PS Plus Essential October 2023 Games Confirmed

UPDATE: Sony has confirmed the PlayStation Plus Monthly Games for October. As revealed in this week’s leak, The Callisto Protocol and Farming Simulator 22 are available to download from October 3 to November 6. They’re joined by WolfEye Studios’ Weird West.

ORIGINAL STORY: The ever-reliable billbil-kun of Dealabs has leaked upcoming PlayStation Plus games, this time with a couple of “headliners” for the Essential October 2023 lineup.

According to billbil-kun, two of the three headliners set to launch in PS Plus Essential next month are The Callisto Protocol and Farming Simulator 22. The third game remains a mystery.

EXCLUSIVE
🚨 PS Plus Essential – October 2023 🚨

Here are 2 of the 3 headliners of Playstation Plus Monthly Games lineup for October 2023 !#PsPlus #playstationplus https://t.co/1xFxHT6idG

— billbil-kun (@billbil_kun) September 26, 2023

The Callisto Protocol is the spiritual successor to sci-fi horror classic Dead Space. IGN’s review gave it a 7/10, saying: “The Callisto Protocol is a satisfyingly gory spiritual successor to the Dead Space series, but it’s ultimately more of a striking modern mimic than a scary new mutation.”

The Callisto Protocol hit the headlines recently after developer Striking Distance Studios laid off 32 employees in what was described as a move to “realign the studio’s priorities to better position its current and future projects for success”. More recently, Glen Schofield, who co-created Dead Space and directed The Callisto Protocol, left the company.

Striking Distance was founded over three years ago by Schofield as a subsidiary of Krafton, the parent company that owns the rights for the battle royale game PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG). The studio was initially formed to create a narrative-driven game set in the PUBG universe, later revealed as The Callisto Protocol.

But Callisto Protocol was met with mixed reviews and plagued with several problems, from performance issues to reports of studio crunch and issues with crediting people who contributed to the development. Roughly a month after release, it was reported the game failed to meet Krafton’s sales expectations.

Farming Simulator 22 has a second big expansion due out in November and lets virtual farmers cultivate an agricultural empire in Zielonka, a brand-new Central European map.

Sony has yet to make an announcement of its own, but we imagine it’s not far off.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at [email protected].