One way that game developers have recently been working to get their popular titles in the hands of as many players as possible is by bringing them to next-gen consoles. Now it looks like indie developer Moon Studios, with its flagship series Ori and the Blind Forest, are preparing to do exactly that on Microsoft's newest series of entertainment systems.
It should be noted that players can currently play Ori and the Blind Forest on Xbox Series X/S, thanks to the systems' backwards compatibility with this and similar titles. Additionally, there have been no official announcements from either Moon Studios or publisher Microsoft on any optimization, so this does still remain in the realm of speculation.
According to a new ESRB rating for Ori and the Blind Forest, the title has an E rating for its appearance on the "Xbox Series" platform. This is likely because every version of a game has to be rated separately, as some platforms tend to impose different censorship restrictions based on the target audience for the company. However, in the case of Ori and the Blind Forest arriving on new platforms, the game has previously been given an E, with the only restricting factor being mild fantasy violence.
What all of this points to is that the original Ori title might finally be getting the optimization update to make it perform without any of the common hiccups that come with backwards compatibility across console generations. This means that the whole series could now be playable at the best performance possible on Xbox Series X and Series S, since its sequel Ori and the Will of the Wisps has already received the same treatment. Of course, much of this is still speculation, though the existence of an ESRB rating is among the more concrete pieces of evidence that can point to this type of optimization enhancement being true.
At the moment, it does remain a strange oversight that Ori and the Blind Forest hasn't yet been enhanced for next-gen consoles when Ori and the Will of the Wisps already has. So, it would make sense for Moon Studios to go ahead and give the original the update in order to give players on newer consoles the best chance to play both games at the highest quality performances. However, if this isn't the case, then both games are still available across multiple platforms that can each offer their own unique experience with the series.
Ori and the Blind Forest is currently available for PC, Switch, and Xbox One.
Source: ESRB