Xbox Partner Preview: What we’ve seen from the showcase

Microsoft took to the digital stage at their second Xbox Partner Preview to showcase the titles coming to the console across 2024.

We’ll be breaking down the best of what was displayed and posting some of the announcement trailers below.

Xbox games previewed

Here, we see 11bitstudios had a solid event with the reveal of The Alters, The Creatures of Ava, and an official launch date for Frostpunk 2 (July 25, 2024).

The Alters is a sci-fi survival title set on a dangerous planet. The protagonist, Jan Dolski, must use the strange alien material, Rapidium, which creates copies of himself to man the many different processes aboard a ship, hoping to avoid calamity.

Each of these new versions of himself is an altered state of his past — like forks in the road of life that have been made manifest by the properties of the material.  The game looks to take on some of the mechanics of the studio’s other hit title, “This War of Mine.”

Creatures of Ava is a game chock full of cute and interesting monsters, as shown in the announcement trailer. The main character, Vic, takes a pied-piper approach to healing and saving the world’s creatures who have been burdened with a sickness.

Writing on this cozy adventure game comes from Rhianna Pratchett of Tomb Raider and Mirrors Edge fame.

The Last of 11bitstudios’ announcements was the Frostpunk 2 reveal, which gave those interested in the industrial-revolution-inspired survival and resource management title a day to put in the diary.

Final Fantasy XIV Online was given a release date trailer and a look at the content coming March 21 for Xbox Series X|S. A Starter Edition will be available for a limited time via Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Perks from March 21 to April 19. Watch for more details here on ReadWrite.

As we reported yesterday, Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess, Tales of Kenzera: Zau, and First Berserker: Khazan all made the stage with updated trailers.

Three new games, a successor to the Sinking City, a monster rally title, and a stealth game, would be announced as part of this preview.

The Sinking City 2 would make its world debut on the streamed event, showing a cinematic trailer in the Boardwalk Empire fashion of the previous installment’s setting. Frogware will take players back to the Lovecraftian city of Arkham to find out why the streets are flooding:

Riffraff Games revealed Slight of Hand, a stealth action game from Joshua Boggs, who was responsible for the puzzle noir mobile game Framed. Players take on the role of Lady Luck, a Witch using her magic tarot deck to bring down her old Coven in the city of Taboo.

Monster Jam Showdown was another new game that would premier during the event.

Other notable announcements revealed today were Bandai Namco’s Unknown 9, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Legends of the Zone Trilogy, dropping on Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S, and SEGA showing the first details for Persona 3 Reload: Expansion Pass. Remarkably, this features new costumes, background music, and extended story content.

Image credit: Xbox.

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