Xbox Games Showcase live coverage – All the news out of the Xbox and Bethesda event

Let’s take another look at that reveal trailer shall we?

Of course, all eyes will be on Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, which only got fully revealed with its title earlier this year. It’s currently got a loose release window of this fall, but I’d imagine that will get fully confirmed at today’s showcase. 

In development at MachineGames, the game’s story will take place between the Raiders of the Lost Ark and The Last Crusade movies, around 1937. It’ll start at the iconic Marshall College where Jones teaches, but from there, we’ll be traveling the globe for answers, including the Vatican, Egypt, and the Himalayas.

The gameplay looks great – as you’d expect from FPS experts MachineGames – with plenty of stealth and puzzle solving in between taking out Nazis with your gun and whip. While the majority is first-person, the game will also occasionally pull back to third-person to let you take in Indy in his full splendour. 

Another one from last year’s showcase was Clockwork Revolution. Another very cool trailer that gave serious BioShock vibes. Again no details on this one since then either. 

Another game that was showed off for the first time at last year’s Summer Game Fest Xbox Showcase was South of Midnight. 

Honestly one of my favorite trailers for some time, it’s got that creepy cool vibe going on with promises of “a fantastical and macabre third-person action-adventure set in the American Deep South”.

So what about those games, then eh? Let’s leave Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 out of this chat as we absolutely know it’s getting a full reveal at its dedicated post-show Direct. 

My personal pick would be to see more of Fable. We got that epic full trailer at last year’s event complete with Richard Ayoade as Dave the giant and ‘vegetable enthusiast’, but we’ve not heard anything about the game since. 

We got some glimmers of gameplay from this trailer, some magic use and combat, but we did get a fantastic sense that new developer Playground Games (of Forza Horizon fame) is going to retain the British sense of humor that’s always been a staple of the series. 

In his predictions for this Xbox Games Showcase, our own Xbox expert (Xpert?) Josh West said he wants to see a little less conversation and a little more action, please.

“Looking at the lineup of upcoming Xbox Series X games, I find myself reconnecting with why I became so drawn to the Xbox platform in its halcyon years: the promise of PC-quality play on console; the framework to take online multiplayer to new, unassailable heights; and a commitment to delivering best-in-class experiences within the ‘core’ shooter, role-play, and racing niches. Sadly, that message became diluted over time as Xbox waged a war for input one and spent a generation cycle dealing with the aftermath.”

So now, we basically just need some games. 

The report goes though that this snazzy new Universal Controller will be sold standalone but also debut with the Xbox Series X refresh that was also detailed in the leak. 

The big takeaways from that leak were that it’s going to ditch the chunky cuboid design, and opt for a tall cylindrical shape that completely ditches the disc drive.
It’ll still have a power button, pairing button, and USB-C port but it’s unclear how much difference there will be in size between the two from the concept designs alone. 

We also don’t know what the price difference will be – good or bad. The documents say it’ll be the “same great price”, but again these are from 2022. The RRP of the Xbox Series X is still $499, but if you get a good deal you can get one now for around $399. 

According to that report, it’s also supposedly going to include wide “build improvements” and “improved longevity”, with things like new modular thumbsticks, haptic feedback, quieter buttons, and more.

The docs had it listed as a May 2024 launch, but seeing as those docs were from May 2022 no doubt things have changed since then. 

I personally think it’s pretty unlikely that Xbox announces new hardware today, but hey I’ve been wrong before. I personally would love to see the controller refresh that was detailed in the documents that were leaked as part of the Activision acquisition. 

That is said to retain the same design as the current pads, but be quite the upgrade in terms of features. It’ll allegedly have Xbox Wireless 2, Bluetooth 5.2 and Direct-to-Cloud functionality to improve overall connectivity and reduce latency regardless of what you’re connected to. 

But, more importantly for my wireless loving ass, it’ll apparently include a rechargeable, swappable, battery as standard. Goodbye AA batteries, be GONE. 

Let’s start with the biggest rumor but also potentially most interesting, and that’s the reports that Xbox could be about to reveal an Xbox handheld console. 

Now, it’s a little farfetched perhaps, but rumors of an Xbox handheld have been doing the rounds for a number of years now. 

What’s not clear is what kind of form that could take. A mini Series S? An Android powered streaming device? A cloud-based dedicated console? Or a genuine Game Pass powered Steam Deck rival?

Now myself and our Hardware Editor, Phil, agree that if an Xbox handheld finally shows up during the Xbox Games Showcase, we hope it’s not a PlayStation Portal rival. I just want to be able to access my Game Pass games on a plane, train, or anywhere I damn please. Please. 

So with around two hours left to go until the Xbox Games Showcase, let’s take a little walk around the Xbox gardens to see what we could expect to pop up at today’s event.