Five Games to Download on Xbox Game Pass to Help Get You Through the Week

Even if you are not a fan of the racing genre, there is a lot to enjoy about the Forza Horizon series. Developed by Playground Games, it takes many tried and true mechanics and adds a fresh new spin on them, complemented by complete open-world exploration in large maps inspired by real-world locations. Forza Horizon 3 will take you to many destinations across mid and eastern Australia including the outback, Surfers Paradise, Byron Bay and more. Forza Horizon 4, on the other hand, heads to Great Britain and features representations of Edinburgh, Cotswolds and more.

Each game features many hundreds of cars to purchase and race in, game modes to experience which stand out from other racing games, and cross-overs both in the base game and through downloadable content which are pure fun. While there is online gameplay to experience, it is also possible to experience offline races against friends through AI-controlled drivatars.

Developed by PlatinumGames and published by Square Enix, Nier: Automata is a 2017 action RPG which was undoubtedly one of the highlights of the year. Similar to Nier before it, albeit with significant changes to its gameplay, Nier: Automata impressed on many fronts due to going against the norm in terms of its approach to storytelling, a stellar soundtrack and the way it doesn’t always go for the happiest ending for each character. If you haven’t played it already, definitely give this a chance as part of the Xbox Game Pass!

The Become as Gods Edition offers the full game, in addition to the creatively named downloadable content ‘3C3C1D119440927’ which offers new costumes and a boss fight quite fitting for the Nier series.

Untitled Goose Game is very simple in its concept: you are a goose who causes mayhem. Developed by the Melbourne-based team House House as their second project; it has received almost universal acclaim for being a short yet incredibly fun puzzler which rewards out-of-the-box thinking with mayhem. That is if you can get over the adorable yet assumably malice-ridden queks possible with a simple button press.

Untitled Goose Game, like many other indie games available through the Xbox Game Pass platform, is a great way of spending an afternoon or evening doing something unique. I already look forward to seeing what comes from this studio in the future!

A spiritual successor to the imaginative hospital simulator Theme Hospital from the mid-90s, Two Point Hospital takes much of what made that game great and gave it a modern-day overhaul. While initially released for PC in August 2018, it was ported over to major consoles in February 2020 and became available on Xbox Game Pass immediately.

Complemented by the longevity which comes with simulation games and ongoing updates / downloadable content being introduced by developers Two Point Games, if the idea of a Hospital sim sounds even remotely interesting to you, then this is one game in thecollection I would recommend at least trying out if not purchasing outright.