute no brainer I'm surprised it isn't already there, but Minecraft is officially launching on Nintendo Switch 2 on October 27, 2026 with enhanced performance and visuals.

Merlin Entertainment revealed the Minecraft Hotel and Rollercoaster

I've been excited about the upcoming Minecraft-themed park in the UK since it was announced, but beyond some concept art, we haven't seen much detail, especially given its 2027 opening date.

Well today Minecraft Live showed us something to really get excited about, with these two major additions to the Chessington World of Adventures based park. There's going to be a Minecraft Hotel, and the official name of the resort's new rollercoaster is "Escape the Nether."

I'm planning to be there the minute this place opens, as my son is going to lose his mind, and we missed out on the London Minecraft experiences. I've got high hopes for this theme park; don't let me down, Merlin!

Sound effect packs and new creator platform

During the stream, Jens Bergenström (Chief Creative Officer at Mojang Studios) announced a new initiative to build a richer, more accessible, and more diverse Minecraft experience through an evolving creator platform.

Additionally, Mojang introduced Sound Effects Packs for the Minecraft Marketplace, giving players brand-new tools to customize their worlds and bring their creations to life later this year.

And that's a wrap on Minecraft Live 2026

Minecraft fans should be happy with all of those updates, but if not, let me know what you were hoping for in the comments below!

Don't forget there is an ongoing Wilderness Bound Community Challenge where players can earn exclusive character creator items and Java skins simply by placing cushions and a straw bed in-game; full details are here.

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I know, I know. It’s a bold statement, and before you rush to the comments, let me explain myself. You’ve likely all heard the news by now. Halo Studios may be whittled down to as few as 20 employees, with the franchise hoisted under the Activision umbrella and a new team created to take over the mantle of responsibility. It is genuinely devastating that well over 200 people were impacted by this move and are now out of work.

Despite how painful it has been to be a Halo fan over the past 15 years, we should still show compassion and kindness to those impacted by these decisions because, at the end of the day, we’re all human. "Genuinely devastating" is also how I’d describe Halo itself, at least in its current state.

It’s no secret that 343 Industries, and later Halo Studios, struggled to capture what made Halo truly fantastic, with each game suffering from glaring launch issues or missing features. Despite this, I find it a little unfair for 343i/Halo Studios to shoulder all the blame. I imagine Microsoft itself played a heavy role in how poorly the franchise was handled and mismanaged, even going as far back as the Bungie days.

Can it really get any worse?

This begs the question of whether Activision is actually the right choice here. If we look at Call of Duty, it’s fair to be concerned that Halo won’t be treated much better there either. However, I believe the franchise is at such an unbelievable low point that Activision is a better bet for Halo’s future than another game developed under Halo Studios, and I will explain why.

We know Halo Studios relied heavily on contract work to finish Halo: Campaign Evolved, if you could even call it finished. Due to this outsourcing, I'd argue that Halo: Campaign Evolved is among the worst ways to experience the first Halo game, second only to Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary.

Like Campaign Evolved, the Anniversary edition takes creative liberties that I believe ruin the experience for returning fans and do the original a disservice for first-time Halo players.

Don’t get me wrong, though, Campaign Evolved isn’t awful. It still tells the same story as the original, so it isn’t all bad, and I enjoyed the updated visuals and even some of the changes to levels, but that’s mostly where my positives end.

Campaign Evolved suffers from worse cutscenes, awkward pacing, poorly directed voice-overs, and an experience that feels like it was worked on by 2,000 people who barely communicated with one another. That said, I’d still give the campaign itself a solid 7/10 because, despite my problems with it, I had fun.

Ironically, it feels as though the Helldivers 2 x Halo ODST crossover did more for Halo than a remake of the original game. If you’re at a point where crossovers in other games based on titles that predate your studio are better received than your actual games, then something clearly needs to change.

The prequel missions killed any hope I had

Halo Studios developed three new missions that take place before the events of Halo: Campaign Evolved. However, in almost every way possible, they fail to deliver anything meaningful to Halo’s lore. Instead, they wasted what should have been an opportunity for Halo Studios to show that it understood Halo and could carry the franchise forward.

What we got instead turned into an experience I can only describe as possibly the worst story told within a Halo game, right up there next to Halo 5. Allow me to paint a better picture of what we could have had.

Instead of Master Chief and Sgt. Johnson meandering around a Covenant ship, imagine three missions spliced throughout the campaign following Thel 'Vadam, the Arbiter, as he desperately tries and ultimately fails to stop Master Chief from destroying Halo.

Not only would that have given us a far more interesting perspective on the events of the first game, but it could have perfectly led into Halo 2. Instead, we got a barely memorable experience that feels like a huge missed opportunity.

That brings me back around to why I believe Activision is a better option than what we were currently looking at for Halo’s future. The franchise is at a point where, despite enjoying Halo since 2001, I would now rather see the publisher responsible for Call of Duty make a Halo game.

I genuinely don’t see how things could get much worse than they already are.

Yes, I am aware Call of Duty’s battle passes are awful, and skill-based matchmaking is also awful. But I will also remind people that Halo Infinite required you to pay $10 to color your Spartan white and already has skill-based matchmaking as strict as Call of Duty, except with a player base not even a fraction of the size.

Why Activision might actually make sense

Seeing the word Activision rightfully invokes a sense of doom. However, the company has also consistently managed to ship enormous Call of Duty games on an annual basis, with the franchise regularly sitting among the best-selling games each year.

Despite yearly Call of Duty releases becoming stale, it’s fair to say that Activision operates a well-oiled machine with seemingly no signs of letting up. Unlike 343i/Halo Studios, which often struggled to get games out of the door, Activision has repeatedly demonstrated that it can coordinate enormous titles across multiple studios and actually ship them.

We’re talking about an operation capable of juggling huge campaigns, multiplayer, progression systems, live-service content, PC support, console support, backend infrastructure, and multiple studios all working alongside one another.

Somehow, it still gets a Call of Duty game out of the door every single year. Whether every single one of those games is good is another question entirely. Again, there’s no denying that Activision knows how to organize and ship enormous FPS projects.

That’s the biggest thing that gives me hope here, especially when Halo has repeatedly struggled to simply have everything ready at launch. Halo Infinite launched without campaign co-op or Forge; Halo 5 also shipped without Forge, and even Halo: The Master Chief Collection famously launched in an absolutely terrible state.

