New Homeworld game dated, République continues, more Xbox 360 games come to Xbox One, and a screaming Xbox One bundle becomes available tomorrow.

Deserts of Kharak is the next Homeworld story

The first part of the new Homeworld gaming experience from Vancouver’s Blackbird Interactive arrives on January 20.

Published by Gearbox Software, which purchased the rights to the franchise from THQ, Deserts of Kharak is an origin story about chief science officer Rachel S’jet, who leads an expedition into enemy territory to investigate an anomaly that could be the salvation of the dying planet.

The real-time, tactical strategy game requires players to manage resources and direct the movement and actions of both land and air fleets.

Penultimate episode of République released

Developed by Camouflaj for Android, iOS, OS X, and Windows, the fourth episode of the stealth adventure game République released last week.

The game features Hope, a young woman living in a strange, totalitarian environment. You use the tools of the surveillance state, cameras and mics, to help.

Individual episodes of the game, which is a great exploration of privacy, censorship, and fascism, are $5, or you can get the entire season for $25.

The fifth and final episode will be released in 2016.

Another GTA game gets on iOS

You can now play Liberty City Stories, originally designed for the PlayStation Portable handheld game console, on your iPad or iPhone. The open-world game takes place in Rockstar’s equivalent of New York City, and is about the exploits of mafioso Antonio Cipirani.

More Xbox 360 games can now be played on Xbox One

Last week, another 16 games were released into the Xbox One ecosystem due to the console’s backwards compatibility.

• Braid
• Deus Ex: Human Revolution
• Doritos Crash Course
• Fable III
• Halo: Reach
• Hydro Thunder
• Iron Brigade
• Kane & Lynch 2
• Motocross Madness
• MS.PAC-MAN
• Peggle
• Portal: Still Alive
• Spelunky
• Splosion Man
• Ticket to Ride
• Zuma’s Revenge!

Xbox One bundle for Boxing Day (week)

If you’re looking to get a console for Christmas, either for yourself or for that special someone, Microsoft has revealed a bundle that will be sold starting tomorrow, Dec. 24.

The Boxing Week Bundle is only $399.

Here’s what you get:

• An Xbox One with a 1 TB hard drive
• Gears of War: Ultimate Edition, which includes, for a limited time, the entire Gears of War collection
• Rare Replay, a collection of 30 games all playable on Xbox One
• Rise of the Tomb Raider, the new game featuring Lara Croft
• Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition, the 2013 franchise reboot
• Ori and the Blind Forest

Microsoft is also staging a 17-day sale of Xbox stuff that began yesterday (Dec. 22). They’re calling it Countdown. I wonder what they’re counting down to?