So it turns out Phantom Dust is out on Xbox One and PC today where it can be yours for a grand total of $0/£0. Xbox games marketing boss Aaron Greenberg made the announcement in a Tweet yesterday and shared some more details with fans.
Excited to announce a fan favorite Phantom Dust will re-release exclusively tomorrow for free on @Xbox One & @Windows 10! pic.twitter.com/q8lmn4yeIhMay 15, 2017
@BeastFireTimdog Yes UWP, Yes #XboxPlayAnywhere , Yes Cross-play support, Yes Free. :-)May 15, 2017
@PupkinTheKing @Xbox @Windows Re-release of the original game but now in 16x9 with some nice frame rate updates.May 15, 2017
It's not 100-percent free, though, there are some microtransactions for the multiplayer mode. You know, typical Hearthstone stuff.
@Esemes16 @Xbox @Windows Full original game to play through for free, you can buy multiplayer cards if you want to, but will not be penalized if you don’t.May 16, 2017
It looks like Phantom Dust isn't live on the Windows 10 Store or the Xbox One Store yet but it should go up sometime within the next few hours.
Phantom Dust's continued existence on Xbox has been a long, strange story. It remains to be seen whether this surprise re-release is the end or just a chapter mark - this would be a good way to assess interest for a potential sequel, after all. Either way, Phantom Dust is going from hard-to-find cult classic to spruced-up freebie and that's pretty cool.
For more games that we'd like to see make a comeback, check out our list of 15 Xbox franchises that deserve another shot.
