Joule Adams, ReCore's protagonist, and her ”Corebot” companions Mack, Seth and Duncan. Photo: Xbox.
Joule Adams, ReCore’s protagonist, and her ”Corebot” companions Mack, Seth and Duncan. Photo: Xbox.

Gaming consoles are notorious for their vertical integration: only in-house games, services, and controllers will work on them, and occasionally even older games from the same console can create compatibility challenges.

But today, Microsoft is breaking out of the console with ReCore, the first release in the company’s Play Anywhere series. That means gamers can now buy the game through the Xbox Store or Windows Store for $39.99 as a digital download, then play it … well, not quite anywhere, but on their Xbox One console and their Windows 10 device.

While Microsoft is still keeping the Play Anywhere games in the family, the program is a big step towards cross-compatible games, which have been very slow to take off with traditional consoles like Xbox, PlayStation, and Nintendo’s consoles.

ReCore gameplay. Photo: XboX.
ReCore gameplay. Photo: Microsoft.

The series is also a big step towards digital game ownership, as the games do not come with a physical copy, a hotly debated topic among gaming communities. Digital games can be easier to acquire, and have convenient backups, but they also take away from the romanticism of gaming and make the game harder to access by requiring logins.

Xbox seems to have decided that cross-platform compatibility is worth the griping from fans of physical copies. ReCore is the first release in the Play Anywhere series, but a dozen titles have been announced. Future releases will include sequels to popular titles like Halo Wars and Gears of War, along with several original games.

ReCore may be an action-adventure, but from the looks of the trailer it also has an interesting narrative amid the gunfire, and the game world and graphics look fascinating. Check out some of the gameplay below.

The game comes from Armature Studio, the same team behind the popular Nintendo series Metroid Prime, and is currently available in North America, Latin America, and most Asian countries. It will be available in Japan on Sept. 15, and Europe Sept. 16.

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