Celeste Leaves Game Pass as Halo Remake Takes Over

Microsoft's latest Game Pass wave is one of the strongest in months, with Halo: Campaign Evolved arriving as a day-one addition on July 28. But buried at the bottom of the announcement on the Xbox Wire blog is the usual cost of doing business: eight games are leaving the service on July 31, and one of them is Celeste.

Losing Matt Thorson's precision platformer stings more than a typical rotation. Celeste is one of those rare games that transcended its genre, won a stack of awards, and became a genuine cultural touchstone for indie gaming. It's been on Game Pass long enough that plenty of subscribers probably assumed it was a permanent fixture. It isn't, and if you haven't played it yet, you've got until July 31 to fix that. The other departures include Crusader Kings III, Mount & Blade 2: Bannerlord, Rain World, Sniper Elite Resistance, Back to the Dawn, My Friendly Neighborhood, and Whiskerwood. Losing Crusader Kings III and Rain World alongside Celeste is a rough hit for anyone who uses Game Pass as a way to explore games outside their comfort zone.

What's Coming In

The headliner needs no introduction. Halo: Campaign Evolved is Halo Studios' ground-up remake of the original Halo: Combat Evolved campaign, rebuilt with HD visuals, refined controls, three new missions, an expanded arsenal, and up to four-player online co-op. It launches on Cloud, Console, Handheld, and PC through Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass. The game is also coming to PS5, which has dominated the conversation around it for months. I wrote about Game Pass's subscriber shortfall recently, and a title like this is exactly the kind of release Microsoft needs to justify the service's existence. Whether it moves the needle remains a different question from whether it's a good game.

Game Freak's Beast of Reincarnation is the other major day-one addition, arriving August 4. The Pokémon studio's action RPG blends real-time and turn-based combat in a post-apocalyptic Japan setting. It was spotlighted during an Xbox Developer Direct earlier this year, and Xbox has been championing it heavily. Having the Pokémon developer ship a non-Pokémon game as a day-one Game Pass title is a genuine coup, and I'm curious whether the game can stand on its own without that studio's most famous brand attached.

The rest of the wave fills in the gaps. Shift at Midnight, an online co-op detective horror game, arrived today on July 22. Hell is Us joins July 23 through Game Pass Ultimate, Game Pass Premium, and PC Game Pass. Mistfall Hunter, a dark fantasy extraction ARPG, drops July 30 as another day-one release. Corsair Cove, a pirate city-builder, lands July 31 on PC. And Heretic + Hexen, the enhanced re-release of the classic dark fantasy shooters, hits August 4 on the Premium tier before joining Ultimate and PC Game Pass.

Four day-one releases in a single wave is aggressive scheduling, and it comes after Microsoft cut Game Pass prices back in April. Ultimate dropped to $22.99 per month from $29.99, and PC Game Pass fell to $13.99 from $16.49. The value proposition is harder to argue against at those prices, especially with Halo leading the charge.

Still, every time I see a game like Celeste quietly rotate out while a blockbuster rotates in, it reinforces the tension at the heart of Game Pass. The service is brilliant at putting big launches in front of millions of players. It's less great at keeping the smaller, weirder, more personal games around long enough for people to discover them. Celeste deserved a permanent spot. It didn't get one, and on July 31 it's gone.