Next Week on XBOX: New Games for August 17 to 21

Welcome to Next Week on XBOX! In this weekly feature we cover all the games coming soon to XBOX Series X|S, XBOX One, XBOX on PC, and Game Pass! Get more details on these upcoming games below and click their profiles for further info (release dates subject to change). Let’s jump in!

---

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Cost of Hope (DLC) – August 20

Head out on a new expedition into the Zone in this massive, non-linear expansion. Dozens of gameplay hours are packed with unforgettable stories and twisted characters – all wrapped in the signature atmosphere of decay with a flicker of hope. The fragile peace between bitter rivals is shattered. Pick a side in a tangled web of intrigue and half-truths, where no choice is clean or truly right.

---

The Sinking City 2 – August 18
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S

The Sinking City 2 is a third-person survival horror set in 1920s Arkham. Deliberate, tense, and resource-lean: pressure builds as you push deeper, relief comes in brief refuge, and fear is something you manage. Mind your inventory, take on unnerving puzzles, and double back via unlocked shortcuts for supplies and upgrades.

---

Mortal Shell II – August 20
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S

Mortal Shell II is a standalone sequel to Mortal Shell that significantly expands on the original with faster and unforgiving combat, deeper weapon design with extensive upgrade options, and an emphasis on free exploration within a compact open world. The corpses of exceptional warriors are scattered throughout Mortal Shell II’s destroyed world. Once discovered, each warrior can be possessed, awakening their innate strengths and mastered abilities.

Get up to 72 hours Advanced Access (August 17) with the Devout Edition.

---

Black Flower – August 17

Black Flower is a strategic roguelike about survival and growth in a fragile garden. Guide your garden through a magical calendar, making daily choices between unpredictable weather conditions. Each day brings new risks and opportunities, forcing you to manage resources, protect your flowers, and adapt to an ever-changing world.

---

Archerio – August 18
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / Smart Delivery / XBOX Play Anywhere

Archerio is a fast-paced action roguelite where precision, reflexes, and smart upgrades decide your fate. Fight through handcrafted arenas filled with relentless enemies, deadly traps, and escalating challenges. Each run pushes your skills further, rewarding sharp aim and quick movement with powerful upgrades that transform your playstyle.

---

Driving is Hard – August 18
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / Smart Delivery

Challenge yourself in Driving Is Hard! Drive a bathtub on wheels through steep, unforgiving terrain where every mistake costs you progress. Master tough physics-based gameplay, sharpen your patience, and uncover Jeff’s journey of self-doubt, family struggles, and emotional growth as he finds strength, self-acceptance, and hope for a brighter future.

---

Arcade Archives 2 CYBER CYCLES – August 19
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S

CYBER CYCLES is a racing game released by NAMCO LIMITED (current Bandai Namco Entertainment Inc.) in 1995. This game featured a large bike-style cabinet design that stood out at arcades at the time. Set against the backdrop of near-future motorcycle racing, choose from a lineup of unique machines with different performance features, and cross the finish line ahead of all your rivals!

---

Cloudy Day – August 19
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S

Cloudy Day is a hand-drawn 2D casual platformer game. Take on the role of a lonely cloud embarking on a journey to learn how to fly and keep up with the other clouds!

---

Dark Reflection – August 19
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / Smart Delivery / XBOX Play Anywhere

When your best friend vanishes, you must enter the Dark Reflection: a hostile, warped copy of your own reality. Here, familiar places are dangerous, and friendly faces cannot be trusted. Dark Reflection is a classic side-scrolling pixel-art adventure packed with action, puzzles, and heavy metal energy.

---

Dungeon Antiqua 2 – August 19
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / XBOX Play Anywhere

Dungeon Antiqua 2 is a 2D dungeon hack-and-slash RPG featuring SNES-style pixel art and sound. A retro-flavored adventure awaits you, blending strategic exploration with a highly flexible character-building system.

