Xbox's First-Party Output for the Year 2021 [Poll: how would you rate this year ?]

[anon74828371]

Banner credits: @Klobrille

How would rate this year for Xbox ?

• <5
• 6
• 7
• 8
• 9
• 10

New games:

Halo Infinite (Score: 87)

343 Industries

Release dates : November 15 (Multiplayer), December 8 (Campaign)

Won 10 GOTY

Forza Horizon 5 (92)

Playground Games

Release date : November 9

Won 12 GOTY

Age of Empires 4 (83)

Only PC

World’s Edge + Relic (SEGA)

Release date : October 28

Won 1 GOTY

Psychonauts 2 (89)

Double Fine

Release date : August 25

Won 4 GOTY

Deathloop (88)

PS5 exclusive for 1 year + PC

Arkane Lyon

Release date : September 14

Won 13 GOTY

Standalones:

DOOM Eternal: The Ancient Gods, Part Two (75)

id Software

Release date : March 18 (Switch : August 26)

Xbox Series X|S port:

Microsoft Flight Simulator (90)

Xbox Game Studios Publishing + Asobo Studio

Release date : July 27

Re-releases / remasters:

QUAKE

Nightdive Studios / id Software / MachineGames

Release date : August 19

Skyrim: Anniversary Edition

Bethesda Game Studios

Release date : November 11

Microsoft Flight Simulator: GOTY Edition

Xbox Game Studios Publishing + Asobo Studio

Release date : November 18

Expansions / Content updates:

Sea of Thieves: a Pirate’s Life

Rare

A Pirate’s Life (Crossover with Disney’s The Pirate of the Carribean, original story composed of 5 Tall Tales)

Release date : June 22

plus Season One (January 28), Season Two (April 15), Season Three (June 22), Season Four (September 23), Season Five (December 2)

Minecraft Caves & Cliffs

Mojang

Caves & Cliffs

Release date : June 8 (Part 1) and November 30 (Part 2)

Fallout 76: Steel Reign

BGS Austin

Steel Reign (follow-up of Steel Dawn and conclusion of the Brotherhood of Steel storyline)

Release date : July 7

(+ updates through 2021)

The Elder Scrolls Online: the Gates of Oblivion

ZeniMax Online Studios

Blackwood (part of the Gates of Oblivion storyline)

Release date : June 1st

Deadlands (conclusion of the Gates of Oblivion storyline)

Release date: November 1st

Other updates : Flames of Ambition (March 18) next-gen update (June 15), Waking Flame (August 31)

Grounded

Obsidian

Still in early access.

Updates: 0.6 (January), 0.7 (February), 0.8 (March), 0.9 (April), 0.10 - Shroom & Doom (June), 0.11 - Hot & Hazy (October)

Microsoft Flight Simulator

Xbox Game Studios Publishing + Asobo Studio

Reno Air Races (first major expansion, competitive multiplayer racing)

Release date: November 18

World updates:

• UK & Ireland (February 16)
• France & Benelux (April 13)
• Nordic countries (June 17)
• Germany, Austria, Switzerland (September 7)

The Outer Worlds: Murder on Eridanos

Obsidian

Murder on Eridanos (2nd narrative expansion + next-gen update)

Release date: March 17

Wasteland 3 : The Battle of Steeltown

inXile Entertainment

The Battle of Steeltown (1st narrative expansion)

Release date : June 3

Cult of the Holy Detonation (2nd narrative expansion)

Release date : October 5

DOOM Eternal

id Software

Update 6.66 : Horde Mode, Battlemode 2.0, 2 new Master levels

Release date : October 26

Minecraft Dungeons

Mojang

Ancient Hunts free update + Flames of the Nether

Release date : February 24

Hidden Depths

Release date : May 26

Echoing Void

Release date : July 28

Seasonal Adventures

Release date : December 14

Age of Empires 2: Definitive Edition

World’s Edge + Relic (SEGA)

Lords of the West expansion (2 new civilizations, 3 new campaigns)

