I’m beginning to really feel like Charlie Brown from The Peanuts comics, and Microsoft is the Lucy who retains pulling the soccer away proper as I’m going to kick it. Yearly I write this function, and yearly I say that this seems to be like The 12 months™ the place every little thing comes collectively for Xbox. Final yr, in truth, I particularly stated, “Waiting for 2024, that optimistic momentum seems to be set to proceed and, optimistically, snowball.” Microsoft arguably didn’t reside as much as that for the primary 10.5 months of the yr, with solely the visually-full-but-gameplay-empty Hellblade 2 dropping in Could after a few years of ready. However to the big-spending writer’s credit score, it did finish the yr extraordinarily robust, dropping three unique bangers in a row: STALKER 2, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024, and my private vote for Sport of the 12 months in 2024 and the sport that I believe is the very best Xbox unique in years, Indiana Jones and the Nice Circle.
So, can Microsoft hold that optimistic end-of-2024 momentum going into 2025? Name me Charlie Brown when you should, however sure, I genuinely imagine that 2025 could possibly be Xbox’s strongest and most bountiful yr since not less than 2021, when it dropped Forza Horizon 5, Halo Infinite, and Psychonauts 2. Let’s dig into why I’m optimistic…
A Fountain of Fantasy and Firearms
Xbox’s 2025 kicks off fairly shortly and, from every little thing we are able to inform, fairly impressively with Obsidian’s first-person fantasy RPG Avowed, because of be launched on February 18. This “Skyrim Lite” is about within the studio’s established and well-loved Pillars of Eternity universe, it’s purported to be across the identical meaty-but-not-gargantuan 25-40 hours lengthy as Obsidian’s most up-to-date first-person RPG The Outer Worlds, and it’s impressed us increasingly each single time we’ve performed it, together with fairly just lately.
Subsequent, whereas it doesn’t have a agency launch date but, id Software program’s surprising zag of a prequel, Doom: The Darkish Ages, is sort of a lock for 2025. In truth, I’d wager an In-N-Out Burger lunch that it drops within the first half of the yr for 2 causes: 1) Doom Everlasting shipped in March of 2020, which means that in only a few months, it is going to have been a full half-decade for the reason that final Doom (which itself adopted 4 years after Doom [2016]). In different phrases, it’s time! Significantly for the reason that idTech engine is already firmly in place regardless of the soar to a brand new console era. And a pair of) I’d wager one other In-N-Out lunch that the long- and eagerly anticipated reboot of Fable being cooked up at Playground Video games – which, bear in mind, bought tagged with a 2025 launch window in its Xbox Showcase 2024 trailer – goes to be Xbox’s massive Fall/vacation sport on the finish of the yr. Which means Doom in all probability ships earlier than the vacations. However each time it does – and do not forget that it’s already confirmed to be a multiplatform launch on day one – it’s in all probability going to kick some critical ass for Xbox subsequent yr, judging by how good id Software program’s final two Doom video games have been.
Again to Fable: in my view, the revival of Fable has greater potential – each critically and commercially – than virtually anything in Xbox’s portfolio wanting Name of Obligation, The Elder Scrolls, and Fallout. We’ve seen Playground’s tackle the British-charm-tinged action-adventure-RPG just a few instances now, and every time it’s been crystal clear that not solely does Playground “get” Fable (it’s British itself, which little doubt helps), however that the sport seems to be completely unimaginable as properly. Who knew that the ForzaTech engine might render a jaw-droppingly stunning fantasy forest simply in addition to a racetrack?
There’s one different big purpose to be optimistic about Fable, and that’s Playground’s observe document. Merely put, this studio has not solely by no means missed, it’s by no means made something lower than a consensus 9 out of 10. Its final sport, the aforementioned Forza Horizon 5, was IGN’s 2021 Sport of the 12 months. And it clearly is being given loads of time to cook dinner, as Fable was formally introduced in 2020 with work having already been accomplished previous to that. Microsoft is aware of it could’t fumble Fable a second time, and I couldn’t be extra enthusiastic about what has been proven to date.