So, having a company that has consistently managed projects of this scale does at least sound appealing on paper. It’s also important not to get caught up in the fact that it’s Activision.

They are reportedly creating a completely new team to head up a Halo project, and I’m hoping we see some old, familiar faces join on board, with the likes of Joe Staten and, of course, Marcus Lehto, who has recently spoken about how he’d love to return to Halo, even posting numerous polls asking fans what they’d like to see from the franchise moving forward.

That new team is probably what gives me the most hope, as it clearly won’t just be Treyarch or Sledgehammer being told to make Halo, or Infinity Ward being pulled away from Call of Duty. Microsoft is effectively building a new Halo team under Activision, which creates an opportunity to bring in people specifically because they want to work on Halo.

A completely new team also means completely new leadership and, hopefully, a clearer creative direction from the very beginning. Activision’s existing technology, production pipelines, QA teams, and general infrastructure could still sit behind that new team without necessarily dictating what Halo itself has to become.

That’s really the important distinction here because I don’t want Call of Duty wearing a Halo skin. What I want is Halo being given access to the kind of development structure that has allowed Call of Duty to consistently ship enormous games year after year, while still retaining what actually makes Halo, well, Halo.

Halo doesn’t need to reinvent the wheel or itself

This really brings me to what I think Halo actually needs moving forward. At this point, I don’t think the franchise needs yet another grand reinvention, although I wouldn’t necessarily be against them rebooting things and picking the story back up after Halo 3.

Halo 4 tried to take the story in a completely different direction, Halo 5 then shifted things again, and Halo Infinite was supposed to become a platform for Halo for years to come. Then, 343 Industries became Halo Studios with the promise that things would change (Spoiler: they didn't). At some point, you really do just need somebody to make a complete Halo game.

Give me a campaign with scoring and timing, split-screen, campaign co-op, Forge, Firefight, Big Team Battle, social modes, custom games, theater, a proper progression system, and a multiplayer suite that actually feels complete when I boot the game up on day one. These shouldn’t feel like ambitious requests either because, for a franchise like Halo, a lot of these things were once simply expected as far back as 2010.

More than anything, I’d also like to see some consistency with the story again. Halo has spent far too long introducing new ideas, setting up villains, establishing plot threads, and then seemingly deciding by the next game that it would rather move on to something else entirely. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

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Xbox players have long wanted an answer to PlayStation's Platinum Trophy, something to chase that rewards achievement hunters for getting them all.

We're finally getting that, and thanks to some poking around in the latest version of the Xbox app on Windows 11, we've got some new information to go on.

For one, the badge and the sound that plays when it unlocks have now been seen (and heard) for the first time.

I think it looks pretty good. I mean, it's just a little icon, after all, but I think the design is certainly a little fancier than PlayStation's equivalent, which is just a trophy.

Xbox hasn't publicly detailed anything as yet around the Mythic Achievement and its requirements, but it was always assumed we'd be getting something that rewards for completing all the achievements attached to a game.

The folks at XCT.live have been poking around inside the bits of the app we mere mortals never see and appear to have extracted some key bits of information on how the new Mythic Achievement will work. Crucially, it doesn't look to be a fully 100% requirement, isolating any achievements linked to DLC outside of the Mythic unlock process:

"The Xbox app works out Mythic from a group of achievements that it calls BaseGame. The unlock toast says “Unlocked all N achievements in the original game”. The game page has a “Required for Mythic achievement” filter, and it labels every achievement outside the group as “Add-on”. DLC achievements are not in the BaseGame group, so they do not count. The app counts achievements, not Gamerscore. It is not a “100% Gamerscore” reward."

Code in the app indicates that it is not a 100% Gamerscore requirement, either. It counts achievements within the BaseGame group, not the associated Gamerscore. So it sounds like if you start a game that had more achievements added over time, you'll still be able to get the Mythic Achievement by hitting all the original ones, not having to get all of the new ones as well.

Hopefully it's also retroactively applied to games that you've already completed the requirements for. Either way, it looks like it's beginning to gather steam, and hopefully we'll see it for ourselves sooner rather than later.

What's the first game you'll be trying to get the Mythic Achievement for? It's got to be here in time for GTA 6, hasn't it?

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Microsoft just revealed another round of "restructures" for Xbox and its game studios, with Ninja Theory, Obsidian, Turn 10, Halo Studios, and others impacted in various ways.

Last July, Microsoft announced it would be looking to reduce its gaming workforce by around 3,200 staffers. Sources suggest that the total figure will fall short of that previous estimate, as Microsoft opts for restructuring and moving employees around to other departments as much as possible.

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One way Microsoft has sought to achieve some of this is via divestitures. Double Fine and Compulsion have both returned to being independent game studios, for example, with the former starting a Kickstarter to fund its next title. Undead Labs of State of Decay fame is also moving to another publisher, although it has not been revealed exactly who this is just yet. Discussions around the future of Arkane are still ongoing.

Unfortunately, Microsoft revealed today that two previous attempts to divest Ninja Theory of Hellblade fame have fallen through. Microsoft has entered into redundancy consultations with the UK government as a result, per local law. Sources say Microsoft is still trying to find a buyer for Ninja Theory and the Hellblade franchise, but it's still looking a bit bleak.

Furthermore, Halo Studios is also looking at major layoffs in the 100s, as Microsoft seeks a major restructure to the way Halo is run.

In its heyday, Halo was a cultural phenomenon. It turbo-charged the Xbox platform, giving Microsoft's incumbent console a strong basis for growth in a market dominated by Nintendo and PlayStation. Halo 2 and 3 sent the platform even higher, and defined a new era of console-oriented first-person shooters. Those times are well and truly behind it, though.

Through years of mismanagement, Halo is now a shadow of its former self. A disastrous TV show, and two previous games that arguably missed the mark in different ways, Halo Studios' most recent outing (yet another remaster of Halo Combat Evolved) also received mixed reviews from fans and critics for various reasons.

Microsoft announced that it is effectively downsizing Halo Studios into the franchise's production and administration arm, and will place stewardship of the franchise under Activision — confirming some vague industry rumors I'd heard over the summer. Microsoft says around 230 roles will be lost as a result.

Exactly which Activision studio will handle Halo going forward remains to be seen, but it's certainly true that Activision's Call of Duty teams have had far more success than Halo Studios has at building broadly appealing live service shooters.