---

Grim Trials – August 19
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / XBOX Play Anywhere

Grim Trials is a heavy metal action roguelite where you craft and customize your own weapons and equipment to embrace Death your own way. Play as Avelin, a young woman who has met an untimely end, and found herself recruited as one of Death’s many Reapers. Tasked to hunt down impure souls, face her demons, and fight her way through an underworld of her own making, Avelin must endure these trials to become a full-fledged Reaper and see her still-living love once again.

---

Hidden Cats in Barcelona – August 19
XBOX Play Anywhere

It’s time to have a snack at a local Churreria and take a long stroll through Park Güell, because the Hidden Cats have arrived in ever beautiful and sunny Cat-alonia! The nooks and crannies of Barcelona hide many adorable furballs… Can you spot them all?

---

WonderCat Adventures – August 19
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / Smart Delivery / XBOX Play Anywhere

The Wonder Cat needs your help to find his cat buddy and escape the strange mines where they crash-landed! No trace of your UFO spaceship. You only have the robot pod that traveled with you to help. Beware the dangerous and unexplored path ahead. You’ll need all your stamina and quick reflexes to ride through those 55 levels. Where is your cat buddy? Where does the cave go? Let’s find out and go back home. The adventure starts now!

---

Berry Bury Berry – August 20
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S

Berry Bury Berry is a surreal first-person incremental game about growing berries and putting them in a hole. Lots and lots of berries. Use all that sweet, sweet money earned to unlock upgrades and tools to help increase profits and explore more of the accursed garden!

---

Educational Family Games – August 20
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / Smart Delivery / XBOX Play Anywhere

It is family game night. Your kids want to play your games, but most games are not made for them. You may have tried educational games before, only for the adults to become bored within minutes. Before long, everyone is looking at their phones again. Educational Family Games brings everyone together with a local 1–4 player experience where children learn, adults compete, and the whole family plays in the same room.

---

Emoji Killer – Casino Massacre – August 20
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S

You awake in a mysterious casino where evil poker emojis have awakened — and they’re not happy to see you. This rogue-like first-person shooter throws you into a wild casino environments, fast-paced combat against gambling addicted emojis wearing funny hats and wielding powers. Before each run, customize your experience with crazy modifiers: make enemies bounce, wear funny hats, or unleash maximum casino power for maximum challenge.

---

Find the Cats 2 – August 20
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S

Discover even more adorable cats hidden across charming, handcrafted scenes in Find The Cats 2! Explore brand-new colorful environments, sharpen your attention, and find every sneaky little kitty before moving to the next level. Perfect for casual and cozy game fans, Find The Cats 2 brings even more relaxing hidden object fun with new levels, cute visuals, satisfying discoveries, and plenty of fluffy cats waiting to be found. Can you find them all?

---

Gallipoli – August 20
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / XBOX Play Anywhere

Take part in the historic beach landings at Gallipoli and fight for survival on unforgiving shores and sun-scorched deserts! After the muddy trenches of Verdun, the snowy plains of Tannenberg, and the imposing Alps of Isonzo, Gallipoli brings you the deepest dive into the Ottoman Fronts of World War 1 through grounded, yet accessible battles. This is a hardcore, one-shot-one-kill PVP environment that demands teamwork in intense objective-based battles.

---

Ground Zero Hero – August 20
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / Smart Delivery / XBOX Play Anywhere

Forget surviving the apocalypse. You’re here to dominate it. Ground Zero Hero drops you into a radioactive wasteland overrun with mutated creatures. Every enemy you destroy becomes fuel for your evolution. Absorb their remains, stack mutations, and build increasingly powerful and unpredictable combinations until you become an unstoppable force.

---

Wings of Beyond – August 20
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S

The galaxy’s skies are at war. Are you ready to fight your way through thousands of enemies? Wings of Beyond is an intense shoot ’em up that throws you into thrilling space battles filled with challenges and powerful upgrades. Take on 30 increasingly difficult stages, where quick reflexes and smart strategy are essential to survive relentless waves of enemies. Travel across three unique galactic systems, each featuring distinct environments, exclusive enemies, powerful bosses, and new challenges that demand different tactics.

