As Xbox gears up for its big Xbox & Bethesda Showcase on Sunday, the firm spoke with press earlier this week to set the stage. During a briefing, they confirmed that Xbox Cloud Gaming will get its first TV apps in Samsung’s 2022 range, alongside the ability to eventually stream games you’ve purchased that aren’t part of the Xbox Game Pass library. Additionally, exclusive Xbox game demos will also hit the Xbox Game Pass service, as the cloud platform expands to new countries with even more servers to meet global demand.
With Xbox increasingly looking to the cloud and its Xbox Game Pass subscription service to grow, exclusive content has become increasingly important across all of its verticals, including PC and console as well. Last year Microsoft managed to nab the top spot on the Metacritic publisher chart for review scores, and will look to achieve similar across its next fiscal year, which for Microsoft begins in July.
In a statement to press, Microsoft described its intent to “meet or exceed” the number of games it launched in its FY2022, which included Age of Empires IV, Flight Simulator, Psychonauts 2, Halo Infinite, and Forza Horizon 5.
“Last fiscal we launched 5 new games across console, PC, and cloud. We are on track to meet or exceed that amount in the next fiscal,” it said.
One can assume that this includes Starfield, the space RPG from the creators of The Elder Scrolls and modern Fallout games. Starfield was delayed out of 2022, but is expected to launch before next summer as it undergoes extensive polishing. Redfall will most likely be another game we see before next summer too. Redfall is a 4-player co-operative vampire action game, from the creators of Dishonored and the reboot of Prey.
Beyond these two games, it falls a bit towards speculation. Highly likely candidates for other games launching between now and next summer include RPG Avowed, from the developers of Pillars of Eternity. We could also see sim racer Forza Motorsport 8 emerge too. There are other potential candidates, such as leaked Project Belfry from Stoic, or Obsidian’s Pentiment.
I suspect we’ll get a better idea what we can expect to see from Microsoft’s big Xbox & Bethesda Showcase this Sunday on June 12. One thing is for certain, though: Xbox fans are going to have plenty to play.