I’ve been saying for some time that Xbox Game Pass is the gaming bargain of the decade, long past the point where people have stopped inviting me to parties. But it’s astonishing value: in recent weeks I’ve played my way through Halo: Infinite, died a billion times in Hades and spent endless hours crawling Minecraft Dungeons with my kids, all for the same low fee on my Xbox Series X.
And with new games being added all the time, there’s always something new to play. Here are some of the highlights for Xbox Game Pass in February 2022.
Dreamscaper (3 February)
Dreamscaper is a roguelike from Afterburner Studios, whose founders worked on Gears of War and NBA2K. It’s a dungeon crawler with a difference because it’s based on dreams, and your character Cassidy will play while wide awake and fast asleep. When you die, you wake up in Cassidy’s world where you can make and improve friendships through gifts you’ve earned on your adventures, and those friends can in turn give you more powerful abilities that you can use to overcome previously impossible obstacles.
Besiege Console (10 February)
Although Besiege has been available for a while on PC, it doesn’t come to the Xbox until February 10. It’s a physics-based building game where you make a variety of war machines to ruin your opponents’ day, and in single player mode there are four distinct islands packed with fully destructible levels, lots of building blocks and tons of mayhem. We particularly like the time slider that enables you to view your most delicious destructions in slo-mo.
Even if you’re familiar with the PC version there’s lots of new stuff here: huge sections have been revamped from the ground up, and there’s a new interface designed specifically for Xbox controllers. There’s also a new workshop for sharing machines with others.
Edge of Eternity (10 February)
Also coming to Game Pass on February 10, Edge of Eternity is an epic JRPG that’ll appeal to fans of Final Fantasy and Chrono Trigger. Technically it isn’t actually a JRPG – the studio behind it is French – but it’s clear that the developers really love their JRPGs and made this in homage, something that’s apparent in its turn-based combat mechanic and Final Fantasy-style battle gauge. But it’s not just a copy: it’s an ambitious, appealing and immersive adventure in its own right. It’s not quite up there with the likes of Final Fantasy XV, but then it’s coming from a much smaller studio. Think of this as the indie band equivalent.
