The must-watch Xbox games releasing in 2022 and beyond

Ever since the Xbox Series X|S launched in 2020, Microsoft has provided audiences with a healthy supply of stellar titles that have enriched the videogame industry to new heights. These videogames have ranged from AAA blockbuster epics that push the hardware capabilities of the Series X to its limits or humble indie titles that evoke nostalgic memories with pixel-art inspired visuals and thought-provoking stories.

As 2022 rolls on, the Xbox platform continues to expand its library with more exciting games. With so many titles in the works, it can be tricky to keep track of them. And that’s without mentioning the plethora of rumors surrounding unannounced games for Xbox consoles.

As such, we at Windows Central will help you out by highlighting the latest upcoming AAA and indie games confirmed to release for Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S. With this list, you can stay up to date on what’s to come and not miss out on potentially playing the best Xbox games these platforms have to offer.

Destiny 2: The Witch Queen is the next major expansion to Bungie’s multiplayer-focused, first-person shooter, Destiny 2. This expansion will feature tons of new maps, gear, weapons, missions, a new raid dungeon and a new story where players are tasked with stopping the Witch King from the stealing the Light.

Monster Crown (Feb. 22, 2022)

Monster Crown is an upcoming indie monster-catching RPG developed by Studio Aurum and published by SOEDESCO. This game takes on Crown Island, a land populated with vicious monsters and power-hungry villains seeking to use said monsters to conquer the island. It is up to you to make pacts with the monsters, use their powers to bring villains to justice and uncover the truth behind Crown Island’s dark history.

Release dates confirmed

GRID Legends (Feb. 25, 2022)

GRID Legends is the upcoming fifth entry in Codemasters and EA’s series of racing games, GRID. Race against your friends in online racing matches that support up to 21 players. Partake in the single-player Career mode or the virtual production-inspired Driven to Glory mode. And create your own racetracks and challenges for your friends to complete with the new Race Creator mode.

Elden Ring (Feb. 25, 2022)

Elden Ring is the next game from Hidetaka Miyazaki and FromSoftware, known for games like Dark Souls and Sekiro. Elden Ring takes the popular Soulslike formula and injects it into a large and perilous open world, penned in collaboration with Game of Thrones writer George R.R. Martin.

The highly anticipated title launches on Feb. 25, 2022, and looks like it could easily sit among this year’s game of the year nominations.

Shadow Warrior 3 (March 1, 2022)

The rude and crude Lo Wang is back for another crazy, bullet-riddled caper in the Shadow Warrior 3, the latest entry of the first-person shooter series, Shadow Warrior. In this adventure, Lo Wang and his sidekick Orochi Zilla must embark on a journey to a stop they accidentally released from destroying to the world and gun down any bad guys and evil demons they find along the way.

Stranger Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin (March 18, 2022)

Stranger Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin is a hack and slash spin-off of Square Enix’s Final Fantasy series, developed by Team Ninja of Ninja Gaiden and Nioh fame. In this tale inspired by the original Final Fantasy, you play as Jack Garland, a warrior who is on a quest to restore the crystals of light back to Cornelia and destroy the evil being known as Chaos.

Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands (March 25, 2022)

Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands is a spin-off title of the crazy, looter shooter series, Borderlands. Create your own tabletop-inspired fantasy hero, grab the biggest guns you can find and begin a chaotic adventure where rules and logic can go flying out the window at any moment if Tiny Tina feels like it.

Tunic (March 16, 2022)

Tunic is an upcoming old-school dungeon crawler in the vein of the OG Zelda games. Taking control of a cutesy fox warrior, it’s on you to brave ancient ruins, battle swarms of spooky dudes, and get piles of loot.

Weird West (March 31, 2022)

Built by the co-developers of Prey and Dishonored, Weird West is self-described as an action RPG fantasy western where werewolves, cultists, and other occult beings lurk in the shadows of the frontiers. It’s looking to bring a new take to the open-world formula when it launches in March.

LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga (April 5, 2022)

LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga is the latest and biggest LEGO Star Wars game to date. Play as all your favorite heroes or villains and re-live all nine movies of the Skywalker Saga told through the whimsical and family-friendly lens of the LEGO Star Wars universe.

Chrono Cross: Radical Dreamers Edition (April 7, 2022)

The cult-classic PlayStation One JRPG Chrono Cross is coming to Xbox in the form of an updated remaster called Chrono Cross: Radical Dreamers Edition. Embark on a magical journey as the young boy Surge and his thieving partner Kid as they traverse two parallel worlds in search of the truth of their world’s future.

