5 Best Xbox Games That Aren't Halo or Gears of War

Since the arrival of the original Xbox in 2001, Microsoft has published countless different games across its various consoles. Of the games to come directly from Xbox, those tied to Halo and Gears of War are undoubtedly the most popular. Halo has been with Xbox from the beginning and has received numerous spin-offs outside of the mainline entries which follow Master Chief. Gears of War didn’t arrive until the Xbox 360, but once it did, it proved to be one of the most influential franchises of its time that completely changed third-person shooters. Even today, Halo and Gears of War remain the biggest Xbox franchises by a large margin, and that likely won’t change soon.

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When looking outside of Halo and Gears of War, though, it’s a bit harder to determine what the best Xbox games in history are. As such, let’s rank the five best Xbox titles to ever come about that aren’t tied to either series. For the purposes of this list, we’ll also be ruling out franchises like Call of Duty, Fallout, Minecraft, and more that were acquired by Xbox later on and didn’t originally come from the publisher.

5. Sea of Thieves

Sea of Thieves is one of the more interesting success stories in the history of Xbox. Upon its arrival in 2018, Sea of Thieves was seen as a bit of a disappointment. The pirate-themed co-op adventure game was found to be lackluster, as it didn’t have much content to keep players enticed.

Since then, though, developer Rare has continued to update Sea of Thieves in all sorts of ways that have kept players coming back time and time again. Today, going on eight years after its launch, Sea of Thieves still has a deep player base and has become one of Xbox’s best live-service games ever.

4. Sunset Overdrive

Before developer Insomniac Games went on to be acquired by PlayStation, it developed Sunset Overdrive exclusively with Xbox. This zany, open-world take on the post-apocalyptic genre features Insomniac’s usual penchant for unique weapons, combined with a traversal system that feels akin to something like Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater. The final product makes Sunset Overdrive one of the most unique and purely enjoyable games to ever come from Xbox.

While we’re unlikely to ever see anything else come Sunset Overdrive since Insomniac has moved on, the game itself still holds up incredibly well almost 12 years after its launch. If you haven’t gotten around to playing Sunset Overdrive already, you should really rectify that sooner rather than later.

3. Crackdown

Crackdown’s original claim to fame is that it included access to the Halo 3 multiplayer beta. While that alone was enough for many Xbox 360 owners to run out and grab a copy, it turns out that Crackdown itself was also great. Set within the sprawling Pacific City, Crackdown puts players in control of the “Agent”, who is more or less a superhero. Tasked with taking down various mobsters throughout the city, players would be able to grow their powers through essentially everything that they did. This led to Crackdown having a fantastic sense of progression that other games often fail to achieve.

Xbox tried to capitalize on the success of the original Crackdown with two sequels, both of which failed to reach the same heights as the original. Despite the franchise now being on ice, it doesn’t undo just how special the first Crackdown was.

2. Forza Horizon 5

Forza has been around for over 20 years now and is one of the most popular racing franchises on the planet. Beginning in 2005 with Forza Motorsport, the series would eventually make a major shift with Forza Horizon, which brought the fast-paced racing the franchise had been known for up until that point into an open-world format. Since then, Forza Horizon has surpassed the popularity of the series it came from and has continued to get better with each new installment.

While it might not be the best in the series for long, Forza Horizon 5 currently represents the best Xbox has ever seen from its flagship racing property. Its diverse, gorgeous world of Mexico makes for one of the best racing playgrounds and is accompanied by some of the most impressive and realistic audio ever seen in a game. Forza Horizon 5 is so good that even those who typically aren’t fans of racing games will still find a ton to love with it.

1. Fable 2

There’s a reason that there’s so much excitement circling for the upcoming reboot of Fable, and much of it is because of Fable 2. While the original Fable on Xbox was fantastic at the time, Lionhead Studios improved on just about everything from the first entry with its sequel. A better story, combat system, and the introduction of a dog companion made Fable 2 far more memorable and entrenched it as one of the best RPGs in history.

Fable 2 isn’t just one of the high points of the RPG genre as a whole, but it stands as one of the greatest games to ever come from Xbox. While it can be argued that certain Halo or Gears of War titles might be better than it, no other Xbox game outside of these franchises can hold a candle to Fable 2.

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