Furthermore, Microsoft is also placing Rare and Sea of Thieves under Activision too, with Obsidian and Grounded moving under ZeniMax to work more closely with Bethesda Softworks on Fallout. World's Edge and the Age of Empires franchise will also move under Activision. Xbox Game Studios will remain as Playground (which is absorbing Turn 10), The Coalition, InXile, and Xbox's publishing arm, handling games like Hideo Kojima's PHYSINT.

A new dawn for Halo?

The job losses at Xbox have been regrettable over the summer, but it's hard to overlook the fact that in order to have a sustainable business ... games need to actually sell. Whether it's small and quirky projects like Keeper or mismanaged live service ops like Halo Infinite, Microsoft hasn't exactly handled its portfolio effectively in recent years. There's less free time and money for gaming among consumers, and more competition than ever, making the stakes higher than they likely were previously.

Microsoft has seen some big success stories. Minecraft is bigger than ever, as is Forza Horizon, Flight Simulator, Age of Empires, and Blizzard has well and truly thrived in its post-Activision era. Microsoft wants to double down on the bigger opportunities like Fallout and The Elder Scrolls, building TV and movie adaptations for its bigger properties like Diablo and Overwatch.

There's also a corporate structural issue here that Microsoft is looking to address. Moving some of its game teams out from the Microsoft umbrella also moves employees out from under Microsoft's bureaucracy and corporate structure, potentially reducing overheads and costs.

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Halo Studios' proximity to Microsoft HQ, I've heard, has long been a source of corporate inertia and cost bloating — which is absolutely no fault of the employees working there. Those employees and projects also have to deal with A.I. money inflating wages of software engineering-adjacent professions, making some game projects unsustainable purely on the basis of the A.I. bubble. It's a weird economy right now.

As for Halo and other games, it remains to be seen if the restructure will actually lead to higher quality products. Halo fans have been long-suffering, waiting years upon years for a truly consistent delivery schedule for the franchise. I've often wondered myself what an Infinity Ward-led Halo might look like ... perhaps we'll find out exactly what that'll be like in the coming years.

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I've been a PC gamer for as long as I can remember, pushing my earliest family desktop computers to their limits by installing a single copy of Command and Conquer to their tiny hard drives, before eventually building my own rigs with a meager part-time job wage and a bright-eyed idea of what good value components looked like.

These days, I do most of my gaming on my still-loved Steam Deck, the Linux-based handheld from the same company behind the massive PC game storefront, Steam. It runs practically every game originally designed for Windows, and for the ones that it struggles with, I fall back on cloud gaming on services like GeForce NOW and Xbox Cloud.

Until now, I've pushed as many curious gamers as possible toward handheld gaming PCs, easing them in with budget-friendly options before watching them grow an appetite for high-end examples of excess that squeeze the capabilities of traditional gaming laptops into a compact form factor. However, one seems to have stuck closer to its MSRP, while many others become pipe dreams.

Somehow, the XBOX Ally is holding strong

As it stands, the ROG XBOX Ally sells for $599.99 at Best Buy, which is the same price it launched at when we tested it for our XBOX Ally review. Right now, it holds an average 4.4/5 rating among at least 930 customer reviews from that listing alone, and they seem quite happy with its price-per-performance ratio.

The white ROG XBOX Ally relies on AMD's Ryzen Z2 A processor, a relatively older Zen 2 chip with performance more comparable to Valve's long-standing Steam Deck than its high-end black ROG XBOX Ally X sibling or its predecessors like the (discontinued) original ASUS ROG Ally, built as a modern entry-level pick.

So, in what feels like an unexpected turn of events, Microsoft and ASUS offer the best price in handheld PC gaming with the ROG XBOX Ally, since the cheapest Steam Deck starts at $789 for a 512GB model, though Valve has an edge with an OLED screen that offers stronger contrast. If nothing else, it's certainly a different vibe than the price hikes on the Xbox Series X|S consoles.

Then again, the ROG XBOX Ally can reach a higher 120Hz refresh rate than the Steam Deck OLED's 90Hz, though you'll have to find a lightweight PC game that runs well enough to show those theoretical benefits of smoother visuals, with support for the Ally's variable refresh rate (VRR) that helps to reduce screen tearing and frame pacing inconsistencies.

"But, it runs Windows!"

Usually snared by the inevitable cost of a Windows license for each corresponding handheld, the appeal of Valve's in-house 'SteamOS' operating system became obvious in the category's formative years. However, alternatives initially designed around that prospect, such as Lenovo's Ryzen Z2 Go-based Legion Go S, now cost around $989.99.

That's a disappointing increase from the $599.99 MSRP we saw during our Lenovo Legion Go S review, with another rise to $1,579.99 for the Ryzen Z1 Extreme Legion Go S model that we tested (dropping to $999.99 in occasional sales). Suddenly, a Windows-based handheld that comes, in part, from XBOX itself doesn't sound so bad.

Of course, the repeated blame for these price hikes lands squarely on the memory crisis driven by massive-scale AI hardware infrastructure, which shows no signs of slowing down in the near future. Gamers are essentially stuck between a rock and a hard place as most components become unaffordable, which somewhat softens the OS argument on the PC side.

Because ultimately, there's nothing stopping anyone from installing SteamOS on a ROG XBOX Ally (or any other Windows-based handheld, for that matter). The experience will vary between devices, but to date, none of the major players have arbitrarily locked their products to Windows 11. If, despite all the awful odds, the Ally can maintain its price, it could become the mainstream choice.

Availability also seems fine for the white XBOX Ally, unlike ultra-high-end variants like the "mind-blowing" MSI Claw 8 EX AI+ and its $1,799 price tag, which apparently convinced flush gamers to spend, but its stock couldn't keep up. For handhelds targeting far below $1,000 — the realm of sensible spending — XBOX is surprisingly beating Valve. Will it last? I'd love to believe it.

Join us on Reddit at r/WindowsCentral to share your insights and discuss our latest news, reviews, and more.

Over the weekend, legendary game designer Hideo Kojima was interviewed by The Washington Post and IGN regarding behind-the-scenes details of one of his studio's upcoming Xbox Series X|S titles, Physint.

