Worldwide gaming communities have been eagerly awaiting the joint Microsoft / Bethesda announcements that took place this week. In case you missed it, The Microsoft acquisition of Bethesda was approved in North America and the European Union. Here is a quick summary.
20 Bethesda Games Joins XBox Game Pass
On March 12, 2021 amazing Bethesda games joined XBox Game Pass and most became available on the three XBox platforms: console, PC, and cloud. If you would more details on which games are available on which platform, you can find out more from this news.xbox.com. Below, the Elder Scrolls titles are listed.
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind (Console, PC)
An epic, open-ended single-player RPG, Morrowind allows you to play any kind of character imaginable. You can choose to follow the main storyline and find the source of the evil blight that plagues the land, or set off on your own to explore strange locations and develop your character.
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (Console, PC)
Step inside the most richly detailed and vibrant game-world ever created. With a powerful combination of freeform gameplay and unprecedented graphics, you can unravel the main quest at your own pace or explore the vast world and find your own challenges.
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Special Edition (Console, PC, Cloud)
Winner of more than 200 Game of the Year Awards, the Skyrim Special Edition includes the game and add-ons with all-new features like remastered art and effects, volumetric god rays, dynamic depth of field, and more. Also bring the power of mods to consoles. New quests, environments, characters, dialogue, armor, weapons and more – with Mods, there are no limits to what you can experience.
The Elder Scrolls Online (Cloud, Console)
Experience the award-winning story in a persistent Elder Scrolls world. Embark on an adventure that lets you play your way, go anywhere at any level. Battle, craft, steal, siege, explore and more.
Source: news.xbox.com
If you have played a number of iconic games like Halo and The Elder Scrolls, you have to check out this short but amazing mashup welcoming Bethesda to the XBox family.
XBox and Bethesda Round Table Stream
There was an interesting hour long round table where Bethesda and XBox sit down tells us what we can expecting in the future. During the presentation, a common theme was that the combined family shares a commonality of having founders that are creator-led (founders are game designers, game creators), the studios have a mutual respect for each other, and that the parent companies give them to pursue their creative vision. There were some examples given how the studios can benefit of sharing technology such as game engines and participate in collaborations within similar genres of games. The presentation did not provide much in the way of details on future projects. In my opinion, Microsoft is very interested in capturing a large market share of the three billion gamers worldwide. If you are fan of gaming trivia, there are some interesting tidbits discussed early in the presentation and later on, there were some brief summaries of each of the studios involved in the acquisition.