The CoD competitor arrives sooner than you might expect
Call of Duty is finally getting a true first-person shooter competitor in the form of XDefiant in the very near future. The Ubisoft-developed free-to-play multiplayer title has been in development for years, and it is finally gearing up for its full release. But before then, players have the opportunity to check it out again in the XDefiant open beta.
XDefiant open beta release date, explained
XDefiant is launching later this summer, but you can play it this month during the Open Session from June 21-23! Learn more about it and check out XDefiant’s Year 1 roadmap for a look at the cadence of new weapons, factions, maps, and more coming to the free-to-play shooter. pic.twitter.com/zyskFVLFQp
— XDefiant (@PlayXDefiant) June 12, 2023
For those of you who missed out on the XDefiant closed beta testing sessions in the past, the open beta is almost here to remedy that situation. As announced in the recent Ubisoft Forward event, open beta begins at approximately 1 p.m. ET on Wednesday, June 21, and will conclude at around 2 a.m. ET on Saturday, June 24, 2023.
This relatively brief open beta session will be available worldwide to everyone on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC. You don’t need a special code or anything to get in; you’ll just download the game directly from your platform’s store once it is available.
Unfortunately, there is no love at this time for the older-gen console ports for PS4 and Xbox One, despite those versions still “actively being worked on.”
XDefiant full launch window finally revealed
In addition to the upcoming open beta release, players finally have news on when the full release of XDefiant will happen. The game being developed by former Call of Duty masterminds and pro players is coming out sometime “later this summer.”
No specific release date or month is available at this time. All we know is that the free-to-play FPS title is coming out sometime after the open beta session concludes. It could release in July, but it also could also release all the way until near the end of September.
When it does release, it’ll be in a preseason mode. This will be the full release of the game, but it won’t be yet in its first season of content. Instead, the preseason period will run for six weeks, during which players will have access to all of the factions, characters, and maps from the past testing phases, but with permanent progression.
Year 1 road map, explained
After the initial six weeks of XDefiant are up, the first portion of the Year 1 road map for the game kicks off with Season 1. Each season runs for approximately three months and offers players three new weapons, three new multiplayer maps, and a brand new faction of characters.
Here are the current codenames for each of the four seasons, named aptly after their respective factions:
- Ruby: Season 1
- Buzz: Season 2
- Orchard: Season 3
- Horde: Season 4
Every season also comes with a new Battle Pass, comprised of 90 tier levels for players to progress through before the season ends. We’ll have more details to share about the XDefiant release date in the near future, but for now, look forward to the open beta June 21-23, 2023, on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC.