The first interview at The Washington Post revealed that Sony tried to cancel Physint during a Zoom call with Hideo Kojima. The man was shockingly surprised at Sony's decision; Hideo Kojima then commented, "I didn’t have any anger or sadness. I was just thinking, ‘What should I do?’ It’s a big problem for us, and I couldn’t tell staff at the time."

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Additionally, Kojima took this time to release a statement (which has also been released on Kojima Productions' official X account) regarding speculation people are making about Sony trying to pull the plug on Physint:

He then reassures worried fans that Kojima Productions is in a healthy, profitable state, that development for Physint is progressing with Xbox's backing, and that its relationship with PlayStation remains strong.

In an interview with IGN, he revealed that ever since partnering with Xbox on Physint, Microsoft has given Kojima Productions access to so much new technology and tech support that he jokingly remarked: “There are so many Doc Browns from Back to the Future here!”

He's clearly very excited to get to grips with this new tech, work with Xbox, and figure out what engine he'll decide to use for Physint, something he apparently hasn't chosen yet. Whatever engine Hideo Kojima's new stealth-action game will use, you can be sure we'll report on it as we keep a close eye on Physint's development, as well as Kojima Productions' other upcoming Xbox title, OD, which has survived Xbox's 'big reset'.

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During the Xbox Tokyo Game Show 2026 showcase, Fallout 76 appeared with a trailer for a content update called 'The Slasher' where players are tasked with hunting down the titular serial killer in a new questline.

However, this newly implemented update has a massive, Fatman Nuke-sized bombshell feature that Fallout fans have been waiting for for years: native Xbox Series X|S support.

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That's right, you can run Fallout 76 on modern Xbox consoles (and PlayStation 5) and take full advantage of their hardware to play the game at 60fps and 4K resolution on compatible TVs.

Slasher villains and next-gen support aren't the only new pieces of content in this update. The Fallout 76 'The Slasher' update also includes:

• Improved weapon crafting so that Unique weapons and armor can have their Legendary Mods changed and have a 4th Legendary Mod added to them.
• Legacy Seasons, which will bring back one past season to run alongside a current one for players who missed out on it. The first Legacy Season will be 'Armor Ace and the Power Patrol in Cold Steel' and will last for the entirety of Season 26.
• Season 26: Beware the Blood Moon, which will reward Halloween-themed items.
• New Seasonal fish will appear on September 22, 2026 (visit Captain Raymond for clues on where to find them).

On top of that, the update has a ton of bug fixes and balance change patch notes which you can read in their entirety on the Fallout 76 website.

Windows Central's take

I don't play Fallout 76, but I do remember my friends playing it when it first came out in 2018 and bemoaning that it didn't receive Xbox Series X|S support as the consoles were released shortly after Fallout 76 did in 2020.

So I'm betting they're pretty stoked to see this game finally get smooth 60fps with 4K resolution on Xbox Series X|S so they don't have to dodge Super Mutants and Deathclaws with sub-30fps anymore.

What do you readers think? Are you happy Fallout 76 can finally be played at a smooth 60fps with 4K resolution? Are you still playing Fallout 76 after all these years?

If you have any thoughts on the matter, please let us know in the comments section, poll, or through our Reddit page linked below.

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The Xbox Tokyo Game Show 2026 showcase has just wrapped up, and it showed off a mountain's worth of trailers for some highly anticipated Xbox games like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 and Persona 4 Revival.

It also debuted some original and artistically creative Xbox titles coming soon with Xbox Play Anywhere support.

Here are all the announcements made during the show.

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Gachiakuta: Breakout

The first new game revealed is Gachiakuta: Breakout, an action-RPG with survival elements set in the world of the popular anime series Gachiakuta.

This game will be released in 2027 for Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5, and PC.

Crazy Taxi: World Tour

Next up, we have a new gameplay trailer for Crazy Taxi: World Tour, which showcases a level set in Japan.

This upcoming revival of SEGA's classic Crazy Taxi series is set to release in 2027 for Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 showed up with a new cinematic trailer for its single-player campaign mode, which will involve a brutal war on the Korean Peninsula.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 is set to release on October 23, 2026, for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox Cloud Gaming, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC.

Persona 4 Revival

Persona 4 Revival gives players a glimpse of Naoto, one of the most popular characters from the original Persona 4. She is a private detective seeking to uncover the murder mysteries of Inaba, and eventually gains the power of Persona to aid the player in battle.

Persona 4 Revival is set to launch on February 18, 2027, for Xbox Series X|S (with Xbox Play Anywhere), Xbox Cloud Gaming, Xbox Game Pass, PlayStation 5, and PC.

It will also release for Nintendo Switch 2 on May 20, 2027.

Shape of Dreams

Shape of Dreams was an action-roguelike released in 2025 on PC, but it's available right now on Xbox Series X|S (with Xbox Play Anywhere), Xbox Cloud Gaming, and Xbox Game Pass.

Play as one of eight travelers and fight your way through a nightmare world filled with never-ending monsters, each wave more deadly than the last. You can take on these foes alone or with friends in 4-player co-op.

Wo Long 2: Wings of Ember

Koei Tecmo and Team Ninja revealed a short gameplay deep dive into the upcoming action-Soulslike, Wo Long 2: Wings of Ember. It featured a look at a massive, humanoid boar/monkey boss named Zuochi and a brief description of the new Insight Skills mechanic.

Insight Skills enhance the player's actions if they perfectly parry or dodge an enemy's attack at the last second. For example, using Insight Skills to deflect an enemy's attack will knock them back into the environment for extra damage while briefly stunning them.

Wo Long 2: Wings of Ember is set to launch on March 4, 2027, for Xbox Series X|S (with Xbox Play Anywhere), Xbox Game Pass, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC.

Hope in the City

Hope in the City is a new narrative-adventure game where you play as a young teenager looking for her missing parents after their apartment was ransacked.

Hope in the City is set to release on November 10, 2026, for Xbox Series X|S, PC, and Xbox Game Pass with Xbox Play Anywhere.

Bloomwalker

Bloomwalker is an upcoming crafting adventure game where you play as the titular Bloomwalker on a journey to bring nature back to life in a world ravaged by pollution.

Bloomwalker is coming soon to Xbox Series X|S, Xbox Cloud Gaming, Xbox Game Pass, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC.

Faraday Blues

Faraday Blues is a visual novel/strategy card game where you determine people's fates through the cards you play, with 64 endings to unlock across three dramatic storylines.

