2015 saw Xbox touting their “greatest lineup in history” with games like Forza 6, Halo 5: Guardians, Gears of War Ultimate Edition, and Rise of the Tomb Raider hitting the shelves in the last half of the year. Microsoft announced that these exclusives all sold over 1 million copies a piece.
Even though one of the most anticipated exclusives of 2016, Scalebound, was delayed until 2017, Xbox still has a strong offering of console-exclusive titles slated to release in 2016. Not only is there a good volume of releases coming down the pipeline, but the lineup of games is also incredibly diverse. Here are the 9 Xbox One exclusives you should be looking out for in 2016.
Quantum Break
Remedy Entertainment, the studio that brought gamers Alan Wake, have been working for quite some time on their latest game, Quantum Break. Revealed during an event in May of 2013, the third-person action game was supposed to release in 2014, but after a series of setbacks has found its release window slated for this year.
In the three years since its announcement, Quantum Break has undergone quite the facelift. Set against the backdrop of a time-travelling experiment gone wrong, players will control Jack Joyce, a man with the ability to manipulate time. What makes Quantum Break so unique is its mixture of in-game cutscenes and live-action television episodes. The cutscenes will tell the story of Jack Joyce, and the interactive television show starring Shawn Ashmore, Aiden Gillan, and Dominic Monaghan will tell the story of the antagonist.
Inside
Things have been a bit silent from Inside, the spiritual sequel to the dark platform puzzle game Limbo, but whenever it releases, the first place gamers will be able to play it is Xbox One. The 2.5D platform game from Playdead has been in development since 2010 and was supposed to get a release in the first half of 2015. As that window came and went, the publisher issued a press release saying “After five years in development, we, more than anyone, are looking forward to the release, we are so close, but getting it right has taken a little more time than we anticipated.”
Limbo was a big success when it launched in July of 2010, and if Inside can capture the same tone and difficulty as its predecessor it is sure to repeat Limbo’s success.
Cuphead
This quirky run and gun platformer, developed by Studio MDHR, was revealed at E3 2014 and captured fans attention through its unique, hand-drawn 1930s style. With the attention placed heavily on boss design, the protagonist, Cuphead, must defeat a series of bosses in order to repay a debt to the devil.
Even though this is Studio MDHR’s first title, they have already garnered a lot of excitement about this up and coming exclusive. With an art style, sound design, and overall tone looking to stay true to the time period, Cuphead is sure to be one of the most unique and fun games of 2016.
Gears of War 4
Gears of War Judgment was a bit of a misstep in the Gears of War franchise, earning a 79 score from Metacritic when the rest of the entries in the series earned a score somewhere in the 90s. The newly monikered, The Coalition (formerly known as Black Tusk Studios) will look to get the series back on track with the next numbered title in the franchise, Gears of War 4.
The game was revealed at E3 2015 and featured two new characters, JD and an unnamed woman. The reveal trailer showed the pair fighting off giant scorpion-like creatures with their shotguns and lancers, but little else is known about the game outside of that trailer. Gears of War 4 is set to release in the Fall of 2016.
ReCore
ReCore was first revealed through a pre-rendered trailer during Microsoft’s E3 2015 press conference. The game, which is being developed by Keiji Inafune (the maker of Mega Man and Might No. 9) and Armature Studios (founded by the makers of Metroid Prime), is still a bit of a mystery. The trailer featured a young woman and a robotic dog, fighting through a desolate desert. The dog was powered through a blue orb, presumably the core. When the dog sacrifices himself at the end of the trailer the orb is then placed into a larger robot that comes to life as a result.
Outside of that trailer, nothing else about the game has been shown, but ReCore was featured on Xbox’s “Greatest Games for 2016” list. If the pedigree of the studio and project leader is any indication, the quality of this game should be incredible.
Crackdown 3
Of course, no list is complete without a game where players can blow things up in a grand fashion, and Crackdown 3 offers that experience in spades. Powered by Microsoft’s Azure cloud computing technology, the game is set to offer grand-scale destruction with the developers promising that the entire city can be destroyed.
A bit of concern has been raised since Microsoft’s Greatest Games Line-Up post published that only the multiplayer portion of Crackdown 3 would be releasing in the summer of 2016, with no indication as to when the remainder of the game would be hitting shelves. While the multiplayer will be the only mode to feature the much-anticipated fully-destructible environments, players are still looking forward to what Crackdown will offer in terms of a single player campaign. At least players will get to taste what the cloud can offer them this summer.
Halo Wars 2
It was unclear after the release of Halo Wars in 2009 — and the subsequent closing of Ensemble, the studio responsible — whether or not the real-time strategy game would get a sequel. Microsoft shocked Halo fans during Gamescom 2015 when it announced that 343 Industries Studio would be partnering with the makers of the Total War series, Creative Assembly, to bring a sequel to Halo Wars to the Xbox One.
Outside of the reveal trailer, nothing else has been shown about Halo Wars 2, but the game is slated to come to Xbox One in Fall 2016. Halo Wars 2 looks to draw from the runaway success of Halo 5: Guardians which released in October of 2015 to great critical reception.
Sea of Thieves
Rare, the makers of Banjo Kazooie, Golden Eye, and Perfect Dark, had been appointed to making Kinect games for the Xbox 360 since 2010 when it began developing Kinect Sports. However, at E3 2015 it was announced that Rare would be returning to the standard controller-based gaming that made their studio popular to begin with.
The first-person multiplayer title allows players to live the life of a pirate on the high seas, taking on other pirates, sailing ships, and fighting animated skeletons. Players will also be able to use a set of in-game tools to create user-generated content. The game has no specific release date but is being advertised as releasing in 2016.
Below
Capybara Games, known for their latest release Super Time Force, announced Below way back at E3 2013, but the game had been in the works years prior to its announcement. A top-down adventure game with a bend towards difficulty, Below is going to feature “brutal but fair combat”, alongside permadeath according to its creators. But of course, survival is just the start.
“If you manage to survive, that’s where the discovery component comes in,” game creator Nathan Vella says. “That’s when you start unlocking the potential of the game, the story, the lore and also what you can do within the game itself.”
After a long development cycle, Below is finally set to release in 2016.
There are the 9 Xbox exclusive titles to look forward to! Which ones are you looking forward to the most in 2016? Let us know in the comments below!
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