Digital Trends may earn a commission when you buy through links on our site. Why trust us?

Octopath Traveler, Undertale come to Xbox Game Pass this month

By Giovanni Colantonio March 16, 2021

Xbox Game Pass is getting another batch of games this March. The new group includes some heavy hitters like Octopath Traveler and Yakuza 6: The Song of Life, as well as indie favorites including Undertale.

The latest batch of games comes at a particularly busy time for the service. Game Pass subscribers just got a total of 20 Bethesda games following Microsoft’s successful acquisition of the company. Microsoft is also bringing Outriders to the service on April 1. The newly announced games will fill the space between those two content drops.

This news calls for some eyeball emojis https://t.co/ALfcNi5kvY pic.twitter.com/HOGmDuIkyZ

— Xbox Game Pass (@XboxGamePass) March 16, 2021

The biggest addition is Octopath Traveler, which will be available on console and PC March 25. The retro RPG originally launched as a Nintendo Switch exclusive before finding its way onto PC in 2019. Yakuza 6: The Song of Life also drops on Cloud, PC, and console that same day. Microsoft previously confirmed that the game would come to its service at this year’s Game Awards.

Undertale is now available for Cloud, console, and PC users. The indie game has become a cult classic since its 2015 release, propelling it to meme infamy.

PC players have a big day coming on March 18. The service will add Star Wars Squadrons, Nier: Automata, and Torchlight 3 to the service on that day. Gangster strategy game Empire of Sin also joins the PC roster as well as Cloud and console on March 18.

The latest batch is rounded out by some brand-new indie games. Stylish detective game Genesis Noir lands on console and PC on March 25, and action-adventure game Narita Boy will be available on Cloud, console, and PC on March 30.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics

Giovanni Colantonio

Section Editor, Gaming

Giovanni is a writer and video producer focusing on happenings in the video game industry. He has contributed stories to…

Gaming

Microsoft has acquired Activision Blizzard: What does that mean for you?

The key art from when Microsoft finally acquired Activision Blizzard.

Microsoft now owns Activision Blizzard. After Microsoft worked to appease regulators and fend off litigation, the $69 billion acquisition first announced in January 2022 is finally complete. Now that Activision Blizzard is officially part of Microsoft and a sister company to Xbox Game Studios and ZeniMax Media, that raises an important question: What does this acquisition mean for you as a player?

Following this acquisition, Microsoft will own more gaming studios, the availability of Call of Duty and other Activision Blizzard franchises will shift, and unionization efforts within Activision Blizzard could gain a bit more ground. If you're wondering what happens next, here's our thorough examination of how the deal could impact players moving forward.
Microsoft's new game studios
With this acquisition, Microsoft will now own all the developers under the Activision Blizzard company. That includes the teams at Activision Publishing, Blizzard Entertainment, and King, the latter of which is the developer behind the wildly popular mobile series Candy Crush. The acquisition encompasses the following subsidiaries as well: Treyarch, Infinity Ward, Raven Software, Sledgehammer Games, High Moon Studios, Beenox, Toys for Bob, Activision Shanghai Studio, Solid State Studios, Demonware, Digital Legends, and Major League Gaming. Microsoft now also owns the rights to all of the games and IP Activision Blizzard previously released.

Gaming

Will Starfield come to PS5?

Spaceship on planet in Starfield.

The long-anticipated Bethesda RPG Starfield has finally been released and the reviews from players are looking great so far. Featuring the publisher's first new world in 25 years, Starfield is centered around endless space exploration — quite a different direction than Fallout's postapocalyptic America or The Elder Scroll's fantasy landscapes. While the game doesn't necessarily allow you to get lost in space like most players initially were looking forward to, it does contain plenty of excellent sci-fi standbys like multiverse theories, a vast pool of spaceships to pilot through galaxies, and some far-out futuristic weaponry.

Starfield launched on the Xbox Series X and PC (and Xbox One, sort of), but hasn't made its way to the PlayStation 5. While there are plenty of great games on PS5, some Sony gamers are still eagerly waiting for their chance to jump into the world of Starfield.
Will Starfield come to PS5?

Gaming

Xbox’s 2023 games feel like the Series X launch lineup we never got

EMBARGO 10/4 12:01 AM PT: A camera angle up close to a Forza Motorsport race.

Even though we’re almost three years into the life span of the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S, it feels like this console generation is just starting for Microsoft.
It’s no secret that Xbox was slow to start up and then maintain consistency this console generation. For example, 2020 saw the company putting out a weak console launch lineup made up of ports and remasters. While 2021 had a flurry of great games, it was followed by a comparatively barren 2022. And 2023 hasn't been perfect either (due, in large part, to the flop that is Redfall), but outside of that, this year delivered the excellent Hi-Fi Rush, the grandly scaled Starfield, solid ports of two Age of Empires games and Quake II, a new Minecraft title, and a technical showpiece in Forza Motorsport.
Looking at that varied lineup, these games showcase both the potential of the Series X and the power of Xbox as a brand. Prospects for Xbox’s lineup are up heading into 2024 too, so it feels like we’re at the proper start of the Xbox Series X and S console generation ... even if it came a few years too late.
A new beginning
Looking at the 2020 launch lineup for Xbox Series X/S, it wasn’t exactly emblematic of what the console could do. While there were some nice 4K and 60 frames per second (fps) upgrades for Xbox One games, the only new draws were a console port of Gears Tactics, the multiplayer-supporting Tetris Effect: Connected, a temporary next-gen exclusive version of Yakuza: Like a Dragon, and some smaller indies like The Falconeer and Bright Memory 1.0.

Most of those games were on or came to more platforms afterward and, in general, didn’t provide that strong of an argument for why players should stick around this console generation. But looking at many of the games Xbox has released this year, it finally feels like we have a bundle of good Xbox exclusives that show what the platform was always capable of.
In my review of Forza Motorsport, I note that the game feels like a launch title because it’s an impressive technical showpiece. It runs at 4K and 60 fps in performance mode, which is something not many games this generation have done. The closest comparable games are Astro’s Playroom and Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered on PlayStation 5, which effectively demonstrated the power of Sony's console early on.
Forza Motorsport was also built as a platform that developer Turn 10 Studios can expand over time. It plans to periodically slot in new single and multiplayer content, including new cars and tracks. A game like that makes a lot of sense early on in a console’s life span in this live-service era. It’s what Microsoft tried to do with Halo Infinite, even if that didn’t pan out as expected due to a one-year delay, and with Killer Instinct on Xbox One.