Wccftech’s Most Anticipated Multiplayer Games of 2026 – New Online Worlds

[UPDATE - January 20, 2026] We have now posted the final results of the staff and community polls. You can find out which multiplayer game from this list took the crown in our full Wccftech Awards '25 Winners recap.

[ORIGINAL STORY] Multiplayer games are unique in that they can last for years and years, even decades in some cases, but the excitement of a brand new release cannot be truly matched by DLCs or expansions for existing titles.

Luckily, 2026 looks very interesting on the front of new multiplayer games releases. They're also quite varied, offering a variety of settings and gameplay formulas that are likely to entice many players throughout the year.

Other Wccftech's Most Anticipated 2026 Games per genre: Role-Playing Games, Indie Games, Platformers, DLC/Expansion, Action, Shooters, Horror, Sports/Racing, Fighting, Adventure Games, Strategy/Simulation

Marathon (March 2026 - PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series S|X)

Bungie's Marathon reboot has had to dodge several issues before approaching the launch. The game was originally slated to launch in 2024, but a round of layoffs caused a delay until 2025. Later, we learned that the former Game Director, Christopher Barrett, a veteran who had been at Bungie for more than twenty years, had been fired for misconduct and replaced by Joe Ziegler, who had previously served as the Game Director of Riot's Valorant.

Rumors continued to be uncertain as to the game's quality, and indeed, another delay was confirmed in June 2025 as the studio worked on refinements based on user feedback from previous testing phases. Last month, the development team finally nailed down the March 2026 release while also explaining the updated vision following the aforementioned improvements: proximity chat has been reintroduced (following its great implementation in ARC Raiders, perhaps), solo queuing has been added, and the new Rook Runner makes it easier to drop into in‑progress runs with minimal gear but no real risk, improving accessibility. Grass rendering was significantly improved, and now dead bodies remain persistent with decay animation, so that runners visibly deteriorate post-death, increasing immersion.

Whether that will be enough to catch the player's attention for a long period of time remains to be seen, but Bungie's standing in the multiplayer games category makes it impossible to discount them outright.

Enshrouded (Spring 2026 - PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series S|X)

German indie developer Keen Games may not be a household name like the others on this list of multiplayer games. However, they've already demonstrated their ability to deliver a fun cooperative action RPG with their previous game, Portal Knights, which is estimated to have sold between 1.5 and 2.8 million units on Steam alone.

Their new game, Enshrouded, has already far surpassed it with its early access sales. The studio announced that it had broken the four million units milestone back in April 2025, so it might be approaching five million units by now.

The survival game has proven to be very popular, and with version 1.0 tentatively slated in Spring (though it might slip) on both PC and consoles, it's not long until the 'Zelda meets Valheim' game gets out of early access and into more players' hands.

The Duskbloods (TBA 2026 - Nintendo Switch 2)

FromSoftware already delivered a great multiplayer game in 2025 with Elden Ring: Nightreign. With the Nintendo Switch 2 exclusive The Duskbloods, they're looking to repeat the success while experimenting with a different formula. The Duskbloods is a PvPvE game where eight players simultaneously compete against each other and AI-powered enemies and bosses.

According to the Japanese developer known primarily for the Souls series, The Duskbloods underwent the longest gameplay prototyping cycle of any of their games to date. It was greenlit even before Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice's March 2019 release and spent years on pure systems validation and mechanical iteration. The setting appears to blend Lovecraftian gothic horror with Steampunk aesthetics. As humanity reaches its apocalyptic Twilight, various time periods and spaces converge. Players are the Bloodsworn: vampire-like characters transcending human limits through blood-granted superhuman abilities. Based on the released gameplay, we can glean the following details:

• Victorian weaponry, such as blades, great weapons, and serrated arms)
• Firearms reminiscent of Bloodborne's trick weapons
• Steampunk jetpacks enabling vertical traversal
• Winged stone orbs with Cheshire grins
• Occult spells, blood magic, and necromantic summoning

One of the game's distinguishing features is that the victory conditions are dynamically variable and include:

• Last Player Standing (traditional battle royale)
• Designated Rival Defeat (assigned specific opponent to kill)
• Designated Ally Cooperation (assigned ally to find and support)
• Boss Defeat (cooperative or solo)

Victory Points accumulate through direct combat, strategic evasion, objective completion, or boss kills, theoretically ensuring that solo combat skill doesn't exclusively determine victory.

There are over a dozen Bloodsworn, and each possesses unique weapons, abilities, and aesthetic variations. These characters can also move with superhuman feats, unlike previous FromSoftware games, like ​double Jumps, super jumps, dashing, and air-dashing. Finally, a randomized Event System attempts to prevent stagnation by introducing elements such as special enemy spawns and additional objectives that offer bonus rewards.

GTA 6 (November 19, 2026 - PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series S|X)

Rockstar fans are extremely eager to see what the industry-leading studio has in store for them when it comes to the online mode of GTA 6. Whereas GTA 4 had a multiplayer mode that didn't really hold players' interest for long, the exact opposite is true for GTA 5, which has had such a successful online mode that the studio is still continuously updating it (and making a lot of money off it) after thirteen years.

Rockstar literally said nothing about it so far. Thankfully, we at Wccftech brought you a rumor from the industry veteran Rich Vogel, who heard through the grapevine that many of GTA 6's online features are typical of a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) and as such, he wouldn't be surprised to see it evolving more toward that direction. That rumor is compounded by Rockstar's acquisition of FiveM's maker, Cfx.re, back in August 2023. FiveM is the popular community-made online modification framework that provides customized dedicated servers and extensive roleplaying features.

With GTA 6 set to launch on November 19, 2026, if the game isn't delayed, we might hear a lot more about the massively anticipated game in the coming months.

Cinder City (TBA 2026 - PC and Consoles)

Korean developer NCSoft is going to be very busy in 2026. They're bringing Aion 2 to Western countries, for one thing, although the Korean launch hasn't been that well-received. They're also working on another MMO-like game, Cinder City, which I had the chance to play at Gamescom 2025 before chatting at length with BigFire Games CEO Jaehyun Bae.

Cinder City is a lot like The Division in that it's an open world third-person shooter set in a post-apocalyptic city environment. In this case, instead of New York, there's Seoul, which has been quarantined following its invasion by 'bizarre lifeforms'. I didn't see any of that in the Gamescom 2025 demo, nor did I experience any cooperation with other players (it was a single player build), but the full game will have both. In fact, the developers assured me we can expect dynamic events, dungeons, boss fights, and even endgame content. At launch, there will be between seven and nine playable characters, each packing different skillsets.

Honorable Mentions

We have at least five more multiplayer games to recommend you keep an eye on throughout 2026:

• Chrono Odyssey
• ArcheAge Chronicles
• Aion 2
• Path of Exile 2
• John Carpenter's Toxic Commando

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