Xbox Game Pass May 2021: The best games to play this month

May 5th, 2021 Jordan Oloman Xbox Game Pass

Mayday, mayday! The Xbox Game Pass library is growing again, and at this point trying to maintain a backlog feels like a futile endeavour. The library is just overflowing with must-play games, with new essentials entering the fold every month.

May is no different. In this month alone, we’ve got two of Rockstar’s greatest games to dig into, as well as souped-up versions of some tremendous cult classics. Follow along as we recommend our favourite games available in the current Xbox Game Pass library.

Destroy All Humans! (Cloud, Console and PC) — Out Now

Disintegrate 1950s humans like it’s 2005 with the recent remake of Destroy All Humans!, a superb third-person shooter with a silly script that holds up to this day, and was added to Game Pass at the end of April. The charming Crypto is a vessel for pure mischief, offering an arsenal of absurd alien weaponry for players to tinker with as they melt buildings and torment the minds of suburban nuclear households.

Grand Theft Auto V (Cloud and Console) — Out Now

If you haven’t already experienced the open-world brilliance of Grand Theft Auto V, you can now check it out as part of your Xbox Game Pass subscription thanks to a super late April addition. As well as the carefully crafted, well-acted and chaotic campaign, GTA Online is still being updated to this day, and is well worth a look for its magnificent, communication-focused multiplayer heists.

Psychonauts — May 13 (Cloud, Console and PC)

Ahead of the sequel coming later this year, you should definitely check out Double Fine’s first game, which is one of the most unique IPs in video game history and a stellar platformer. You play as a young adept at a psychic summer camp who projects into the minds of the troubled to mitigate their mental health worries. It sounds dark but it has a light heart, with plenty of incredible jokes to chuckle at and a magnificent moral at its core.

Red Dead Online — May 13 (Cloud and Console)

If the modern world doesn’t appeal, you can also cast your mind back to a simpler time and with another endlessly interesting Rockstar Games open world on Xbox Game Pass. Red Dead Online is ruthless with its lassos and online chain gangs, but it can also be beautiful as you wander through the woods, engaging with one of the game’s many Frontier Pursuits, from animal sample hunting to artefact collecting. Grab some friends and start a posse and I bet you’ll lose tens of hours to this meticulous masterpiece.