Faraday Blues is set to release in 2027 for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox Cloud Gaming, Xbox Game Pass, PlayStation 5, and PC.

Atelier Karia: The Night Kingdom & the Guide of Memories

Atelier Karia showed off a new trailer showcasing the personalities and abilities of Rutger & Lenja, two playable party members originally from Atelier Yumia.

Atelier Karia: The Night Kingdom & the Guide of Memories is set to release on February 25, 2027, for Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC.

Raji: Kaliyuga

Next, we have a developer commentary trailer for Raji: Kaliyuga. This is an action-adventure title where two sibling warriors, Raji and Darsh, are on a quest to stop the evil warlord Mahabalasura from unsealing the heavens and waging war throughout the cosmos.

Raji: Kaliyuga is set to release sometime in the future for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox Cloud Gaming, Xbox Game Pass, PlayStation 5, and PC.

Once Human: Isles of Abyss

The free-to-play survival game, Once Human, has announced a new expansion called "Isles of Abyss," which will let players explore the seas to uncover the riddles of a mysterious journal. But beware, foul sea monsters will be lurking around every corner of the sea, waiting to sink your ship.

The Once Human: Isles of Abyss expansion will launch on October 22, 2026, for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox Game Pass, PlayStation 5, and PC.

Edge of Memories

Edge of Memories has at last revealed its release date with a new gameplay and cinematic montage trailer.

This upcoming action-RPG, where you fight to save the world from corruption while risking turning into a monster, will be released on November 5, 2026, for Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5, and PC.

Genigods Nezha 

Next, we have a developer behind-the-scenes look at an upcoming action-RPG called Genigods Nezha. This game has you play as a powerful demigod known as the Spirit Pearl and embark on a journey to save the world from reality-warping spacetime rifts while battling colossal beasts and gods inspired by Chinese mythology.

Genigods Nezha is set to be released sometime in the future for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox Cloud Gaming, Xbox Game Pass, PlayStation 5, and PC.

Fallout 76

Fallout 76, the open-world, MMO-like spin-off of Fallout, has just received a Halloween-themed update called "The Slasher". It will have players explore a crooked home and struggle to survive while fighting the update's titular serial killer.

Bloodstained: The Scarlet Engagement 

From the creators of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night comes a new trailer for Bloodstained: The Scarlet Engagement, the long-awaited sequel to the beloved 2019 indie Metroidvania game, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.

This game tasks you with tearing through armies of demons, vampires, and more to free 16th-century England from the tyrannical reign of the Demon Lord, Elias.

Bloodstained: The Scarlet Engagement is set to be released in 2027 for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox Cloud Gaming, PlayStation 5, and PC.

OD and Physint

The Xbox Tokyo Game Show 2026 showcase closes with a video of Hideo Kojima announcing that development for his upcoming horror game, OD, is progressing smoothly.

Plus, Hideo Kojima has revealed that Swedish actor Bill Skarsgård will be voicing the main character in his upcoming stealth-action game, Physint.

Both OD and Physint will be released on Xbox and PC at a later date.

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Xbox Game Pass has been through a somewhat controversial year, with its price hike in 2025 before being reversed by current Xbox CEO Asha Sharma later on.

Microsoft has been on the defensive somewhat with the service, removing Call of Duty earlier this year on rumors that it's simply "too generous" and potentially unsustainable.

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Furthermore, even more rumors have been circulating online that Xbox Game Pass may be undergoing a massive restructuring in 2027, with changes that purportedly include:

• The inclusion of "ads" in Xbox Game Pass with different versions. One version of Xbox Game Pass with ads will cost $12.99 per month, and one without ads will cost $19.99 per month or $239.99 annually.
• New Xbox games will no longer release day one" for Xbox Game Pass "starting somewhere between February and April 2027," in exchange for reducing the cost of Xbox Game Pass by $3.
• The claim "cloud streaming will no longer be a part of Xbox Game Pass."
• Cloud Streaming will be "an add-on bundle" that costs $5.99 for 25 hours.
• Here's one I would actually like: "Xbox Game Pass' Family plan will be included, as a $5.99 addon."
• And more bits and bobs.

However, the truth is perhaps not so clear.

Forbes journalist Paul Tassi recently interviewed an Xbox spokesperson about what they thought of these rumors, and they had this to say:

"We regularly test different Game Pass offerings and look at what works best for players in different markets. We don’t have any changes to announce today or plans that have been finalized. There are no changes to previously announced games coming to Game Pass Ultimate on day one.”

Additionally, we've been doing some digging of our own and can confirm that the list of "changes" outlined by the above forum aren't based on any current plans within Microsoft and amount to "speculation or guesswork," trusted sources suggest.

However, it's no secret that Microsoft is actively exploring "changes" to Xbox Game Pass, which could include some of the guessed ideas outlined in the forum post.

Our sources say that there's no current plan to remove "day one" games as a feature of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate in totality, but like the statement to Paul Tassi says, changes are coming. But, 100% speculatively and analytically: I think it's probably worth expecting that more franchises like Call of Duty may be pulled from day one access even on Xbox Game Pass Ultimate.

Perhaps bigger franchises might be moved onto an even more expensive tier, or come with some kind of "addon" bundle like a cable TV package.

In short, Xbox is effectively denying these specific rumors, while acknowledging that changes are coming. Like Paul Tassi spotted, the mention of "previously announced games" in Xbox's quote is interesting, as the wording increases the likelihood that future Xbox Game Pass game additions could be altered or paired back.

Anonymous forum rumors should be always be taken with a huge grain of salt. However, with the recent changes to Xbox Cloud Gaming getting monthly restrictions, I have a feeling some of the suggestions in the thread could materialize in a worst case scenario.

Xbox Game Pass is a huge revenue stream for Microsoft today, but balancing that against retail sales and cash flow back to studios (particularly first-party studios) has been a subject of debate for some time.

However, we will have to wait until 2027 to find out if these rumors of Xbox Game Pass changing are true or false.

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Over the last couple of months, I've been salivating at the chance to play Final Fantasy Resonance, the first 'HD-2D' RPG in the Final Fantasy franchise.

It aims to bring back turn-based combat to the series after being absent for decades, while taking players on a grand adventure with gorgeous pixel-art graphics, lovable characters, and a fun story that pays tribute to the entire Final Fantasy legacy.