Release date : January 26

Dawn of the Dukes expansion (2 new civilizations, 3 new campaigns)

Release date : August 10, (+ co-op historical battles on June 15)

Age of Empires 3: Definitive Edition

World’s Edge + Relic (SEGA)

United States civilization

Release date : April 13

The African Royals expansion (2 new civilizations and kingdoms, 3 new battles)

Release date : August 2

Mexico civilization

Release date : December 1st

Halo: MCC

343 Industries

• Season 5: Anvil
• Season 6: Raven
• Season 7: Elite
• Season 8: Mythic

(new maps for Halo 3, Custom Game Browser, new armors/skins)

Release date : January 27 (S5), April 7 (S6), June 23 (S7), October 13 (8)

Gears 5

The Coalition

• Operation 6
• Operation 7
• Operation 8

Release date : March 2 (O6), May 18 (O7), August 3 (O8)

State of Decay 2

Undead Labs

Release date : February 8 (Update 24), June 21 (Plague Territory)

Homecoming (remastered map of the first State of Decay game)

Release date : September 1st

Summary of 2021 :

• 5 new games (343, Playground, Double Fine, Arkane, World’s Edge/Relic) + 1 standalone (id Software) + 3 re-releases/remasters

• Overall, 16 studios on the 23 released new content (in any form) during 2021

[Proven]

I’m going to re-open this thread for now as long as this topic doesn’t just become Game Studios OT v2, hopefully FarSight is willing to update the post as more games are confirmed.

[YoungGrumpyMan]

Awesome round-up @anon74828371

While the first half of 2021 looks rather empty on the first-party side, I am happy Xbox is filling this with AAA day one 3rd party deals on Xbox Game Pass

[Tesla]

Great thread @anon74828371

I wonder if on the day on deathloops release MS will pull a “deathloop fragrance coming to gamepass 1yr from today”

[Xplainin]

Is there any reason Age of Empires couldn’t come to console?

[BRiT]

@Xplainin

Is there any reason Age of Empires couldn’t come to console?

You mean besides them already saying it wouldn’t happen for AoE4 because of the keyboard+mouse centric controls?

[Xplainin]

@BRiT

You mean besides them already saying it wouldn’t happen for AoE4 because of the keyboard+mouse centric controls?

Lots of games were keyboard and mouse centric but ended up on console. Gears Tactics for instance.

[PhantomFox]

@Xplainin

Lots of games were keyboard and mouse centric but ended up on console. Gears Tactics for instance.

Gears: Tactics is turn-based, that’s why. It’s much harder to get an RTS to work well on console, hence why there are so few.

[Xplainin]

@PhantomFox

Gears: Tactics is turn-based, that’s why. It’s much harder to get an RTS to work well on console, hence why there are so few.

But its possible. Infact you can hook up and keyboard and mouse to your xbox. So again, is there a reason it can’t come to Xbox?

[Running_Riot (Tyler Sanders)]

Firstly, excellent job. Secondly I think it’s valid to have a separate thread that drills down onto specifics of what’s happening this year with the studios. Covering new releases, dlc, seasonal updates. It’s a very cool idea.

On topic I just started Murder on Eridanos and I’m loving it so far. I really like the Murder Mystery and the detective stuff. I feel like this dlc pushes you to play with the dialog more and tackling obstacles differently compared to the base game where I was guns blazing most of the time. Honestly so far I feel like they could have went even harder in that direction and taken out some of the combat scenarios that I’ve seen so far.

[Cerysnetics (Cerys)]

@Xplainin

Is there any reason Age of Empires couldn’t come to console?

Adam Isgreen explained it pretty well from his PoV during the questions in the podcast the other week.

The XboxEra Podcast | Episode 53 - "The Age of Empires" with Adam Isgreen

[LucasTaves]

We are looking of a very strong chance that these at least are released this year:

• Halo Infinite
• Starfield
• Forza Horizon 5
• Grounded
• As Dusk Falls
• Psychonauts 2
• Age of Empires 4
• Flight Simulator for Xbox

Plus Ghostwire and Deathloop for PS5.

