How about that for a surprise? At the tail end of the Xbox and Bethesda Games Showcase, Microsoft unveiled a new title coming from the folks at Arkane. Yes, Arkane already has a title on the way in the PlayStation-exclusive Deathloop at the moment. But the studio also has something else in the works that’ll be Xbox exclusive: a vampire hunter co-op shooter called Redfall. In the closing moments of the stream, we didn’t quite get ourselves a Redfall release date so much as a window. But still: we don’t have too terribly long to wait.
Here’s the scoop on Redfall so far.
The Redfall release date right now is Summer 2022
We’re just about into Summer 2021 (at least, when this post is being written). So Redfall is therefore about a year away. For a game we literally had no idea existed until it was revealed, that is a pretty short amount of time.
In our predictions post, we toyed with the idea that perhaps Microsoft had found some way to get out of the Deathloop exclusivity deal so it could bring the game to Xbox. But it turns out the company just went a different direction entirely. Rather than focus on getting Arkane’s nearest project, it just nabbed exclusivity on an entirely new one. Yes, you read that right: this game — much like Starfield — will be Xbox exclusive.
What the heck is Redfall?
In the game’s CGI presentation, you can definitely get some Deathloop vibes looking at Redfall. There appears to be some similarity in the art style. Redfall, however, isn’t about assassinating targets on a timer. Instead, this game is all about roaming an open world killing vampires. You can play it solo, or you can buddy up with some friends to put stakes through vamps.
This being shown at the end of the Xbox/Bethesda conference seemed to be more about impact. We’ll undoubtedly learn more about the game as we draw closer to release, but I have a feeling the reveal today was about sending a message: Microsoft is going to care about exclusives again. It is going to have all of its many talented studios make games, and those games are coming to Xbox.
We’ll have more for you on Redfall as details are released over the coming months (like a more specific Redfall release date, for instance). In the meantime, if you own an Xbox, you have yet another Arkane game to look forward to next year.
