Outriders
While the biggest Xbox Game Pass news of the week has been the arrival of 20 massive Bethesda titles after the Microsoft acquisition, there may be one more to add soon of some significance.
Game Pass has done this before, “leaking” a game coming to the service with a joke email, and now we have a new one from “Melissa McGamepass” which you can read below.
The most important line there is “Has anyone noticed a mysterious signal appearing in the distance lately or am I the anomaly in this situation?”
While yes, many sci-fi games have used both mysterious signals and anomalies in various plot points, there is one that uses both that is being released in…two weeks. Square Enix’s Outriders.
And some of the wording here is exact:
In addition to the mysterious signal mentioned there, the anomaly is the main focus of the entire game and the unstable storm on an alien planet that gives you your powers.
When it was first suggested to me that Outriders could be launching on Xbox Game Pass after this tease, I didn’t think that made much sense, considering you can already pre-purchase the game. But Microsoft has done things like this before, and it’s hard to rule anything out when it comes to their desire to make Game Pass attractive.
Square Enix’s last big deal was with PlayStation for Avengers, where that version of the game got a few bonuses and the promise of an exclusive Spider-Man hero still to come. But now for its other looter, it’s possible they went with Microsoft this time. The biggest looter on the market right now, Destiny 2, also did a deal with Microsoft to be on Game Pass with its new expansion, and it’s possible that was successful, so Microsoft pursued Outriders for this new deal.
It would just be a hell of a coincidence to see this phrasing dropped two weeks before Outriders arrives. One potential issue with this is that it could change minds about where people pick up the game, meaning their investment in the demo wouldn’t carry over because there’s no cross save. For instance I have four maxed characters and several legendaries on PlayStation, but if I wanted to switch over to Game Pass on Xbox, that wouldn’t carry over (demo progress saves for the final release of the game).
It’s possible that this is another sci-fi game that I can’t think of right now. Dead Space? I don’t know. But Outriders really does fit the bill based on what’s being teased here, and if there’s an official announcement, I would expect to hear it soon. Stay tuned for updates.
Follow me on Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and Instagram. Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series, and The Earthborn Trilogy, which is also on audiobook.