This remaster includes the original game along with enhanced visuals, a re-done soundtrack, and quality-of-life improvements to the combat system, such as the ability to turn off enemy encounters or change the combat speed. The biggest addition of this remaster is “Radical Dreamers Le Trésor Interdit,” a text-based adventure game set in the Chrono Cross universe that was originally released only in Japan for the Satellaview, an add-on peripheral for the Super Famicom (Japan’s version of the Super Nintendo).

Moo Lander (Spring 2022)

Moo Lander is a Metroidvania-style platformer developed and published by The Sixth Hammer. In this game, you have been given the daunting task of piloting your civilization’s last functioning spaceship to gather the galaxy’s greatest energy source — milk. To accomplish your mission, you must travel to distant worlds and use your ship’s advanced weaponry to hunt down and tame the Mighty Cows. These are a breed of super-intelligent and super-strong alien cows that will destroy anything that invades their territory.

Trek to Yomi (Spring 2022)

Trek to Yomi is an upcoming samurai action game, inspired by classic samurai movies from the likes of Akira Kurosawa. A young swordsman named Hiroki swears to avenge his dying master, on a mission that blurs the lines between the living and the dead. Trek to Yomi sports a unique monochromatic aesthetic, with brutal side-scrolling combat that looks every bit as stylish as it does satisfying.

Capcom Fighting Collection (Jun. 24, 2022)

Celebrate Capcom’s fighting game legacy with the Capcom Fighting Collection. This collection contains ten classic Capcom fighting games such as Hyper Street Fighter II: The Anniversary Edition, Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo, Super Gem Fighter Mini Mix, Cyberbots: Fullmetal Madness, the entire Darkstalkers series, and the once-arcade exclusive, Red Earth. All these games can be played be solo or against other players in casual or ranked online matches, supported by rollback netcode to ensure stability during online gameplay.

Saints Row (Aug. 23, 2022)

Saints Row is an upcoming open-world, action-adventure game that is set to reboot Deep Silver Volition’s over-the-top, Saints Row franchise. You play as the boss of a criminal gang called “The Saints,” and your goal is to eliminate all rival gangs and take over the city of Santo Ileso so you can forge your criminal empire.

Soul Hackers 2 (Aug. 26, 2022)

Soul Hackers 2 is an upcoming JRPG created and brought to you by Atlus, the team behind the Shin Megami Tensei and Persona franchises. This game is about the “Devil Summoners”, a group of young people who have the ability to summon demons and use their powers. It is your job to lead these Devil Summoners on a mission to stop the mysterious “Phantom Society” from calling the “Great One” and bring about the end of the world.

Starfield (Nov. 11, 2022)

Microsoft grabbed Starfield with its ground-shaking purchase of Bethesda in 2020. Starfield is a singleplayer sci-fi RPG set in space, although almost nothing is known about the game so far. We know that Starfield will launch in 2022.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chernobyl (Dec. 8, 2022)

Microsoft also unveiled STALKER 2: Heart of Chernobyl at their July showcase as a timed exclusive for Xbox Series X and PC. STALKER is an open-world shooter with survival elements, tasking players to navigate a radiated Chernobyl filled with physics anomalies and other threats lurking in the dark.

At the start of 2022, it was revealed STALKER 2 is sadly being delayed until the end of the year.

SD Gundam Battle Alliance (2022)

SD Gundam Battle Alliance is an upcoming action RPG based on the giant robot anime franchise Gundam. This game will have the player pilot Super Deformed (SD) versions of the iconic Gundam mechs to stop a mysterious phenomenon called “Breaks” from destroying the world. Take control of Gundams from the original “Mobile Suit Gundam” series to the modern “Mobile Suit Gundam Iron-Blooded Orphans” series in an action-packed single campaign that can be played solo or alongside your friends in 3-player co-op.

Atomic Heart (2022)

Atomic Heart is an upcoming first-person shooter set in alternate universe where the USSR became the leading global superpower after it developed a powerful resource known as “Polymer.” However, not all is well in Russia as a disastrous incident has occurred at the facility where Polymer was invented and you, as the KGP agent Sergey Nechaev, have been dispatched to investigate it. What follows will be a terrifying adventure filled with killer robots, bloodthirsty mutants, and all sorts of science experiments gone horribly wrong.

