Though the Xbox One doesn’t have much in the way of exclusives coming this holiday season, especially with Crackdown 3 being delayed to spring of next year, Microsoft’s announcement that it would be publishing the hugely successful PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is a glimmer of hope for the console come late 2017.
Yet one can’t help but wonder what potential the manufacturer has when it comes to porting over other PC hits to its Xbox One platform. Competitor Sony has successfully courted many indie developers to support the PlayStation family of systems, most notably with gaming phenomenon Undertale making the jump to both PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita recently, so it’s only time for Microsoft to do the same.
The following is a list of titles with established fan bases that are almost guaranteed to make a splash on Xbox One should they be ported over to the console. Keep in mind this is purely speculative and of the imagination of the author, though not completely out of the question.
StarCraft
With Halo Wars finding an audience among Xbox consumers and even warranting itself a sequel, Microsoft should have no problem convincing Blizzard to port some iteration of real-time strategy franchise StarCraft over to the Xbox One – preferably the recently released StarCraft: Remastered, and even StarCraft II.
This could be an excellent means of breaking the console into Asian markets, seeing as how the game is still popular in the esports industry, particularly in South Korea. Having a presence in the tournament bracket could help extend Xbox’s global reach further.
Total War: Warhammer
Total War: Warhammer is one of the most critically acclaimed games of last year and its sequel, appropriately named Total War: Warhammer 2, is set to release next month. It’s the fastest-selling Total War game ever, with half a million copies sold in its first few days on sale. Best of all is that three parts are planned, meaning that there’s even more sales to be had in the future.
Though Total War is a turn-based strategy and real-time tactics franchise with a larger target audience on PC than on console, Microsoft could allow cross-platform play should the title make it to the Xbox One. This could be an excellent means of providing a buffer between the ever-encroaching threat of PC gaming, too.
Dream Daddy: A Dad Dating Simulator
If PlayStation has Undertale, then Xbox should have Dream Daddy. Arguably the most talked about game on Steam this year (next to PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds), this visual novel from the minds of Game Grumps should be ported as a natural crowd-pleaser. After all, with so many fans online sharing OTPs and memes of the game already, it’s a given that console players would be eager to see what all the hype is about.
By the way, the dating simulator genre does have its place on console, seeing as how Hatoful Boyfriend enjoyed great success from its ports to PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita some years back. It, too, was a much talked about game on Steam during that time.
Hearthstone
Hearthstone is halfway on its way to making it to the Xbox One – it just needs to make the jump from Microsoft Windows first. Though this free-to-play online collectible card game from Blizzard isn’t as talked about as it once was, rest assured that it still has a huge fan base behind it, with 70 million players as of May this year.
If Microsoft is concerned with capturing more of the esports market, it need not look further than Hearthstone, as the title is estimated to accrue $20 million per month. A Blizzard partnership could work wonders for the Xbox brand and make it more modern in today’s gaming ecosystem.
Star Citizen
One can’t even imagine how crowds of people would react if Cloud Imperium Games got on stage at one of Microsoft’s press conferences and announced that Star Citizen would be coming exclusively to Xbox One X. Though the developers have stated before that a major roadblock hindering console ports of the game is technological prowess, the newest iteration of Xbox may be the first home system capable of running it.
Think about it from a business perspective. Having Star Citizen on the Xbox One X would garner fabulous publicity for the mid-generational upgrade and would entice more people to want to check it out. Seeing as how Star Citizen has no shortage of hype around it, the game is almost guaranteed to sell well, too, and Microsoft should act fast lest it loses out on a great opportunity.
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