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As someone who grew up playing turn-based Final Fantasy games ever since the original PlayStation One version of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy Resonance wowed me with its nostalgic-yet-fresh presentation and gameplay.

Yet, I can't be worried. Square Enix hadn't made a home console Final Fantasy game with turn-based combat since Final Fantasy X-2 in 2003. It has spent many years trying to turn this series into an action-RPG franchise, which made me worry the developers had forgotten how to do turn-based combat for a Final Fantasy game.

Fortunately, after having played the recently released Final Fantasy Resonance demo on Xbox, my fears were crushed harder than a falling Meteor because this game is AWESOME so far.

Here's why I'm looking forward to playing Final Fantasy Resonance and why you should to if you're an old-school Final Fantasy fan or turn-based RPGs in general.

What is it?

Final Fantasy Resonance follows the story of Rain, a Knight of Grandshelt tasked with saving the world's life-giving Crystals from being destroyed by an evil group of dark knights known as the Sworn Six.

Along the way, you will meet heroic companions with intriguing backstories, explore a vibrant and colorful world rendered in nostalgic yet richly detailed pixel-art graphics, and call forth spiritual manifestations called 'Visions' to aid you in turn-based combat against deadly foes.

Story and Presentation

What I like about the story so far is how simple yet effective and easy to follow it is.

After dealing with shoehorned alternate timelines and 'Plot Ghosts' in the Final Fantasy VII Remake series and Final Fantasy XVI's library's worth of exposition and introspection, it feels so nice to play a Final Fantasy game where the premise is "Evil knights want to burn the world because they felt it wronged them; go stop them."

What also helps elevate the story from what I've played so far is the myriad of side-quests that go into detail on the characters' backstories, the vibrant worldbuilding and charming characters, and the stunning way Square Enix presents it.

This game takes 'HD-2D' graphics (a graphical style that blends 2D-pixel art with 3D backgrounds and atmospheric lighting) and perfects it with gusto.

The cinematic cutscenes, environments, and turn-based battles are so gorgeously animated and detailed that they make the world feel more alive than games rendered in Unreal Engine, and make something as mundane as fighting low-level goblins feel like the most epic battle in the world.

Not to mention, the pixel-art animation breathes so much life and personality into the characters through their facial expressions and actions that it makes me feel nostalgic for old PlayStation One JRPGs like the underrated classic, Grandia.

On a side note, the story has plenty of funny gags and heartwarming moments that will please long-time Final Fantasy fans while bringing levity after some pretty brutal moments.

Classic Final Fantasy turn-based combat returns with a modern twist

Now, of course, Square Enix wastes no expense when it comes to their games' presentation, but what about gameplay?

Well, Final Fantasy Resonance follows the old-school Final Fantasy gameplay loop of exploring a world map to progress the plot, visiting towns to shop for equipment, and exploring dungeons filled with deadly enemies and bosses that must be defeated in turn-based combat.

Turn-based combat was my biggest draw to Final Fantasy Resonance, and I'm pleased to report that Square Enix still knows how to make it, and it feels SO GOOD.

At first, it plays the combat system seen in Final Fantasy X, where you take turns smacking each other with weapons and spells until one side is defeated. However, Final Fantasy Resonance quickly introduced me to new mechanics to spice things up.

These include breaking an enemy's Stagger gauge to stun them, like in Final Fantasy VII Remake, and gaining extra turns where you can unleash a storm of attacks to batter them while they're down.

Combat takes things a step further with Visions. This mechanic allows your party to embody the traits and abilities of heroes from past Final Fantasy games or original heroes exclusive to this game.

These Visions can turn party members into tanks that draw aggro from enemies, healers to keep the party alive, damage dealers that focus on breaking an enemy's stagger meter, and much more. What's more is that these Visions can perform powerful super moves (with pre-rendered cinematics) when you manage to stagger all enemies on-screen at once.

As you use and level up Visions, you can even permanently learn their passive traits and mix and match them to suit your playstyle to create the ultimate party of heroes. I got so hooked on the Visions system that I spent hours trying to learn the few abilities that were available from the demo just to see what kind of party members I could create.

It felt so rewarding when I managed to cobble a team together to take this game's brutal optional bosses and obtain some loot for my efforts, especially on Hard Mode when breaking Stagger meters became harder to do with just brute force alone.

On side note, thank goodness this game allows you to play the hardest difficulty immediately instead of making us beat the whole game on 'Normal/Easy' Mode first like many Final Fantasy games seem to these days. It makes the story's high notes feel more worth it when we're given the option to tackle it's hardest difficulty.

Here's hoping the full version of Final Fantasy Resonance lives up to its name and 'resonates' with gamers

Overall, I'm liking what I'm seeing in Final Fantasy Resonance so far after completing the demo.

It nailed the retro vibe of the early 2D-era Final Fantasy games while being fresh with its beautiful HD-2D art style. The combat system and Visions system are so addictive; there are hints of plenty of side content to partake in, and it's chock-full of fan service for Final Fantasy fans while being accessible enough for newcomers to enjoy without making them do homework.

Hopefully, if the full version of Final Fantasy Resonance is good and sells well enough with gamers, it will convince Square Enix to make more turn-based Final Fantasy games in the future once it's finished with Final Fantasy VII: Revelation.

Either way, I can't wait to play the full version of Final Fantasy Resonance when it launches on October 22, 2026, on Xbox Series X|S (with Xbox Play Anywhere support), PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch 1 & 2, and PC via Steam.

If you want to check out Final Fantasy Resonance for yourself before then, the playable demo is available to download on digital storefronts.

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A few days ago, Microsoft shocked the gaming world by revealing that it has acquired Xbox exclusivity for Hideo Kojima's 'Physint', an upcoming stealth-action game that's billed as a successor to the legendary Metal Gear Solid franchise.

It was originally a PlayStation-exclusive, but Hideo Kojima cut ties with Sony after the company tried to cancel Physint without warning, as stated on his X account.

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Fast forward to today, and Bloomberg found a scoop from an anonymous source who was familiar with the project about why the company decided to axe Kojima Productions' latest IP.

According to Bloomberg's report, "[Physint] missed deadlines and was on track to be well over budget despite being years away from release".

It then stated, "Kojima’s previous two games, Death Stranding and its sequel, didn’t meet PlayStation’s revenue expectations," and "PlayStation was reluctant to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in another game that wouldn’t remain permanently exclusive to the company’s own hardware."