That’s already an insane year for a single publisher, and more insane is that Ms is literally just getting started

[Roronoa_Zoro90]

@LucasTaves

Plus Ghostwire and Deathloop for PS5.

I sincerely hoped that MS would have lifted those bullshit contracts, it’s reaaaally annoying that we miss for a year multiplatform announced products in 2019, meh, there are even Xbox Wire blog post about these games.

[LucasTaves]

@Roronoa_Zoro90

I sincerely hoped that MS would have lifted those bullshit contracts, it’s reaaaally annoying that we miss for a year multiplatform announced products in 2019, meh.

I would love that too. No need to keep them from releasing on PS5, but they should come day and date to xbox

[peter42O]

@LucasTaves

We are looking of a very strong chance that these at least are released this year:

• Halo Infinite
• Starfield
• Forza Horizon 5
• Grounded
• As Dusk Falls
• Psychonauts 2
• Age of Empires 4
• Flight Simulator for Xbox

Plus Ghostwire and Deathloop for PS5.

That’s already an insane year for a single publisher, and more insane is that Ms is literally just getting started

Replace Starfield with Wolfenstein III and I would say this is an excellent guess. Why is Grounded on the list though? It released already.

[Roronoa_Zoro90]

@LucasTaves

I would love that too. No need to keep them from releasing on PS5, but they should come day and date to xbox

E3 2019: Doom Eternal, Fallout’s Battle Royale, and Ghostwire: Tokyo Revealed at Bethesda’s E3 Keynote - Xbox Wire

I mean, it’s a really aggressive and intentionally mean move by Sony, Phil shoud not be the good guy here, there’s always a resolution clause in these contracts, in order to restore at least the original multi platform release.

[LucasTaves]

@peter42O

Replace Starfield with Wolfenstein III and I would say this is an excellent guess. Why is Grounded on the list though? It released already.

I think they will have Starfield first solely because how Phil couldn’t shut up about it when they announced Beth lol

Grounded is in early access, full release should be coming next month or the next after that.

[peter42O]

@Roronoa_Zoro90

I mean, it’s a really aggressive and intentionally mean move by Sony, Phil shoud not be the good guy here, there’s always a resolution clause in these contracts, in order to restore at least the original multi platform release.

Like I have said before, Ghostwire Tokyo and Deathloop were close to being cancelled along with Arkane being shutdown so in a way, Sony literally saved these games. Plus, to go through legal shit and whatnot for these two games simply isn’t worth it. Neither are expected to have any post launch content and will most likely be one and done.

@LucasTaves

I think they will have Starfield first solely because how Phil couldn’t shut up about it when they announced Beth lol

Grounded is in early access, full release should be coming next month or the next after that.

We’ll see. I’m sticking with March 2022.

Okay but Grounded is still playable and was released already. Early Access or not, a game doesn’t release twice. lol.

[LucasTaves]

@peter42O

Like I have said before, Ghostwire Tokyo and Deathloop were close to being cancelled along with Arkane being shutdown so in a way, Sony literally saved these games. Plus, to go through legal shit and whatnot for these two games simply isn’t worth it. Neither are expected to have any post launch content and will most likely be one and done.

Is this something official? Or hinted by someone reliable? Never saw before that Arkane was close to shutting down.

Of course, I would say they facing lay offs would be expected if their games continued to bomb

Edit: But that’s the thing, Grounded hasn’t released yet. Gamepreview is a program to get basically a public beta (or for a dev to gather funds to continue development) but there’s way less requirements than a released game would have.

[Roronoa_Zoro90]

@peter42O

We’ll see. I’m sticking with March 2022.

Okay but Grounded is still playable and was released already. Early Access or not, a game doesn’t release twice. lol.

What’s the source of that? I’ve never seen before someone saying that Deathloop and/or Ghostwire were nearly cancelled. For Arkane closure is more complicated and it could have been related to the overall Zenimax situation, but I seriously doubt that Deathloop was the “make or break” title for Arkane destiny.