---

Yet Another Zombie Survivors (Game Preview) – August 20
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / Smart Delivery

The Horde is coming but you’re ready to fight it! Assemble your team and decide upon their enhancements to find the most efficient synergies against thousands of the undead. Survive. Then evolve. Then break all the limits in this deceivingly simple but addictive reverse bullet hell.

---

Creepy Shift: Uncle Joe’s Motel – August 21
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / XBOX Play Anywhere

An unfulfilled actress takes a job at Uncle’s Motel to make ends meet. She’s running from trouble, but peace is the last thing she’ll find here. Enter a world where cozy simulation tasks mix with the horror of a decaying building, and the narrative brims with the complexities of the human psyche. This is a sim-horror with a strong focus on narrative, which becomes increasingly dramatic and dark with every step. Uncle Joe’s Motel is the third game in the “Creepy Shift” series – games based on original creepypastas, where the main mechanic is following mysterious rules.

---

Dark Dungeon Head Haze – August 21
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S

As if called by a siren, the deceptive Thief is pulled into the Dark Dungeon after its riches. As he takes a single step, darkness swallows his surroundings! Will it be this thug’s final big heist? Dark Dungeon Head Haze breaks conventions in puzzle games by… turning off the lights!? In this 3D low poly isometric puzzler, your intuition and memory will be put to the test. Grasp the layout of the level at the start, because as soon as you make your first move, almost the whole path ahead will turn pitch black!

---

KeyQuack Quest – August 21

KeyQuack Quest is a pixel art platformer where you control a clever mallard on a mission to collect keys, avoid deadly traps, and reach the exit door. With progressively challenging levels, precise mechanics, and a charming retro aesthetic, the game blends action and strategy across carefully designed stages.

---

Mega City Force – August 21
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / Smart Delivery

Hello, Agent. Mega City needs your services. Are you ready to uphold the law? The crime is out of control, the streets are not clean. There are criminals and psychopaths everywhere, ready to cut anyone’s throat. A corrupt megacorporation squeezes the life out of the citizens, seeking to establish control all over the city. Only the incorruptible agents of Mega City Task Force stand fast before the crime wave that consumed the city and threatens to overwhelm society. Choose your agent and dive into a deadly battle against the criminals and brutal bosses to unleash the beast of justice in the darkest corners of the city.

---

No More Slimes!! – August 21
XBOX Play Anywhere

Slime Rebellion! Small and adorable slimes have started a bouncing rebellion, filling up the entire screen. Dive right into this unstoppable commotion! Build diverse skill trees using the loot you earn from battles. Add special abilities like striking lightning with cards and relics or summoning a bouncing boomerang that deals damage off walls, and grow in your own unique way!

---

Pay to Path – August 21
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S

Get ready for a challenge where strategy, logic, and smart spending go hand in hand in Pay To Path. Help adorable piggy banks find their way to their bank vaults by rearranging roads, removing obstacles, and carefully planning every move. Here, every decision has a price, and using your money wisely makes all the difference.

---

Psalm 5:9-13 – August 21
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S

Step into Psalm 5:9-13, a first-person psychological horror game with a VHS effect and a tense, oppressive atmosphere. At first glance the place seems ordinary, but the further you go, the more it reveals its true nature. Explore the location, search for anomalies, and keep moving as frightening things wait along the way. Built as a short walking simulator experience, Psalm 5:9-13 focuses on tension, unsettling details, realistic visuals, high-quality sound, and a compact horror journey that can be completed in about 30 minutes.

---

With Eyes of Ice – August 21
Optimized for XBOX Series X|S / Smart Delivery

Dying of frostbite, Gréta Egilsdóttir is left to wonder how she found herself in such a dire situation. Perhaps it began with Steina’s baby, or with Kai agreeing to stay the night, or with that kiss she almost shared with Nataníel. Perhaps it began when she journeyed from her home to work as a housemaid in the distant fishing village… Or perhaps it began three years ago, when her grandmother was still alive. For Gréta, meeting Nataníel Jóhannsson was love at first sight… But there are some loves which cannot — or perhaps should not — be.