Games With Gold Rundown for February 16-28

This past week, a new pair of Games With Gold joined the lineup. The Xbox 360 game Star Wars: The Force Unleashed and the Xbox One’s Project Cars: Digital Edition were added while Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime will be available until the end of the month. The Force Unleashed stars the new protagonist Starkiller and was a huge early showcase for the Xbox 360’s hardware increases over the PS2. It featured remarkable lighting and glass effects, and really did blend action with the Star Wars universe better than most games released up to that point in time. It has been a frequent part of digital bundles on PC, but hasn’t been released for free until now. Of course, as an Xbox 360 freebie, it’s yours to keep forever – so it’s a great value over the long haul.

The real cream of the crop here is definitely Project Cars: Digital Edition. The core game is great enough, but this version packs in a bit of DLC – so anyone with both a high-end PC and an Xbox One who missed out on the Humble Bundle with it can still have a lot of fun with the game. Project Cars was a crowdfunded racing fan’s dream game and came along before Kickstarter before finally seeing release in 2015 and dazzling everyone with incredible racing action and gorgeous graphics. Its visuals remain some of the finest in the genre, and the Xbox One’s triggers make it a joy to control using a controller.

Overall, February was a fantastic month for the Games With Gold program. Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime was an odd game to keep using all month, but it also allowed its fanbase to grow a bit with each passing day – so over the long haul, it was probably a smart move for that game. Both The Force Unleashed and Project Cars are worth the $10 a month to subscribe on their own – although the better value is always the annual plan at $60. Each game is worth owning and Project Cars is one of the system’s finest racing games – and that’s saying something given that the Xbox One is easily the definitive racing game console on the market today.