Microsoft and Xbox have a variety of different first-party titles on the way for its console and PC gaming ecosystem, with the Halo: Campaign Evolved remake, Playground Games' Forza Horizon 6 and Fable, and Gears of War: E-Day representing some of the brand's biggest upcoming 2026 games, as well as some of the year's biggest games in general.
Indeed, pretty much everything Xbox Game Studios has in the oven right now looks promising, if you ask me. But are there any titles in the publisher's portfolio that stand out as something to keep your eye on in particular?
That question was asked to the recently promoted Xbox chief content officer Matt Booty in the latest episode of the Official Xbox Podcast, and his answer lines up with the game I'm most excited for, myself.
"We just took a trip down to Irvine, and we've got quite a lot of studios there with Blizzard Campus and then Obsidian and with InXile," he began, mentioning several of Xbox's largest studios.
"We got to see the latest updates on Clockwork Revolution, which is just really coming along, right? I think it's a bit of a cliche to say they punch above their weight, but it's kind of hard. You've got to remind yourself, this is a team of 100 people, and it looks like a lot more than that. It really is coming along. That's fresh in my mind in terms of what we see," he continued.
First announced back in 2023 during the summer Xbox Games Showcase, the first-person action RPG Clockwork Revolution is the latest game from InXile Entertainment — best known for Wasteland 2 and Wasteland 3, sequels in the Interplay Entertainment franchise that gave way to Fallout back in the day.
Led by Interplay founder Brian Fargo, InXile is building one of the boldest RPGs in recent memory with Clockwork. Indeed, Fargo has called it "the most complex game I've ever worked on," and later went on to say it's the studio's "most ambitious title, probably by a factor of 10."
Where InXile aims to set a new bar for RPG design with Clockwork Revolution is with its reactivity, as the developer plans to have its primary setting — the steampunk dystopia city of Avalon — change on incredibly deep levels when you engage with its time travel mechanics, and also depending on the actions and choices you take and make during your adventure.
Very little has been said of the game's specifics, but we do know that it's going to be extremely crunchy and systems-driven; I'd expect it to be comparable to Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 or Baldur's Gate 3 in that way. It's also going to have rich character building options and tons of content, with "roughly 30% more content than what any player could see in a single playthrough."
As an RPG lover, everything we've heard about Clockwork Revolution thus far has made it my most-anticipated new game outside of Metro 2039, so it's great to hear Matt Booty mention it as one of the upcoming Xbox titles that stands out the most, and that he thinks development is going well.
It still doesn't have a release date, but a later 2026 release is a real possibility, especially since a leak last year hinted at one. I'm sure we'll get a concrete date to look forward to during this year's Xbox Games Showcase.
Do you agree with me (and Matt Booty) that Clockwork Revolution stands out as one of Xbox's most exciting new games, or are you not really interested in InXile's RPG? Share your take below, and vote in our poll as well.
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