2026 is a crucial year for Xbox Game Pass. Last year, Microsoft made some significant changes to its game subscription service, a move that came with a major price hike. A handful of strong first-party games in the immediate wake of the change helped justify the cost, but Xbox is going to need to work hard this year if it’s going to maintain that Game Pass is still a good deal that will pay off for players. We’ll need more than Fable and Forza Horizon 6.
With January coming to an end, we at least have some idea of what kinds of games subscribers can expect this year. The strong first batch added celebrated AAA games like Resident Evil Village and Death Stranding: Director’s Cut to the service alongside new indies like Mio: Memories in Orbit. If you’re looking to sample January’s crop for yourself and see what you’re getting for your monthly price, here are three recently added games to check out this weekend.
Resident Evil Village
We’re one month away from what will likely be one of 2026’s biggest games: Resident Evil Requiem. Capcom’s latest horror game is looking like an ambitious swing even by Resident Evil standards, fusing the old-school tension of older games into the fast-paced action of more recent ones. Before it comes out, you’ll probably want to make sure you’ve played Resident Evil Village. The series’ most recent installment set the stage for Requiem with a sort of amusement park design philosophy that takes its hero, Ethan Winters, through very different horror set pieces, each with its own gameplay. You unlock a puzzle-box manor in one section, gun down waves of lycans in another, and try to escape from a creepy dollhouse with no weapons at all in the game’s best moment. If Requiem can live up to those highs in its own pace-swapping gameplay, it could be another highlight for a series full of them. —Giovanni Colantonio
Mio: Memories in Orbit
Mio: Memories in Orbit is Silksong for people who bounced off Silksong. While true, that’s about the most reductive way to describe Douze Dixièmes’s new Metroidvania. Yes, it offers similar meditative vibes as Team Cherry’s smash hit, but the devs play with the genre conventions in several inventive ways. Boss fights are tough but not impossible, and Mio offers greater control over its difficulty with a trio of creative settings. Its map unfolds into a centralized area, mimicking the anatomy of a body (as noted in viraltrendingcontent’s review) and giving the sense you’re occupying a real place, rather than a series of levels. It is hauntingly beautiful, dizzyingly brilliant, and somehow both like and unlike anything else in the space. All month long, I’ve been recommending Mio to anyone who will listen. My friends are begging you too now: Play this game so I’ll finally shut the hell up about it. —Ari Notis
Drop Duchy
While big-budget games and buzzy new releases are the core selling point of Game Pass, the little discoveries in between can add up to help subscribers feel like they’ve gotten their money’s worth. If you’re looking for an example of a smaller indie gem on Game Pass, don’t sleep on Drop Duchy. The unique roguelite is one-part puzzle game, one-part strategy, and one-part pastoral city-builder. In each round, you’re tasked with building a little medieval town inside a Tetris-style puzzle well. Tetromino-like blocks fall, each one containing buildings or terrain, and it’s your job to slot them together on the fly to create a functional town. Rounds culminate in a battle against invading enemy forces, testing how well you’ve built your defenses. Like a lot of modern indie roguelites, it’s a bit of a genre mash-up with a lot of bits to learn, but the satisfaction of dropping blocks and creating a nice little town makes Drop Duchy a satisfying one to casually jump into. —Giovanni Colantonio
