New co-op action game Warhammer 40,000: Darktide is announced for PC and Xbox Series X at the Xbox Game Showcase. The game is being developed by Fatshark, the same development team behind the Warhammer: Vermintide co-op action games.
In Warhammer 40,000: Darktide, players can team up with up to three friends, forming a group of four Inquisition Acolytes heading into the depths of the hive city of Tertium. The "seeds of corruption threaten an overwhelming tide of darkness," reads the official description for the game, as a Chaos cult called the Admonition wants to take control of the planet of Atoma Prime and turn those living there into dust. Players will be taking on hordes of Imperium and Chaos enemies.
While Warhammer: Vermintide 2 also provided co-op action gameplay, Warhammer 40,000: Darktide seems to be a much more horror-based experience. In the trailer, the four characters can be seen navigating Tertium in the dark, using beams of light to guide them, before coming face to face with a wall of some very unfriendly-looking faces. There are plenty of exciting upcoming horror games but fans who love being scared out of their seats may have to make room to put a new title on the list.
Little else is known about the game, though Fatshark has described Warhammer 40,000: Darktide as a "console launch exclusive." This could mean that like fellow horror game The Medium, it may only be available on PC and Xbox Series X and will not be released on PS5 or any other console. However, it could also mean that the game is just a timed exclusive and will be coming to PS5 at a later date.
As seen from Epic Games Store exclusives, timed exclusive deals typically run for a year. In June though, PlayStation's head of global marketing and consumer experience, Eric Lempel, confirmed that some PS5 games have timed exclusive deals that last just a few months or up to a few years. The full details of Fatshark's deal with Xbox isn't known meaning that fans on competing platforms could be in the dark for a while.
Those planning to get an Xbox Series X should be quite happy with things, as Fatshark has also confirmed that Warhammer 40,000: Darktide will be available on Xbox Game Pass at launch. In April, Xbox revealed that Xbox Game Pass has more than 10 million subscribers and by adding a Warhammer title to the library, that number could grow so much more.
Warhammer 40,000: Darktide will be released in 2021 on PC and Xbox Series X.