Xbox's First $80 Game, The Outer Worlds 2, Gets A $10 Price Cut Ahead Of Launch [Update]

The Outer Worlds 2, Obsidian’s bigger and wilder sequel to the original RPG from 2019, was planned to be the first Xbox game to be sold at $80 when it arrives on October 29. However, just about a month after making that announcement, Xbox and Obsidian have reversed course and dropped the price of Outer Worlds 2 from $80 to $70.

On July 23, Obsidian announced on social media—via an in-universe message—that it was lowering the price of its upcoming RPG, The Outer Worlds 2, after receiving an “SOS” from players.

“Dear Galactic Citizens! We have received your SOS via skip drone about the pricing,” posted Obsidian. “As an organization devoted to making sure that corporations do not go unfettered, we at the Earth Directorate have worked with [REDACTED] to revise the price of The Outer Worlds 2. While this will not bring peace to the galaxy, or even your local colony, we assure you all that we are here to fight for all colonies in every way that we can.”

This is quite the change of plans for The Outer Worlds 2. It was just 45 days ago, on June 8, that Xbox announced that the standard edition of the upcoming sci-fi sequel would cost $80. This marked Outer Worlds 2 as the company’s first attempt at selling games for more than $70, and it followed Nintendo’s lead of selling Mario Kart World on Switch 2 for $80.

This was part of a larger price increase that Xbox announced in May that suggested some first-party games would cost $80.

But now, things have changed, and Outer Worlds 2 will only cost $70 for the base version of the game. So what happened? If I had to take a guess, I’d say that the negative feedback Nintendo received from players over Mario Kart World’s price likely didn’t help convince leadership at Xbox and Obsidian. The question now is, does this mean Xbox is done flirting with $80 games, or will it try again in the future?

Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 won’t be $80 either

It seemed inevitable that if The Outer Worlds 2 was going up in price, the next Call of Duty would too, but Microsoft is also now confirming that none of its holiday 2025 releases will be more than $70, which includes Black Ops 7. “We’re focused on bringing players incredible worlds to explore, and will keep our full priced holiday releases, including The Outer Worlds 2, at $69.99—in line with current market conditions,” a spokesperson for Xbox told Kotaku in an email.

Update, 7/23/2025 12:00 p.m. ET: Added comment from Microsoft.

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