The Wolf Among Us 2 (2023)

The Wolf Among Us 2, the long-awaited sequel to Telltale’s narrative-focused adventure game, The Wolf Among Us, has finally been unveiled with a tentative release date for 2023. This series tells the story of Bigby Wolf, the former sheriff of “Fabletown” — a secret community within the streets of New York City that houses characters from fairy tales and folklore. The first game had Bigby track down an enigmatic serial killer murdering the citizens of “Fabletown,” and it looks like Bigby will once again be pulled into another murder mystery in the sequel, whilst also trying to keep a leash on his own inner wolf.

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide (2022)

From the developers of Vermintide, Warhammer 40,000: Darktide is an upcoming 4-player co-op shooter that shares familiarity with the likes of Left4Dead. Set in the harrowing universe of Warhammer 40K, players battle a heretical cult known as the Admonition, hellbent on taking over the planet Atoma Prime. Battle all sorts of Chaos monstrosities in this class-based evolving shooter, which also arrives first on Xbox Series X/S consoles as a timed exclusive.

War Hospital (2022)

War Hospital is an evocative strategy game that puts you in command of a hospital in World War 1. You’ll be tasked with healing the wounded in dire conditions, in a game that seems to draw inspiration from the likes of Frostpunk.

A Plague Tale: Requiem (2022)

A Plague Tale: Requiem is the next installment in the Plague Tale franchise, and it’s launching directly onto Xbox Game Pass in 2022. A Plague Tale: Requiem is a next-gen-only affair, following Amicia and Hugo on an all-new quest in a plagued, infested world.

Scorn (Fall 2022)

Scorn is an upcoming horror title that leans heavily into H.R. Giger’s art styles to create its grotesque world. Not a huge amount is known about the game besides the fact that it is firmly survival horror, set in a first-person, and is exclusive to Xbox Series X and PC.

Release dates to be confirmed

Mandragora

Mandragora is an upcoming Metroidvania-style, side-scrolling action RPG developed by Primal Game Studio and published by Marvelous Europe. This game takes in a dark fantasy world where mankind has fallen to entropy and monsters lurk behind every corner. It is up to you to explore this decaying realm, slay the monsters preying upon humanity, and find a way to restore peace and happiness to the land.

Klonoa Phantasy Reverie Series

The Klonoa Phantasy Reverie Series is an upcoming remastered collection of the Klonoa series. These are a series of cute and charming side-scrolling platformers where you play as the titular Klonoa, a young cat-like boy on a quest to the save world from evil. This collection contains “Klonoa: Door to Phantomile” and “Klonoa 2: Lunatea’s Veil,” both of which have received visual upgrades and new difficulty options to bring in new audiences to experience Klonoa’s colorful world how they see fit. This title will be releasing on the Nintendo Switch on July 8, 2022, but it will also be arriving on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, and PC via Steam at a later date.

Redfall

From Arkane we have Redfall, an upcoming co-operative shooter/immersive sim, where you go toe to toe with vampiric forces of darkness. Not a huge amount is known about Redfall, besides the fact it’s Xbox and Windows exclusive. It’s expected to launch sometime in 2022, but it’s as of yet unconfirmed.

Deathloop

Deathloop was commissioned as a PlayStation-timed exclusive, but with the exclusivity period set to end in 2022, you can expect to see it on Xbox sooner rather than later. Deathloop is a puzzle FPS, where players examine time loops to make a series of assassinations in a set time limit.

Ghostwire: Tokyo

Ghostwire: Tokyo is from the legendary mind of Shinji Mikami, famed for work on The Evil Within and Resident Evil. Not a huge amount is known about Ghostwire, but this is another PlayStation-timed exclusive … at least for now. With Microsoft now owning Tango Gameworks, much like Deathloop, you can expect to see this game on Xbox in 2023 most likely.

Contraband

Contraband is an upcoming Xbox exclusive developed in partnership with Avalanche, known for Mad Max and Just Cause. Contraband has been described to us as a multiplayer smuggler sandbox, where players come together to plan heists and execute them, in a vehicular-combat extravaganza. There’s no known planned launch window for Contraband as of yet.

Pragmata

Pragmata is an upcoming title from Capcom set in an extraordinary futuristic setting. Almost nothing is known about the game, besides the fact it’s coming to next-gen systems and looks incredibly sleek.

There Is No Light

There Is No Light is a Kickstarter success story that came to Xbox and PC in November 2021. This self-proclaimed “brutal” action game sports a gothic retro-pixel art style and looks to have tight (and gory) combat. Escape a deadly cult, and kill hordes of enemies while doing so.

