Skip to main content

XDefiant is getting some massive updates for its Season 1 launch

XDefiant: Season One Reveal | Ubisoft Forward
Summer Gaming Marathon Feature Image
This story is part of our Summer Gaming Marathon series.

XDefiant, Ubisoft’s PVP free-to-play shooter, is going strong after a release last month, and its upcoming first season is adding a ton of new features for the players who’ve stuck around.

The studio showed off the highlights during the Ubisoft Forward on Monday, and it’s looking like a full slate for its July 2 launch. Ubisoft had previously released a seasonal roadmap, which teased that the game would be getting a new faction, new maps, new weapons, and more. The announcement confirms a lot of these details for its first season.

One of the more interesting announcements involves a new map each month. For Season 1, players will get three maps: Clubhouse, Daytona, and Rockefeller. Live service games releasing maps isn’t anything new, but one new map per month is quite a lofty goal.

Ubisoft also announced a new XDefiant faction: GSK from the Rainbow Six series. There will be a new ranked progression system, which will give players rewards if they make their way through it. Finally, there’s upcoming capture the flag mode, putting it in line with a lot of its competition in terms of gameplay.

The studio is also celebrating the announcement with some free goodies. If people log in and play the game within the next 48 hours, they’ll also get three free eruption skins.

There’s going to be plenty of more coming up, and Ubisoft will be doing a full reveal on July 1.

XDefiant had a rocky launch, with server issues that made the online game unplayable. However, it’s continued on and, according to Insider Gaming, has been a big success for the studio.

Carli Velocci
Carli is a technology, culture, and games editor and journalist. They were the Gaming Lead and Copy Chief at Windows Central…
Volgarr the Viking 2 will take you back to your Ghosts ‘n Goblins days
A viking slashes a tree in Volgarr the Viking 2.

Developer Digital Eclipse is working on a surprising project: Volgarr the Viking 2. The 2D retro sequel will launch on August 6 for PlayStation 4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch, and PC.

The news is an out of left field reveal. The first Volgarr the Viking game released in 2013 and was made as an ode to 1080s classics like Ghosts 'n Goblins. Despite being a small release, it sold over 1 million copies over the past decade. As revealed during today's Guerrilla Collective stream, the series is coming back with a new sequel by Digital Eclipse, the team behind this year's Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story.

Read more
3 Days of Play PS Plus games to try this weekend (June 7-9)
Key art for Streets of Rage 4.

June 2024 is shaping up to be a pretty great month for PlayStation players. Not only are we coming off an entertaining State of Play showcase, but a new Days of Play initiative surrounding all the video game showcases this month is bringing a lot of new PS Plus additions with it. Many of those games hit PS Plus this week, and three in particular stand out to us.

For owners of Sony's oft-neglected PlayStation VR2, the first game is one of its rare exclusives that take full advantage of the headset's eye-tracking by seeing how often players blink. The next is a new PS Plus Essential game that's a revival of Sega's classic beat-'em-up series for the modern gaming era. Finally, the last title is an atmospheric and eerie fishing game that should entice fans of Lovecraftian horror.
Before Your Eyes

Read more
3 first-party Xbox Game Pass games to try this weekend (June 7-9)
Gears 5 Kait Hero Close Up

Microsoft will hold an Xbox Games Showcase and Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Direct. this Sunday. These shows will provide a much better idea of what to expect from Xbox over the course of the next year or two. That's really needed right now, as Microsoft has struggled to keep online discussions around Xbox positive as it went multiplatform with some games, laid off thousands of developers, and outright shut down the developers of Hi-Fi Rush and Redfall. Based on leaks and my personal expectations for the showcase, there are three games you can play on Xbox Game Pass this weekend to prepare for the event.

The first is the latest first-person shooter in a long-running series by id Software that might be getting a medieval-set spinoff. After that, we have the fifth entry in a sci-fi Xbox series that still looks fantastic on Xbox Series X/S even though it came out in 2019. Finally, you can prepare for Avowed with the latest RPG from Obsidian Entertainment, a satirical sci-fi game where player choice is critical.
Doom Eternal

Read more