Subsequent, whereas it definitely isn’t almost as massive a reputation as Fable, we are able to’t neglect about South of Midnight, the third-person action-adventure from We Pleased Few developer Compulsion Video games that’s leaning heavy into the folklore of the bayous of the Deep South. This one’s nothing just like the developer’s previous video games, which is admittedly riskier but additionally extra intriguing. Microsoft has tabbed this one for 2025, so contemplate South of Midnight as one thing of a wild card for subsequent yr.
One other smaller-name Xbox unique that I believe everybody might be speaking about if it comes collectively when it lastly ships in 2025 is Changed. It’s a pixel-art, cyberpunk-styled side-scrolling action-adventure sport that oozes type and, as I found once I performed it over the summer time, is way deeper than I anticipated. Changed has the potential to hitch the lengthy checklist of legendary Xbox-exclusive indies that features video games like Limbo, Braid, and Inside.
Lastly, don’t neglect about Xbox’s precise greatest franchise (since they now personal it), Name of Obligation. It’ll keep on PlayStation, in fact, however Xbox followers will get it day one on Sport Move. The 2025 Name of Obligation is rumored to be a future-set Black Ops 2 sequel, so maybe Treyarch is dealing with the marketing campaign on this one after Raven Software program did a stellar job on this yr’s Black Ops 6 marketing campaign. And the opposite, a lot quieter juggernaut within the Xbox portfolio, Minecraft, will in all probability get some form of massive in-game content material, what with the Minecraft film on the way in which.
What About {Hardware}?
Barring a 180 from Xbox boss Phil Spencer’s earlier feedback, Microsoft received’t be pushing a mid-gen improve to the Xbox Collection X (an Xbox Collection XX, if you’ll) in 2025, if ever. And although a handheld Xbox is in improvement, we’re unlikely to play it and even see it within the coming yr.
So ought to we count on any new {hardware} in 2025? Most likely not – not less than by way of uncooked horsepower. The Xbox Collection S bought a storage improve in 2024, as did the Collection X. And we’ll little doubt see a bevy of latest special-edition controllers and perhaps even that upgraded controller codenamed Sebile talked about within the FTC leaks from over a yr in the past, however 2025 doesn’t seem like the yr for Xbox to drop any new silicon.
Something Else?
Uncommon’s Everwild seems to be in limbo and/or improvement hell, as we haven’t seen or heard from it in years. Would possibly it reemerge in 2025? Possibly, however I’m not holding my breath. In the meantime, Halo is being reset on the studio degree, which in my view means the following Halo sport is prone to both be a reboot of the franchise altogether or a remake of Halo: Fight Advanced. Both means, it’s going to be in-built Unreal Engine 5, and it’s in all probability going to take some time. InXile’s steampunk RPG Clockwork Revolution was introduced in 2023 with a launch window of “coming in due time.” The Outer Worlds 2 has been revealed, and we now know it’s coming in 2025, so which means Obsidian plans to ship two first-person RPGs in the identical yr.
And talking of first-person RPGs, will that rumored Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion remaster really occur? How about Contraband, from Simply Trigger developer Avalanche Studios, which was within the 2021 Xbox Showcase and hasn’t been seen or heard from since? All we all know is that it’s “a co-op smugglers’ paradise set within the fictional world of Nineteen Seventies Bayan.” Ought to it reemerge in 2025, it’s unlikely that it additionally ships subsequent yr as properly, given the same old PR/advertising and marketing cycles on big-budget video games.
The wild card for 2025 is Double Advantageous, the endlessly inventive and versatile studio headed by sport design legend Tim Schafer that’s coming off of 2021 Sport Awards Sport of the 12 months nominee Psychonauts 2. I’d count on Schafer and the studio to announce their new undertaking quickly, however as as to whether it really comes out within the subsequent 12 months is anyone’s guess.
Lastly, something from this yr’s Xbox Showcase that didn’t have a launch yr on the finish of the trailer can safely be assumed to be a 2026 (or later) launch. Which means I’m not fairly anticipating to play Gears of Struggle: E-Day, Excellent Darkish, or State of Decay 3 within the subsequent yr. And that’s OK! It lastly appears like Xbox is beginning to pump out not only a regular stream of first-party video games, however a constantly good stream of them. That is what Xbox has been constructing in direction of since they first began buying studios in 2018 to attempt to repair their first-party video games downside, and dammit I believe that is the yr they lastly do it. Please don’t pull that soccer away from me once more, Lucy-Microsoft.
