It's been a long time coming, but the wildly popular party game Fall Guys is finally now on Xbox, and the relaunch of the game has also coincided with a transition to a free-to-play model. So, now that we're kicking off Season 1 all over again, including on Xbox this time, is Fall Guys worth a download? In our view, it's a definite yes!

For the uninitiated, Fall Guys is a game where you play as a bumbling jelly bean-like character and compete in obstacle courses and other wacky challenges, with the goal of making it to the final stage and ultimately trying to win it. Fall Guys utilises a battle royale format, where you start off with 60 online players, and they're eliminated round-by-round until you get to the grand finale. You can play solo, in duos, in parties, and even create custom matches with your friends.

The reason Fall Guys is so popular is because firstly it's really good fun, and secondly it's generally very accessible. For every round, all you need to know is how to run, jump, grab, and dive. Those are the only controls! You don't need to be a veteran gamer to enjoy Fall Guys, which means players of all skill levels can get something out of it.

You'll find plenty of variety in the stages too, from races, to puzzle and strategy focused levels, to a sport like volleyball, to rounds where you simply have to dodge giant fruits being catapulted your way. Pretty much all of these stages are really fun to play, although admittedly you sometimes find yourself playing the same few over and over again within the space of a few games, which can occasionally get tiresome. Then again, learning how to conquer these stages is a key part of success in Fall Guys, and as we said before, they're all enjoyable to play.

Fall Guys is still as great as ever on Xbox, then, and the new free-to-play transition hasn't ruined the gameplay. The difference now is that there's a new currency system called Show Bucks, which is largely (but not wholly) focused around paying real money for cosmetics in the in-game store, and the Season Pass is also now a paid element, although you can unlock free tiers of rewards as well. It's worth noting that if you've played Fall Guys on another platform in the past, you can get a free Legacy Pack and the first Season Pass for free instantly.

Levelling up the Season Pass is fun, and there are new daily, weekly, and monthly challenges that you can complete to help you get to tier 100, but if you're a veteran Fall Guys player, you might be irritated by the fact that you can't buy premium cosmetics with Crowns anymore. Instead, the best cosmetics now have to be acquired with Show Bucks. You get a Crown every time you win a game in Fall Guys, but all you can do with Crowns now is slowly build up a collection to redeem some extra free cosmetics over time, which makes the challenge of actually winning a game in Fall Guys less enticing than it used to be. It's fun to win and all, but you're not really being rewarded all that well for it anymore.

Meanwhile, the performance on Xbox Series X seems to be as good as we'd expect, running smoothly at 60 frames per-second, although you'll notice that when you spot other Fall Guys in the distance, they sometimes appear to be running at a slower frame rate. It's not the most graphically intensive game, but it looks great on Series X nonetheless.

So, we're happy to report that Fall Guys is definitely worth trying out on Xbox, and the fact that it supports cross-platform and cross-progression with other platforms means you can mix-and-match across Xbox, PC, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and PlayStation 5, and that aspect seems to be working really well in our experience so far. We've had to wait a couple of years for its arrival, but it's great to see Fall Guys finally joining the Xbox family in 2022!