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July 22, 2026

Shift at Midnight hits Game Pass today, Sir Brante free-to-keep ends tomorrow

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Shift at Midnight, Bun Muen's online co-op gas-station detective horror whose Steam demo has drawn an Overwhelmingly Positive reception (per Pure Xbox), launches day-one on Game Pass (Ultimate, PC Game Pass) and Steam today, July 22, at 8am PT, alongside Tears of Metal's PC Game Pass Early Access debut. Sir Brante (89% Steam, Metacritic 82) and Epic's Echo Generation + Luto are on their last full day free, all ending tomorrow, July 23, when Foretales goes free on Epic, Prime drops In Sound Mind (Metacritic 75), and Hell is Us (Metacritic 77) joins Game Pass. Xbox's freshly announced Wave 2 also brings Halo: Campaign Evolved, Game Freak's Beast of Reincarnation, and more through early August. Every end date checked.

Game Pass: two day-one launches today

Shift at Midnight (Bun Muen, published by Kwalee) is an online co-op detective horror for up to three players. You and up to two friends work the graveyard shift at a rural 90s gas station, examining customer IDs and behavior to figure out which are doppelgangers pretending to be human. Make one mistake and a creature slips out, forcing you to barricade, set traps, and hide. It launches today, July 22, at 8am PT on Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass (Cloud, Xbox Series X|S, and PC; not the Premium tier), and on Steam at $9.99 with a launch discount. Pure Xbox reports the multiplayer demo has drawn an Overwhelmingly Positive reception on Steam, and calls it the kind of co-op horror that could catch on. No critic reviews yet (it launches today).

Tears of Metal (Paper Cult, the Montreal studio behind the acclaimed Bloodroots) is a medieval hack-and-slash co-op roguelike set on a Scottish island under invasion. Carve through hordes with your Scottish battalion, combine over a hundred artifacts into builds, and expand your settlement between runs. It enters Early Access today, July 22, at 8am PT on PC via Steam and the Microsoft Store, free with PC Game Pass and Game Pass Ultimate (Cloud and PC). There is no native Xbox console version yet (slated for later 2026). It is paid separately on Steam, with the price set to rise after Early Access, and has racked up over 400,000 wishlists. No reviews yet (Early Access launch), but the official PR ships three acts, three heroes, and 45-plus handcrafted environments on day one.

Steam: Sir Brante's last full day free to keep

The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante (Sever / Schisma Games, 101XP), a black-and-white narrative RPG that's 89% positive on Steam across roughly 2,717 English reviews with a Metacritic score of 82 and Deck Verified status, is free to keep on Steam right now. It is on its last full day: the giveaway ends tomorrow, Thursday, July 23, at 10am PT (5pm UTC), after which it returns to its regular $19.99. Claim it before then and it stays in your library forever. The giveaway is timed to the sequel, The Life and Suffering of Prince Jerian, which launched on Steam Monday, July 20 (paid), with a launch discount for anyone who owns Sir Brante.

Two other live Steam freebies: The Mound: Omen of Cthulhu's Lost Explorers' Swords Pack, a $4.99 cosmetic DLC, is free to keep through Wednesday, July 29 (it requires the $29.99 base game, currently 20% off at $23.99). And the Steam Train Fest is still running through Monday, July 27, with verified historic lows on Loco Motive ($11.24), Transport Fever 2 ($10.79), Overcrowd ($3.99), and Last Train Home ($9.74) per GG.deals.

Epic: Echo Generation + Luto's last full day, Foretales goes free tomorrow

Epic's current pair is on its last full day. Echo Generation: Midnight Edition (Cococucumber, $24.99, OpenCritic 77, a 90s-nostalgia turn-based RPG) and Luto (Broken Bird Games, $19.99, OpenCritic 77 and Metacritic 79 Generally Favorable, a P.T.-style psychological horror) are both free to keep through tomorrow, Thursday, July 23, at 8am PT.

When they end, Foretales takes over, free to keep from July 23 at 8am PT through July 30. It's a $19.99 narrative-driven card game with a Metacritic score of 74 and Very Positive Steam reviews, and it has never been given away before. It lands on its own, ending Epic's roughly three-month streak of offering at least two freebies per week (though another could still be added). The standalone found-footage co-op horror Together After Dark ($2.99, Mixed on Steam) remains free to keep through Monday, July 27.

Prime Gaming: In Sound Mind + Mystic Academy drop tomorrow

Prime's next batch arrives tomorrow, Thursday, July 23, and both games are yours to keep permanently with an Amazon Prime membership. The headliner is In Sound Mind (We Create Stuff, the studio behind cult horror mod Nightmare House 2), a 2021 first-person psychological horror that earned a Metacritic score of 75 (Generally Favorable) across 18 critic reviews, praised for its atmosphere, puzzles, and soundtrack though critics note the combat is thin. Claim it through the Amazon Games App. The second title is Mystic Academy: Escape Room (mc2games), a fantasy-themed escape room game claimed through GOG. The final July batch follows on July 30 with Zoria: Age of Shattering and Weakless, both on GOG.

Forward calendar: Xbox Wave 2, PS Plus second wave, and the rest

Xbox announced its full July Wave 2 Game Pass lineup on July 21, and it runs deep into August:

On PlayStation, the PS Plus Extra/Premium second wave lands July 28: Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Rita's Rewind, Dying Light, Citizen Sleeper 2, and Snow Bros. Wonderland. The Essential tier games (Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III, For the King II, CrossCode) remain claimable through Monday, August 3.

Remaining deadlines: Steam Train Fest closes Monday, July 27; Together After Dark (Epic) ends July 27; the Mound DLC freebie ends Wednesday, July 29.

That’s the reading for this issue.