The Last Night

The Last Night is an upcoming “2D open-world” title from Odd Tales Games. The neon-blasted cyberpunk title features action-infiltration-oriented gameplay, complete with a branching narrative and stunning art that combines retro-2D sprites and modern lighting with 3D elements.

There’s no launch date listed at the time of writing, but The Last Night is seeking investment due to some developmental issues.

Everwild

The next title from Rare was revealed in late 2019, showing us another gorgeous and colorful world from the British studio. Very little is known about Everwild, but the trailer seems to indicate that it’s some form of multiplayer experience, complete with stealth mechanics and uniquely gorgeous creatures.

Overwatch 2

Announced at BlizzCon 2019, Overwatch 2 finally adds a story mode to the colorful hero shooter, filling in some of the gaps in the game’s lore.

While Overwatch 2 will be a separate game with its own content, Blizzard won’t be splitting up the playerbase between the first and second games, instead uniting both in the same multiplayer pool with the same heroes. There’s no known launch window at this point, but we’ll be sure to update you when there is.

Diablo 4

Diablo 4 was revealed at BlizzCon 2019, and what a reveal it was.

Ditching the previous game’s cartoony, colorful aesthetic, Diablo 4 goes all-in on a haunting, gothic realism and brutal violence. Blizzard notes that Diablo II has been the template for the franchise’s fourth installment, both in tone and in the game’s more methodical pacing.

There’s no known launch window as of yet. We’ll probably be waiting a long time for this one.

Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II

Another huge surprise announcement recently was that of Hellblade II, built from the ground up for the next-gen Xbox Series X. The in-engine trailer showcases the insane visuals Ninja Theory will achieve when the game hits the Xbox Series X.

Little is known about the game, but Senua is a Pict warrior who navigates the horrors of Helheim to rescue the soul of a loved one. The game pushed extremely incredible visuals for its time, with stunning atmospherics, but was a bit limited in scope due to the studio’s independent nature. Now, as part of Microsoft, Hellblade II may push further into more action-oriented territory.

Avowed

Avowed was revealed at Microsoft’s July Xbox showcase and is a next-gen, Xbox Series X, RPG experience from Obsidian, set in the Pillars of Eternity universe. Not a huge amount is known about the game, save for the fact it will have first-person gameplay Elder Scrolls-style and has a slick cinematic trailer to keep us appetized.

Forza Motorsport 8

Microsoft and Turn 10 are rebuilding the Forza engine from the ground up, aiming to launch as an Xbox Series X exclusive in the future. Forza Motorsport 8 may be something of a reboot of sorts, dropping the numbered entries. Not a huge amount is known about the game, but we may be waiting awhile before we get our steering wheels on this one.

State of Decay 3

State of Decay 3 is also a bit of an enigma, offering us a cinematic trailer and not much else. Set in a more wintry environment, there are possibilities that you’ll have to manage your internal temperature in addition to other survival needs, as the plague seems to have now spread to animals and not just humans.

Fable

Microsoft finally revealed Fable after years of rumors and speculation. Fable is being built for Xbox Series X and PC and will showcase the talents of Playground Games, which has grown into a huge studio over the past few years.

Elder Scrolls VI

Like Starfield, Elder Scrolls VI is now part of Microsoft’s Xbox Game Studios, alongside Bethesda’s acquisition. And just like Starfield, almost nothing is known about the game. It will be singleplayer and a traditional Elder Scrolls-style open RPG, but we may be waiting a long while to see this game materialize.

Perfect Dark

At the 2020 Game Awards, Microsoft unveiled the long-rumored project of The Initiative — a full reboot of Rare’s classic sci-fi spy adventure Perfect Dark. Details are scant on exactly how Perfect Dark will look and play, but we’ve heard it will take cues from the gadgetry of Perfect Dark Zero and may draw comparisons to the likes of Splinter Cell: Conviction for stylish stealth-action gameplay.

Indiana Jones

Randomly and out of the blue, Microsoft and ZeniMax’s Machine Games revealed that the studio known for Wolfenstein’s popular reboot is building an Indiana Jones game, in partnership with Disney’s revived Lucasfilms’ Games division. There are practically no details about this whatsoever, but we’re already hyped. I wouldn’t expect to see this game any time soon, though.

What are you hyped for?

As you can see, there are a lot of Xbox games to look forward in 2022 and beyond. With this many games, coupled with Microsoft’s Netflix-styled Xbox Game Pass service that lets consumers download hundreds of Xbox games for a small monthly fee, it’s safe to say the future of the Xbox brand is looking brighter than ever.