Xbox Game Pass in January 2025: Let’s See What’s Poppin’ (Spoiler Alert: It’s Straight Heat Across the Board)

Update 2 (1/7/2025): The “Games Arriving” table has been updated to reflect the insane new additions to January’s Xbox Game Pass roster!

Update (1/2/2025): The games leaving Xbox Game Pass on January 15 are Common’hood, Escape Academy, Exoprimal, Figment: Journey Into the Mind, Insurgency: Sandstorm, and Those Who Remain. I’ll keep updating this as more titles reveal themselves.

Original: Fortunately, we don’t know what’s leaving Xbox Game Pass this month yet. [Editor’s Note: Well, that didn’t last too long!] However, Xbox’s January 2025 lineup is extremely enticing. Filled with either Day One titles I’m downloading immediately when they drop, or older releases I’ve been meaning to play. Without further nonsense, let’s talk about what’s coming to Xbox Game Pass! (And, of course, I’ll update this as new announcements are made.)

games arriving On xbox game pass in January 2025

Game	Platforms	Date Arriving
Carrion	Console, PC, Cloud	January 2
Road 96	Console, PC, Cloud	January 7
Lightyear Frontier	Xbox Series X|S	January 8
My Time at Sandrock	Console	January 8
Robin Hood – Sherwood Builders	Xbox Series X|S	January 8
Rolling Hills: Make Sushi, Make Friends	Console	January 8
EA Sports UFC 5	Xbox Series X|S, Cloud	January 14
Diablo	PC	January 14
Eternal Strands	Console, PC	January 28
Sniper Elite: Resistance	Console, PC, Cloud	January 30
Citizen Sleeper 2: Starward Vector	Console, PC	January 31

and you know I need to include recommendations

If I’m honest, all five games (as of this writing) coming to Xbox Game Pass this month are getting plays from me. However, it’s still my duty to include a small breakdown of what I’m personally most excited about! So, what should be prioritized this month?

Rolling Hills: Make Sushi, Make Friends: It’s just so goddamn adorable. It reminds me of Dave the Diver if you only focus on the “restaurant sim” part! Now, for what it’s worth, don’t enter expecting Stardew Valley levels of depth. But, for my fellow cozy game lovers who just want to enjoy chill vibes? This may be one of the strongest Xbox Game Pass additions in quite some time!

Citizen Sleeper 2: Starward Vector: How can you not? Citizen Sleeper is spoken of in the same breath as Disco Elysium when people talk about the most impactful, emotional narrative-minded games in the industry. Plus, I love an experience that’s going to tell everyone how much capitalism sucks and is an impossible game to win. We’ll also be getting new dice and skill systems — along with a fancy ship! “Stress” will be a major mechanic you have to manage, and who among us can’t relate to that?

more recommendations!

Eternal Strands: I had an interesting journey with this upcoming Xbox Game Pass addition (sorry, Google needs to eat, guys). When I watched the reveal trailer, I was cold on what I saw. The promise of the moment-to-moment gameplay? Stellar. The “showcase” of that at the time? Bleh. However, you can tell the devs have been honing their vision and tightening things up. Now? It looks great. Gives me Shadow of the Colossus vibes, actually!

Road 96: I just keep missing this damn game! I technically have it on the Switch, but… it’s also the Switch. It’s on my PlayStation 5, too! But, I can’t stop playing Baldur’s Gate 3 long enough to play anything else on the PS5 until I finish one playthrough. So, Xbox Game Pass may have made it so I can stop procrastinating! It’s an insane story-driven game about escaping an authoritarian hellscape. Nothing, uh… scarily accurate about that in 2025 at all!