Not-so-easy Gamerscore: 35 tough and long completions from the latest Xbox sales

By Luke Albigés,

Up for a challenge? As a counter-point to our regular articles on easy Gamerscore in the Xbox sales, we thought we'd take a look at the time-consuming and demanding discounted games at the other end of the spectrum.

Sure, there are plenty of dead easy games in the current Xbox sales if you're after a quick injection of Gamerscore, but there's also plenty of discounted stuff for players who prefer their games to put up more of a fight. We've included games based on both their TA ratios and their completion estimates, and you should be able to see whether a game is likely to be long, tricky, or both by comparing the two. If there's nothing here for you this week, you could always check out the hardest and longest Game Pass games to see if you can find something to test you!

Longest and toughest Xbox game completions from the latest sales

Game Sale Price Completion Time TA Ratio Discount
Assassin's Creed Odyssey 80-100 hours 1.66 75%
Assassin's Creed The Ezio Collection 100-120 hours 1.95 70%
Yakuza: Like a Dragon
• in Yakuza: Like a Dragon Hero Edition		 80-100 hours 2.16 70%
Dragon Ball XenoVerse 100-120 hours 2.43 90%
Lost Judgment 80-100 hours 2.58 60%
Assassin's Creed Valhalla
• in Assassin's Creed® Valhalla Deluxe Edition		 100-120 hours 3.11 67%
Yakuza 5 Remastered 150-200 hours 3.11 65%
Yakuza 5 Remastered (Windows) 150-200 hours 3.13 65%
WWE 2K22 (Xbox One)
• in WWE 2K22 Deluxe Edition		 100-120 hours 3.15 70%
WWE 2K22
• in WWE 2K22 Cross-Gen Digital Bundle		 120-150 hours 3.15 70%
Fallout 76 80-100 hours 3.24 75%
Sword Art Online: Fatal Bullet 80-100 hours 3.37 80%
XCOM 2 150-200 hours 3.41 95%
Yakuza 3 Remastered 80-100 hours 3.42 65%
Judgment 80-100 hours 3.45 60%
LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga
• in LEGO® Star Wars™: The Skywalker Saga		 80-100 hours 3.52 50%
Red Dead Redemption 2
• in Red Dead Redemption 2: Ultimate Edition		 200-300 hours 3.88 70%
Trials Fusion 40-50 hours 3.94 75%
Riders Republic 60-80 hours 4.13 70%
Sid Meier's Civilization VI
• in Sid Meier’s Civilization® VI Platinum Edition		 40-50 hours 4.58 68%
How to Survive 2 80-100 hours 4.72 75%
Yakuza 0 150-200 hours 4.75 80%
Yakuza 0 (Windows) 120-150 hours 4.76 80%
Wasteland 3
• in Wasteland 3 Colorado Collection		 120-150 hours 4.84 75%
Kingdom Come: Deliverance 150-200 hours 4.86 75%
John Wick Hex 15-20 hours 5.09 80%
Shiness: The Lightning Kingdom 60-80 hours 5.46 80%
Red Faction: Guerrilla Re-Mars-tered 100-120 hours 5.55 80%
UNSIGHTED 40-50 hours 6.04 40%
Outward
• in Outward: The Adventurer Bundle		 60-80 hours 6.07 60%
Unturned 30-35 hours 6.13 65%
Payday 2: Crimewave Edition
• in PAYDAY 2 - CRIMEWAVE EDITION - THE BIG SCORE Game Bundle		 150-200 hours 6.29 80%
How to Survive: Storm Warning Edition 35-40 hours 6.58 75%
Kerbal Space Program Enhanced Edition
• in Kerbal Space Program Enhanced Edition Complete		 40-50 hours 7.11 67%
ACE COMBAT 7: Skies Unknown
• in ACE COMBAT™ 7: SKIES UNKNOWN - TOP GUN: Maverick Edition		 100-120 hours 7.50 80%


Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown

ACE COMBAT 7: SKIES UNKNOWN

Looking purely at ratio, Bandai Namco's excellent dogfighting game Ace Combat 7 comes out on top, weighing in with a hefty TA ratio of 7.5. While this will have been bloated somewhat by its stint in Game Pass, it's not a quick or easy completion by any means, challenging you across all aspects of the game for a completion likely to take well over 100 hours. If we're going purely on completion length, though, the top dog is Rockstar's sprawling western Red Dead Redemption 2, with a list that covers both the epic story mode and Red Dead Online and estimates putting it at well over 200 hours.

XCOM 2

The Lost in XCOM 2

The cheapest challenge up for grabs in this week's Xbox sales is Firaxis' fantastic strategy epic XCOM 2, which sees its price slashed by a ridiculous 95% to just $2.99/£2.24/€2.49. The base game alone has a completion estimate of 150-200 hours, so you'll be looking at fighting off aliens for even longer if you plump for the Deluxe or Collection editions for the additional content. An honorable mention has to go to the Yakuza Remastered collection too, netting you three absolutely massive (and superb) adventures for just $13.99/£12.24/€13.99 — not bad for hundreds and hundreds of hours of criminal capers!

Outward

Outward

Our cheekiest challenge in the bargain bin this week has to be grounded yet janky RPG Outward, slapping players with a 1G achievement for making their first character, then holding back on rounding it off by keeping a 99G achievement for when you finally finish a trio of core quests across three playthroughs. Rude.

Yakuza: Like a Dragon

Yakuza: Like a Dragon ~ SuperHeroArt

Going by TA user rating, one of the very best challenging completions in the sales this week is Yakuza: Like a Dragon, the turn-based RPG reinvention of Sega's fan favourite series. If you already blasted through the 100-odd hour Like a Dragon completion or already have the game via Game Pass, Red Dead Redemption 2 comes up again here as it also sits on the same lofty 4.6/5, or there's Yakuza spin-off Judgment at 4.49/5 if you prefer the action-packed combat to Like a Dragon's JRPG systems.

You can view the full list of the games discounted in the latest Xbox sale here.

Will you be picking up any of these titles to get stuck into something demanding? Let us know!
Luke Albigés
Written by Luke Albigés
Luke runs the TA news team, contributing where he can primarily with reviews and other long-form features — crafts he has honed across two decades of print and online gaming media experience, having worked with the likes of gamesTM, Eurogamer, Play, Retro Gamer, Edge, and many more. He loves all things Monster Hunter, enjoys a good D&D session, and has played way too much Destiny.
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