Window's Central's take

In short, it seems Sony was running out of patience with Hideo Kojima and wanted to cancel it for taking too long to make, going over budget, and to prevent it from being ported to other systems that aren't PlayStation.

While I'm personally ambivalent about this (my favorite Kojima game will always be Metal Gear Rising), it can't be denied that Xbox is reaping the benefits of this situation.

Microsoft now has Kojima Productions' full support for publishing Physint on Xbox and PC, and with them also working together on the upcoming horror game OD, this could be the start of a long, profitable friendship between the two studios.

With how quickly Kojima Productions' relationship with Sony has deteriorated over this situation, I wouldn't be surprised if we see an Xbox port of Death Stranding 2 with Xbox Play Anywhere in the future, as the original Death Stranding did.

But whether or not Physint and OD will turn out to be good games and make enough money to warrant Microsoft's investment, we will have to wait and see to find out.

Join us on Reddit at r/WindowsCentral to share your insights and discuss our latest news, reviews, and more.

Tokyo Game Show is almost here, and it's ready to bring all kinds of exciting gaming news from the Land of the Rising Sun. Microsoft will be among the many publishers attending this year, and it's planning some big reveals to mark the Xbox brand's 25th anniversary.

Here's where and how you can watch Xbox's Tokyo Game Show 2026 showcase livestream and get a little taste of what to expect at the show.

Xbox Tokyo Game Show 2026: Watch times and platforms

The Xbox Tokyo Game Show 2026 showcase livestream will commence on Thursday, September 17, 2026, at 7:00 pm (JST) / 3:00 am (PT) / 6:00 am (ET) / 11:00 am (BST).

It will be available to watch on the following YouTube and Twitch platforms:

• youtube.com/@XBOXJapan
• youtube.com/XBOX
• twitch.tv/XBOX

Xbox Tokyo Game Show 2026: What to expect

Microsoft will be showing off many upcoming Xbox games during its Xbox Tokyo Game Show 2026 livestream.

Two of these games are confirmed to be Minecraft Dungeons 2 and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4, and they'll also be playable on the Tokyo Game Show's show floor for people attending the event in person.

Minecraft Dungeons 2 is an upcoming ARPG where you and your friends hack and slash your way through the Minecraft universe for glory and loot in a similar manner to Blizzard Entertainment's Diablo series.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 is the latest upcoming entry in the Call of Duty Modern Warfare sub-series. Players will engage enemies in thrilling military shooter combat through an epic single-player campaign and chaotic 6v6 online multiplayer modes.

The community-driven Xbox FanFest will also be at the Tokyo Game Show to host a watch party for the Xbox Tokyo Game Show livestream, with special guests Misuzu Araki and Larry Hyrb.

What are you hoping to see at Xbox's Tokyo Game Show 2026 showcase?

As for what else will be at the Xbox Tokyo Game Show, your guess is as good as mine.

While I'm personally hoping to see gameplay footage of long-awaited titles like Spyro: A Realm Beyond and Persona 6, my colleagues are hoping to see footage of Physint.

Physint is an upcoming action-stealth game made by Kojima Productions that's meant to be a successor to the legendary Metal Gear Solid franchise. It was originally a PlayStation exclusive, but when Sony unexpectedly tried to cancel it, Hideo Kojima cut off ties with Sony and permitted Xbox to publish Physint instead.

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Will we see gameplay of Physint, Spyro: A Realm Beyond, and Persona 6 at the Xbox Tokyo Game Show livestream, or will we see some new games that haven't been announced yet?

Tune in next week to find out when the Xbox Tokyo Game Show 2026 livestream launches on Thursday, September 17, 2026.

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In a major coup for Xbox game publishing, Microsoft has landed the contract to publish Physint, Hideo Kojima's long-awaited follow up to Death Stranding.

Despite being announced by PlayStation, somehow, Xbox has managed to acquire the rights to publish Hideo Kojima's return to the "action-espionage" genre. It was all announced just now via Xbox Wire.

Physint in essence sounds like a spiritual successor to Kojima's classic Metal Gear Solid franchise. Metal Gear owner Konami and Hideo Kojima had a high-profile bust-up a few years ago, following the launch of MGSV: The Phantom Pain — which arguably remains unfinished to this day.

Since then, Kojima went independent, developed the award-winning Death Stranding franchise, and later landed a publishing deal with Xbox for horror title OD. Death Stranding 2 is presently a PlayStation exclusive, but the first Death Stranding since launched on Xbox with Xbox Play Anywhere. Later, Kojima re-acquired the rights to Death Stranding from PlayStation itself. It stands to reason Death Stranding 2 will eventually hit Xbox in the future as well.

During the previous announcement two years ago, PlayStation Studios' lead Herman Hulst said that Physint was "part of the PlayStation and Kojima Productions partnership," although that no longer seems to be the path Kojima chose.

“Creators have choices about where and how they bring their ideas to life," Xbox CEO Asha Sharma said in today's blog post. "We’re honored that Kojima-san has chosen XBOX to work with KOJIMA PRODUCTIONS on PHYSINT. His ambition to challenge conventions reflects the kind of creativity we want to support at XBOX."

"This expands our relationship with XBOX beyond OD," said Hideo Kojima. "As we move forward with the development of PHYSINT, we remain committed to redefining the action-espionage genre for players around the world."

Microsoft and Hideo Kojima also said that the two are collaborating across film and television as well, beyond horror title OD. It sounds as though Microsoft is investing a ton into Kojima Productions to bring this partnership to life, although it sounds as though there's some drama that has taken place behind the scenes between Kojima Productions and PlayStation. Physint was announced on the PlayStation stage, so for it to swap hands in such a stark way suggests there's a bigger story at play here.

In response, Sony has released a statement confirming that it has "made the difficult decision to step away from collaborating with KOJIMA PRODUCTIONS on its project PHYSINT."

Either way, it's a fantastic win for Xbox, potentially. Working with such high-profile developers like Hideo Kojima boosts Xbox's visibility with audiences that Microsoft has typically struggled to access. It also feeds into Asha Sharma's strategy of targeting more ambitious AAA projects with trans-media opportunities for TV and movie treatments.

Whether it all lands remains to be seen, but man oh man, this is NOT one I saw coming.

