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Contraband from Xbox & Avalanche Studios revealed at Xbox/Bethesda E3 2021 showcase

A new co-op open world game from Xbox Game Studios and Avalanche Studios is on the way.

June 13, 2021 10:21 AM

Sunday's Xbox & Bethesda Games Showcase continued with a fresh look at the latest from Avalanche Studios. The sounds of Steely Dan played over the opening trailer, as players were taken through what looks to be a drug lord's leisurely lair. It looks to be a co-op open world effort called Contraband.

"Contraband is a co-op smuggler's paradise set in the fictional world of 1970s Bayan, and our most ambitious and spectacular game to date," reads the announcement on Xbox Wire. "We're taking everything that we've learned from 18 years of being at the forefront of creating beautiful, vast open game worlds filled with stunning vistas and incredible emergent gameplay moments."

Avalanche Studios cites in the Xbox Wire story that it's had Contraband in the works for the past three years. The studio is certainly no stranger to this type of concept, having four Just Cause games on their resume. They're also fairly familiar with some of Xbox's partners, as they most recently worked on Rage 2 alongside Bethesda. Like the Just Cause games, Contraband will be built on the Apex Engine, which the team notes will take advantage of the Xbox Series X's technological capabilities.

There's no release window for Contraband just yet, but it's among the games that we'll be watching for future updates. We have a lot coming from E3 2021, so stay tuned to Shacknews for the latest updates.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?

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