Xbox Showcase (23/07/20) What Was There?
Microsoft wanted to give the fans something to talk about that wasn’t disappointment over a lack of gameplay or lacklustre exclusives, much of which followed the ‘big games showcase’ for the Xbox Series X back in May. So what did Microsoft show?
We’re actually going to start in the pre-show. Microsoft showed what is one of Stage-Select’s favourite Switch games; Dragon Quest 11 S: Echoes of an Elusive Age Definite Edition will be coming to the Xbox One (plus the PS4 and PC) on the 4th of December, 2020. Also in the pre-show you had Square Enix and Yuji Naka (Sonic The Hedgehog) revealing his newest game Balan Wonderland, a musical 3D platformer coming out in ‘Spring 2021’, and will be playable on the Xbox One and Series X, and will be taking advantage of Microsoft’s ‘Smart Delivery’ system.
Then into the presentation proper and Halo Infinite. Microsoft decided to show some opening story and a decent chunk of uninterrupted gameplay combat. There was also a release window of
‘holiday 2020’. Developers 343 Industries are promising the world of Halo Infinite is larger than the worlds of the last two games combined.
Halo was followed by a trailer for State of Decay 3, and then there was some footage for Forza Motor Sport.
Rare was present with a new trailer for creative-looking Everwild, but with seemingly no gameplay it is still hard to tell quite what the game is.
On the 9th of September there will be new content released for Outer Worlds, and also from developers Obsidian was the new first-person RPG called Avowed. So Obsidian has clearly been busy.
There was another new title too, this one the story-driven As Dusk Falls. And for those interested in the weird (and are a little bit older) will have been pleased to see Psychonauts 2.
There were some ‘console launch exclusives’ which seems to be another way of saying
not-really-exclusive which included S.T.A.L.K.E.R 2, a new 3D adventure game called The Gunk and Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis (2021).
The presentation finished with a (short) announcment trailer the newest Fable game.
There was a lot here, including a few things we haven’t mentioned, but Microsoft definitely wanted to have a stronger showing at this attempt. They did that, and if you consider the announcements in the pre-show then this is was worth a look. There were times when the showcase seemed to drag somewhat, but there were some big titles here, some interesting titles, and many titles.
It will be interesting to see how many of these titles are exclusive to Xbox consoles, and how many of them will be available both to the Xbox One and Series X. That aside, Microsoft did a good job overall.
