Microsoft will hold its major annual Xbox Games Showcase on June 7, with Gears of War: E-Day getting this year’s dedicated post-show Direct.
“Sunday, June 7 is locked in,” Microsoft’s new gaming boss Asha Sharma announced today on social media, alongside an image confirming that the action will kick off at 6pm UK / 1pm Eastern / 10am Pacific. “Xbox Games Showcase 2026 is almost here with a deep dive into Gears of War: E-Day Direct.
“In my first month, I heard clearly that our community values Xbox FanFest. As part of the return of Xbox, we made the decision to bring it back to LA to recognize the players who’ve been with us over the years. Looking forward to celebrating together!”
Microsoft still holds its traditional June showcase in the timeslot of now-defunct video games trade show E3, and the confirmation that it will once again do this year is not a surprise. (It’s highly likely both PlayStation and Nintendo will hold similar announcement shows around the same time — and indeed, a major leak of Nintendo’s 2026 plans last week suggested as such.)
Xbox’s choice of Gears of War: E-Day for its annual spotlight is interesting, however, seeing as Microsoft had plenty of other options for this year. 2026 will also see the launch of Microsoft’s new Fable reboot, as well as the return of Master Chief. Could one of those have already launched by then? It seems unlikely. Fable already got a decent showing in this year’s early Xbox Developer Direct, when we learned it will arrive this fall and launch day one on PlayStation 5 as well as PC and Xbox consoles.
Xbox’s plans for its upcoming Halo: Campaign Evolved remake feel more nebulous, meanwhile — unless it is planning to surprise us all and release the game in June as a shadow drop.
Xbox’s practice of spotlighting a specific game for around an hour after its main announcement show began back in 2023, when it started the practice with a lengthy look at Bethesda’s big space RPG hope Starfield. 2024’s show was focused on Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, while last year featured The Outer Worlds 2 and Grounded 2.
Last year’s main showcase included more than 30 games, as well as the Xbox ROG Ally handheld devices. However, there was no sign of Gears, Fable or Halo in last year’s show at all, which led to many fans feeling that it landed fairly flat. The event did include more details of a game we’re still waiting to hear a release date for even now: Inxile’s Clockwork Revolution. Hopefully we see more of that this June, too.
What else could make an appearance? This year’s Call of Duty could get a small reveal, setting expectations after a particularly rocky period for the franchise. Hideo Kojima could turn up to reveal more of his upcoming horror project OD. And the time feels right for us to see something tangible of Undead Labs’ State of Decay 3. Whatever happens, you’ll be able to join us right here on IGN as we report all the big reveals from the Xbox Games Showcase live.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at [email protected] or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
