Chicken Invaders' 27-Year Saga Lands on Xbox as Insiders Test a Five-Game Collection
InterAction studios brings all five Chicken Invaders episodes into one Xbox Insider preview, with 8-player co-op and a remaster of the 1999 original.
Xbox Insiders got their first hands-on look this week at a project that has been a running request from fans of intergalactic poultry warfare for years: a single, unified Chicken Invaders Collection. Xbox Wire confirmed on September 24 that the preview, built by longtime developer InterAction studios, is now open to members of the Xbox Insider Hub on both console and Windows PC.
It is the first time since the original 1999 release that the full run of numbered Chicken Invaders episodes has been packaged together for a single platform launch, and the first time the series has had an official presence on Xbox at all.
What's in the Collection
The preview bundles the arcade shooter's core saga into one package, built around the same fast-paced, screen-filling chicken swarms and gigantic boss fights the series has run on since its debut. InterAction studios has paired the collection with an original orchestral score, and the build supports both solo runs and cooperative play with up to eight friends at once, a notable jump from the two-player co-op the series shipped with for most of its history.
Xbox Wire did not publish a fixed episode count for the Xbox build, but the studio's own catalog on InterAction studios' website lists five numbered entries in the main series, running from the original 1999 game through 2014's Cluck of the Dark Side, alongside the standalone Chicken Invaders Universe spin-off.
How to Join the Preview
Access runs through the same channel InterAction and Microsoft are using for feedback on the finished release. Insiders sign into the Xbox Insider Hub app on console or PC, open the Previews section, select Chicken Invaders Collection, and choose Join. Once registration completes, the Store directs participants to install the Chicken Invaders Collection Demo.
- Launch the Xbox Insider Hub app (installing it from the Store first if needed)
- Navigate to Previews, then Chicken Invaders Collection
- Select Join and wait for registration to finish
- Install the Chicken Invaders Collection Demo from the Store
InterAction studios is asking participants to complete in-app surveys after playing, and Xbox Wire pointed players toward the console's built-in Report a Problem tool, filed under the Games category and the Chicken Invaders Collection Demo subcategory, for anything that breaks during testing.
A Long Road to a First Xbox Release
Chicken Invaders has never been a franchise built for hype cycles. InterAction studios, a small Greek studio founded by Konstantinos Prouskas, released the original game on July 24, 1999, reworking an unfinished 1997 DOS prototype into a full 3D arcade shooter. Four numbered sequels followed over the next 15 years, and the series became one of the longest-running lines of games to come out of Greece, largely through direct downloads and a devoted PC fanbase rather than console distribution deals.
That changed on Steam, where 2010's Ultimate Omelette became the series' first entry on the platform and its first to pick up industry recognition. InterAction studios has continued supporting the catalog since, including a from-the-ground-up remaster of the original 1999 game that shipped on Steam in 2023 with rebuilt, higher-resolution art and a new score. The Xbox Insider preview is the clearest sign yet that work is extending the same modern presentation to the rest of the numbered series, and doing it on a console platform for the first time.
What Happens After the Preview
Xbox Wire's post treats this stage as feedback-gathering rather than a release-date announcement: nothing was said about pricing, a launch window, or whether the eventual release will land in Xbox Game Pass. InterAction studios' pitch to Insiders is explicit about the purpose of the test, framing player reports as directly shaping the collection before it ships.
For a series that spent a quarter-century associated almost entirely with a lone desktop download page, an official Xbox storefront listing built around a preview program run jointly with Microsoft marks a real change in how InterAction studios is bringing the chickens to a new audience.
“The chickens are invading, and XBOX Insiders are being called into action!”Tim, Xbox Program Manager
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Theo covers the business of games for Gamers6: studio moves, platform strategy and the press releases nobody else finishes reading. He files most days before the coffee is cold.
