Xbox has lost two indie game darlings from its store. On Bluesky, Maddy Thorson of MaddyMakesGames confirmed that both Celeste and TowerFall had been pulled from the Xbox store in support of the BDS movement.
This is the second high-profile indie developer this month to make a statement about taking its games off Xbox (or not releasing them there in the first place) after House House shared that in support of BDS, Big Walk would not be made available on the platform. There is a growing tide of anti-Xbox sentiment over parent company Microsoft’s technical contributions to the Israeli genocide of Palestinians. No Games For Genocide is a collective of developers and other gaming professionals urging a boycott of Xbox games and services as a part of the larger BDS (boycott, divest, sanction) movement targeting companies including Disney, HP, Reebok, and more. Though not directly targeting Xbox, Penguin Colony was another game taking a direct stand in support of the BDS movement with a scathing message on the wider games industry’s silence on the genocide, accompanied with a ban of the game’s sale in Israel.
In 2014, MaddyMakesGames released the “Super Smash Bros. but make it archery” game TowerFall, initially on, of all places, the Ouya. Celeste was released four years later in 2018. The game’s tight, challenging platforming, incredible soundtrack, and its equal parts heartwarming and heartwrenching narrative made it one of the best indie games of the decade. That year, Celeste won best indie game at the Game Awards, ironically another institution under fire for its host’s unwillingness to acknowledge the Palestinian genocide.
