Southern Gothic folklore action game South of Midnight, the latest from Contrast and We Happy Few developer Compulsion Games, will launch on Xbox and PC with day-one Game Pass support on April 8, 2025. If you shell out for the Premium Edition, you can play early starting April 3.
On top of a release date, today's Xbox Developer Direct reveal also gave us a closer look at our heroine's textile-themed abilities and the delightfully named bosses on the receiving end of those powers.
Hazel, new to her Weaver powers, can spin up objects to interact with the environment or unravel enemies to cleanse the darkness infecting the land. Combat is a mix of melee combos, jump attacks, and charge attacks, with cooldowns limiting your thread moves instead of a stamina bar. There's a focus on pushing and pulling enemies to control fights, and the devs reckon "the combat system is fast and responsive."
That's all well and good, but I can tell you the 12DOVE chat was flush with excitement not for the combat, which looks quite good, but mostly for characters like Catfish, a big ol' catfish mentor, and some of the best-named bosses of the year.
When I think of giant animal bosses with silly names in an action game, Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree's Golden Hippopotamus, which is – get this – a golden hippopotamus, immediately comes to mind. South of Midnight ups the ante with Two-Toed Tom the giant alligator and Huggin' Molly the whatever-the-hell-that-is. Let's not forget Rougarou, a bird monster who could pass for a wrestler with a really good costume.
The look and feel of South of Midnight has always been intriguing – having lived in Georgia my whole life, I can tell you from experience that southern goths shouldn't be underestimated – and its colorful bosses hammer it home. And packed into a game that, per an Xbox Wire post, "will take most players between 10-12 hours to complete"? Sign me up.
South of Midnight has been one of the lower-key Xbox games, but could end up being an ace up its sleeve for 2025.
