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Deathloop, Valheim and more lead Xbox Game Pass mid-month update

By Jesse Lennox September 20, 2022

The slate of games coming to Game Pass for the last half of September has been fully revealed. While there aren’t many surprises this time around, September will add some heavy hitters in the form of Deathloop, Valheim, and the 1.0 release of Grounded.

A wall of games coming to xbox. — Image used with permission by copyright holder

Xbox released the full lineup of titles subscribers can download and play across cloud, console, and PC in the back half of September, many of which were previously announced. The major addition is the previously PlayStation exclusive shooter Deathloop, which is also coming to PlayStation Plus Extra today.

For those who enjoy playing early access titles on Game Pass, the service is adding 2021 survival hit Valheim and Slime Rancher 2. Obsidian’s Grounded exits early access on September 27.

Here is the full list of titles coming to the service:

Deathloop (Cloud, Console, and PC) — Available today
Hardspace: Shipbreaker (Cloud, Console, and PC) — Available today
SpiderHeck (Console and PC) — September 22
Beacon Pines (Cloud, Console, and PC) — September 22
Slime Rancher 2 (Cloud, Xbox Series X/S, and PC) — September 22
Moonscars (Cloud, Console, and PC) — September 27
Grounded (Cloud, Console, and PC) — September 27
Let’s Build A Zoo (Cloud, Console, and PC) — September 29
Valheim (PC) — September 29
PAW Patrol Grand Prix (Cloud, Console, and PC) – September 30

With every announcement of new games comes the reveal of a new batch of games leaving Game Pass. There’s nothing too substantial on the way out this month, but if you do spot anything you want to play, you can still purchase it for a 20% discount before it leaves on September 30. Here’s everything leaving at the end of the month.

AI: The Somnium Files (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Astria Ascending (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Dandy Ace (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Dirt 4 (PC) EA Play
Dirt Rally (PC) EA Play
Going Under (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Lemnis Gate (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Slime Rancher (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Subnautica: Below Zero (Cloud, Console, and PC)
The Procession to Calvary (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Unsighted (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Visage (Cloud, Console, and PC)

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Jesse Lennox loves writing, games, and complaining about not having time to write and play games. He knows the names of more…

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You don’t need an Xbox Series X to play Starfield. Here’s how

Key art for Starfield

Starfield is the highest-profile Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S game since Halo Infinite, but the game isn't locked to those two consoles. Thanks to cloud gaming and Microsoft's more open-ended mentality of making its games available on a wide variety of platforms, you don't have to own one of Microsoft's current-gen systems or have the Xbox app installed on your PC.
No, it's not on PS5 or Nintendo Switch, but if you want to play Starfield while it's at the center of the video game industry zeitgeist, here are some places where it's playable other than the Xbox Series X, Xbox Series X, and Xbox PC app.
Steam

The most obvious choice if you want to play Starfield elsewhere is to pick it up on Steam. While Microsoft does have a proprietary PC launcher of its own, Microsoft now consistently releases its own games through Valve's launcher. Bethesda joined Xbox Game Studios in 2021 and has a long history of making its games available on Steam as well, so it's not too surprising that Starfield is available on the platform.
Starfield already proving quite popular on the platform too, having peaked at 266,000 concurrent players, according to SteamDB at the time I'm writing this. If you're looking for a way to play Starfield natively on the hardware you own without using a Microsoft platform or service, this is your best option. It'll run on Steam Deck too, although that's not the only way to experience Starfield on the go.
Xbox Game Pass app on Android

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Is Baldur’s Gate 3 coming to Xbox?

A mage holding a flaming object.

After years in early access only on PC, Baldur's Gate 3 is finally here in its final state. This CRPG has the internet buzzing about just how long and varied the experience can be. What's even better is that it can be played in co-op, though with limited cross-platform features. Those looking at the game may notice that there is only ever mention of a PC and PlayStation 5 version, which obviously raises the question about Xbox consoles. Baldur's Gate 3 doesn't have any exclusivity deal with PlayStation, so why isn't it on Xbox, and will it ever be?
Will Baldur's Gate 3 come to Xbox?
https://twitter.com/Cromwelp/status/1685821620756021249?s=20

The latest update from Larian states that it will be able to release Baldur's Gate 3 on Series X and S sometime before the end of 2023, but with the S version not having split-screen coop.

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The impending Xbox 360 Store closure makes me wary of Game Pass’ future

I'm an avid Xbox Game Pass user, often trying almost every game that comes to the service and closely following the games coming to and leaving the service each month. Following some recent announcements by Microsoft, though, I've been thinking a lot more about something else about Xbox Game Pass and Microsoft's current digital-focused Xbox storefronts and ecosystem: what happens when it all goes away?
Microsoft announced last week that it will shut down the Xbox 360 Store in July 2024. After that day, it will be impossible to buy games, movies, or TV shows digitally on the Xbox 360 store; it's just like what happened with the 3DS and Wii U eShops earlier this year. That announcement also came not long after Microsoft revealed it would replace Xbox Live Gold with Xbox Game Pass Core in September. With these changes, Microsoft is stamping out any support or focus its giving to the Xbox 360's era as a platform. As someone who grew up mostly playing Xbox 360, seeing these things I grew up with go away is saddening. It's also making me think about the day this will eventually happen to Xbox Game Pass or the store on the Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S.

Frankly, I'm not as concerned that Microsoft is going to do it anytime soon. Microsoft has given no indication that it plans on abandoning Xbox Game Pass. It's a really successful subscription service heavily integrated into all of its current platforms, there are titles confirmed to launch day one on it into 2024 and beyond, and Xbox initiatives like Play Anywhere and Smart Delivery ensure that at least some version of most Xbox games are available on other platforms. While I expect it to be the primary part of Microsoft's gaming strategy over the next decade, as someone who mainly played Xbox 360 growing up and is now seeing its storefront and subscription service go away, I'm now thinking about what the end of the Game Pass era will look like.
These recent actions have indicated that Microsoft will eventually be willing to do the same to the storefronts and subscription service we're currently using. Even after the backlash PlayStation, Nintendo, and Xbox all faced from these announcements, Sony is the only one that has backtracked its plans to close down older digital storefronts, at least temporarily. Xbox Game Pass is the current hotness for Microsoft, but what happens come the day it isn't? A lot more games are digital-only or tied to a subscription this generation, and those are the games most at risk of being lost if a digital storefront shuts down.
What happens to the Xbox console versions of games like Pentiment or Immortality on Xbox once Xbox Game Pass and the current iteration of the Xbox Store are shuttered? Yes, they can be played on PC, but the Xbox console version will be lost forever. And right now, it doesn't seem like Microsoft has any publicly shared plans to permanently preserve those experiences, nor has it done so for all of the Xbox 360 digital games going away. Game preservation is a significant problem facing the game industry, and Microsoft has just made a move showing that it's on the wrong side of that effort.