New Xbox One Bundles Pack Free Games, More Variety

Microsoft has something exciting for anyone that didn’t buy or receive an Xbox One during the 2015 holiday shopping season. It’s revealed all new Xbox One bundles with free games from the Xbox 360 and more. One of the bundles even includes a free copy of Ubisoft’s Rainbow Six Siege.

Microsoft revealed the first Xbox One bundles of 2016 this morning in a post on its Xbox Wire newsblog. Once a season the company refreshes the console bundles that it offers to shopping interested in a gaming console. It’s the company’s hope that offering bundles with the latest games helps boost interest in the console. This winter the company offered Xbox One bundles with Halo 5: Guardians, Rise of the Tomb Raider and Fallout 4.

The Xbox One Rainbow Six Siege Bundle includes a console that has 1TB of storage. That’s double the amount of storage that Microsoft offers in its cheapest Xbox One consoles and at launch. Buyers get a physical copy of Rainbow Six Siege, an Xbox One Wireless Controller and Xbox Chat Headset. Microsoft is smartly keeping the spotlight on its newly launched Xbox One Backwards Compatibility Program with this new bundle too. Buyers get digital copies of two games that originally debuted on the Xbox 360: Rainbow Six Vegas and Rainbow Six Vegas 2.

The Xbox One Rainbow Six Siege Bundle will come to stores in every country except Belgium, China, France, Netherlands and Japan. The bundle costs $399.

Backing up that bundle is what Microsoft is calling the Xbox One Name Your Game Bundle. For $349 Xbox One buyers get to choose the free game that they get with their console purchase. A code inside the box is worth a single game download from the Xbox Store. The press release on the bundle specifically says that buyers can choose any game from the “greatest games lineup in Xbox history.” Forza 6, Rise of the Tomb Raider, Gears of War Ultimate Edition and Rare Replay are all listed.

The console included in this bundle has just 500GB of storage, which means it’s priced at $349.99. That’s $50 less than the dedicated Rainbow Six Siege Bundle and $50 more than what the company sold the Xbox One for during the holidays. It was always pretty clear that the promotional pricing would end after the holidays were over. Presumably, Microsoft will cut the cost of Xbox One consoles again sometime in 2016.

Shoppers in the United States, Canada and Brazil won’t be able to pick up this bundle from a store until late January. Buyers in other countries can expect the Xbox One 500GB Name Your Game Bundle to arrive on store shelves on January 12th. The consoles included in both bundles have the standard black paint job.

All told, it’s great that Microsoft is refreshing its line-up of consoles. The company needs to keep new games in its roster since buyers often only feel compelled to purchase a bundle when they’re excited about a game specifically.

Regardless of console bundle, both of these new Xbox One bundles come with a single Xbox One Wireless Controller, Chat Headset, Batteries for the included controller, a single HDMI cable, free trial for Microsoft’s Xbox Live gaming service and a power adapter. Microsoft still sells its Kinect sensor for live TV integration and motion gaming in a more expensive bundle and separately for $99.

With these new bundles coming in, now might be a very good time to purchase one of the old bundles. The company doesn’t usually provide any warning when a bundle is about to sell out. This could be shopper’s last chance to get Rise of the Tomb Raider or Fallout 4 without making a separate purchase.