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Microsoft dropped a surprisingly substantial batch of Xbox Insider features today, ranging from nostalgia-fueled startup animations to higher-quality Remote Play streaming.

While none of these additions are major enough to warrant their own showcase, they're all pulling Xbox in the same direction: making the platform feel more personal.

This latest update suggests Xbox sees that shift coming and wants to be the platform that adapts to the player rather than asking the player to adapt to it, and I like where that is going.

Looking through the feature list, it becomes clear that Microsoft's biggest focus is reducing friction, not just adding new features for the sake of it.

That philosophy appears in the new cloud gaming improvements. Xbox Insiders can now continue downloading games in the background while streaming, reducing one of the small but persistent friction points that come with digital gaming.

These updates may not be groundbreaking, but they represent the kind of quality-of-life improvements that users want, which contribute to making a platform feel more refined and complete.

The new personalization features tell a similar story.

Being able to select startup animations from different eras of Xbox history may sound like a cosmetic addition, but it reflects a growing recognition that players often have a deeper connection to gaming platforms than companies traditionally acknowledge.

Users can now pick from Xbox One, Xbox One X, Xbox Series X|S, or We Are Xbox, which is kinda cool.

Remote Play is also getting some new improvements.

The company is now testing support for up to 1440p streaming and higher video bitrates through Xbox Remote Play for Xbox Series X|S users in select Insider rings. The technical upgrade matters, but the broader implication matters more.

A few years ago, Remote Play felt like an extra feature. Today, it feels increasingly central to Microsoft's vision (though we're not thrilled with those new Cloud gaming caps).

Microsoft has spent years talking about making Xbox available wherever players want to play. At first, that messaging was often interpreted as a cloud gaming pitch. What we're seeing now is something more nuanced.

Microsoft now seems more interested in letting players decide which parts of Xbox's history they want to keep with them.

That trend extends to profile customization, where users can choose which achievements and badges are visible and which remain private. If Nintendo's strength is iconic franchises and PlayStation's strength is prestige gaming, Xbox's emerging niche may be flexibility.

Play your games where you want.

Show off your profile how you want.

Start your console how you want.

Access your library how you want.

That seems to be a definable pattern, at least for this update.

Finally, Microsoft is also testing a new Voice Clarity feature for Xbox Series X|S, designed to reduce background noise and improve voice communication in party chat and supported games. Clear communication remains one of the foundations of online gaming, particularly in co-op and competitive titles, so this is a nice nod.

The update also arrives alongside broader backend improvements aimed at making Xbox parties more reliable and secure.

You can get more details from Xbox Wire about today's update.

Windows Central's Take

Again, there's no single standout feature here (although you may disagree), but the bigger picture is that Microsoft is apparently focusing on letting users make Xbox reflect more of their personality and preferences. That's something PC fans are used to, but it's a bit new for console users, where you're more boxed in (pardon the pun).

Maybe this really is all laying the groundwork for the next-gen Xbox (Helix), which is supposed to be more PC-like.

Of course, you could always say this is what Xbox should have been like for years now, but I'm happy to see these changes and like this direction of giving users more choice.

At a time when hardware is becoming unaffordable, the Xbox user experience is becoming the real battleground to keep fans interested, and Microsoft seems to have gotten the message.

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It still feels like a dream that Spyro the Dragon, one of my childhood favorite platformer games, is finally getting a true successor to the classic PlayStation One trilogy with Spyro: A Realm Beyond.

Fortunately, Toys for Bob is here to remind me that it's indeed real by showing off a sneak preview of Arcadian Vale, one of the first locales you'll explore in the game, as part of a special event celebrating Spyro's 27th anniversary called Spyro Community Day.

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As you can see from the concept art, the Acadian Vale is a lush and colorful locale that perfectly captures the childlike wonder you'd normally associate with Spyro games, complete with cascading waterfalls, ancient buildings, and cutesy critters running around (which I totally won't roast alive to spawn butterflies that will replenish my health like in previous games).

The art also implies that the Arcadian Vale will feature a fair degree of verticality, most likely to help players practice the new free-roaming flight mechanic that will allow us to fly anytime, anywhere instead of specific levels and boss fights like in previous games.

It's going to be a long, painful wait until we get to play Spyro, but in the meantime, you can celebrate Spyro's legacy by showing off fan art, appreciation messages, and other content for Spyro Community Day on social media platforms like X with the hashtag #HappyBirthdaySpyro.

Spyro: A Realm Beyond is set to launch sometime in 2027 for Xbox Series X|S and Xbox on PC with Xbox Play Anywhere support, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch 2, Steam, and the Epic Games Store.

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This web-based recreation of the iconic Xbox 360 avatar creator features tens of thousands of clothing and prop items from the original marketplace, and it's even more impressive when you learn that '360sona' was the project of a single person, Ezra Kruger. Shared across Reddit and YouTube, it also carefully denies any direct affiliation with Microsoft.

Built primarily with JavaScript and WebGL, 360sona.com is a "pixel-for-pixel" representation that lets you accurately rebuild your old-school Xbox avatar and even embed it into your personal website via an iframe. The whole project includes "every animation, every camera the console had, drawn the way the console drew them", and each part looks exactly how you remember.

"Well, bam, there it is"

I was enamored with the idea before I even opened it, as the first images took me on an instant nostalgia trip, and I love nostalgia trips. 360sona has everything I remembered, and I rebuilt my original avatar in minutes, including the Max Payne outfit I never removed back in the day. Armor from Halo, Gears of War, and Mass Effect is also here, all authentically rendered.

If I wanted to, I could even export my finished avatar as a .glb model, rigged and ready for inspection in free 3D software like Blender, with baked textures included. It's all built around a basic account system and, importantly, 360sona never asks for your email address. You only need a simple username and password (and you're given a one-time-use recovery code).

The branded elephant in the room is the absolutely gigantic collection of licensed content, including logos of major sports franchises, movies, and real-world clothing icons. Again, Kruger explains in 360sona's terms that you shouldn't expect to reuse absolutely anything exported from the project, stressing the intention of personal, non-commercial use.

Still, I can't shake the feeling that a potential DMCA takedown request could be looming, even though 360sona doesn't feature any on-page ads or other money-making schemes. At face value, this is a purely fan-driven hobby project that exists only to let long-serving Xbox fans spend some time reminiscing about the Xbox 360's heyday. That hasn't stopped mega-corpos in the past, though.