Xbox-Owned Grounded Headlines PS Plus for June

Two years ago, an Xbox first-party game showing up as the headline title on PS Plus would have been front-page news. Now it's just how things work. PlayStation confirmed today that Obsidian's Grounded: Fully Yoked Edition will lead the June PS Plus Essential lineup, joined by Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 and Warhammer 40,000: Darktide. All three go live on June 2 and can be claimed through July 6.

The contradiction here is so normalized it almost doesn't register. Grounded is developed by Obsidian Entertainment and published by Xbox Game Studios. It started life as an Xbox console exclusive in early access back in 2020, got its full release in 2022, and only arrived on PS4, PS5, and Switch in 2024 as part of Xbox's broader push to put first-party titles on rival platforms. Now it's not just available on PlayStation; it's the featured game on Sony's own subscription service. If you'd told someone in 2020 that this would happen, they'd have assumed Microsoft was selling Obsidian.

But this is the reality Xbox built for itself. The multiplatform strategy that started with a few tentative releases has snowballed to the point where Microsoft is effectively supplying Sony's monthly giveaway shelf. I don't think that's inherently bad for players; Grounded is a fun survival game that mixes Honey I Shrunk the Kids with surprisingly tense spider encounters, and the Fully Yoked Edition added enough new bosses, quests, and gear to justify a second look. More people playing it is a good thing. It's just a strange look for a company that spent billions acquiring studios to differentiate its platform.

FC 26 Gets Extra Time

The other wrinkle in June's lineup is EA Sports FC 26, which was already part of May's PS Plus games and is now sticking around until June 16. According to the PlayStation Blog, the timing lines up with the game's "World's Game" update on June 4, which adds an international tournament mode with 48 national teams and new stadiums. The FIFA World Cup connection makes this a fairly obvious promotional play, and it's hard to complain about a sports game getting extra shelf life during the actual tournament it's simulating.

Rounding out the new additions, Warhammer 40,000: Darktide is a solid pickup for co-op shooter fans. It launched in rough shape back in 2022, but Fatshark has patched it into a much better state since then. If you bounced off it at launch or never tried it, getting it through PS Plus removes the risk entirely. Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 fills the platform fighter slot; it's the sort of game that's perfect for a subscription service because it lives or dies on having people to play with, and a PS Plus wave should help with that.

Sony also confirmed that Days of Play kicks off tomorrow, May 27, and separately revealed that Destiny 2: Legacy Collection will join the PS Plus Extra and Premium Game Catalog in June, with the full catalog lineup coming later.

Players have until June 1 to claim May's outgoing titles, Wuchang: Fallen Feathers and Nine Sols. Both are strong action games, so if you haven't added them to your library yet, do it before they rotate out.