Microsoft announced the date and time of its big first-party Xbox Series X video game showcase this morning on Twitter.
The showcase will debut on Thursday, July 23rd at 9 am PT / 12 pm ET with a pre-show from Geoff Keighley an hour earlier.
This time around, Microsoft will be showcasing its first party games. The big headliner is Halo Infinite, of course, but there will be lots of other games as well. Microsoft gobbled up a bunch of indie game developers over the past few years, and hopefully we’ll see what at least some of these studios have been up to.
Microsoft acquired Compulsion Games (We Happy Few), InXile Entertainment (the Wasteland franchise), Ninja Theory (currently at work on Hellblade 2), Obsidian Entertainment (Pillars Of Eternity) and Playground Games (Forza Horizon) in 2018. In 2019 the Xbox maker bought up Double Fine Productions (Psychonauts) and launched a brand new studio called The Initiative.
Expect to see new content from at least some of these developers, if not all of them. Microsoft has a lot of ground to make up in the marketing war with Sony after their previous third-party showcase which did little to impress gamers. Sony’s first-party showcase was much better. Hopefully Microsoft will answer in kind.
Microsoft has emphasized that this showcase will be all about the games, so don’t expect any hardware news—like a price and/or release date for the Xbox Series X or a reveal of “Lockhart”—the rumored Xbox Series S. Then again, they could surprise us like Sony did with the big console reveal.
What do you hope to see on the 23rd? Let me know on Twitter or Facebook.
I write about video games, TV and movies.