PlayStation icon joins Xbox Game Pass in latest free game addition

One of Sony’s former PlayStation mascots has officially jumped ship and moved to Xbox, following a recent Xbox Game Pass update.

As revealed on the official Xbox Twitter account, the 2019 kart-racer Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled will be landing on Xbox Game Pass on 4 December (which is tomorrow, if you don’t have a calendar handy).

This isn’t the first time a Crash Bandicoot game has been released on Xbox– it’s not even actually the first Crash Bandicoot game to come to Xbox Game Pass.

Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex was eventually ported to the original Xbox back in 2002, and Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy landed on Xbox Game Pass back in August.

It does however imply that several Activision-owned titles (many of which used to be PlayStation exclusives) won’t be coming to the PlayStation Plus catalogue in the future.

Last month, Microsoft also revealed that the Spyro Reignited Trilogy would be landing on Xbox Game Pass - another former Sony exclusive mascot.

Take a look at the game in action below.

As of now, you can’t download any Crash Bandicoot or Spyro titles through the PlayStation Plus service. It seems Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard means that the chances of seeing either of these former PlayStation mascots pop up on PS Plus is now pretty slim.

As Activision Blizzard owned the rights to both Spyro and Crash Bandicoot (following Activision’s purchase of Vivendi back in 2008), this means that the exclusive rights to both characters (and their previously released games) now belong to Microsoft.

Still, it’s more than likely that any new games in both franchises will still see release on PlayStation hardware - just don’t expect to get them for free through PlayStation Plus any time soon.

Here’s hoping Microsoft won’t come for Sony’s most beloved mascot next. Please, Microsoft - take anyone except Sony’s beloved Polygon Man.