Microsoft announced earlier Monday that Gears of War: Ultimate Edition on the Xbox One will come with all four Xbox 360 titles from the series for free. At the suggestion of a reader, I contacted the company about where the DLC and Season Passes fit in the picture. The response is not surprising, but there is a mix of good and bad news for those who haven’t purchased some or any.

“If you previously purchased the DLC, it will be supported in Xbox One Backward Compatibility,” the Microsoft spokesperson said. “However, we are not gifting DLC as part of this package.”

The original Gears of War did come with a couple of DLC updates featuring new maps and modes for the third-person shooter. The first two were given away for free, while the third started as paid DLC, but was eventually made free. So, Xbox One owners are covered for the first game in the series whether they pick up the Ultimate Edition or not.

It wasn’t until the release of Gears of War 2 that Microsoft and Epic Games began charging for DLC regularly. There are three map packs sold individually for $5, but all can be purchased in the “All Fronts Collection” for $10. There’s also the “Dark Corners” pack that adds seven maps and a deleted campaign chapter for $7.

Gears of War 3 saw the full explosion of the Season Pass concept that featured four different packs for sale combined with a load of weapon and character skin packs. That Season Pass is still on sale for $30.

Finally, Gears of War: Judgment went even crazier for DLC with a huge amount of weapon and skin packs. The VIP Pass is still available for $20 though and gives access to three map packs. There’s also the free “Haven” pack that comes with a multiplayer map and mode.

To get all the DLC content for Gears 2 through Judgment, you are looking at spending around $67. The good news is that you can pretty much bank on the Gears of War DLC going on sale at some point for Xbox LIVE Gold members.

Microsoft has already shown that they are willing to use backwards compatibility as an incentive to purchase games for the Xbox One with not just Gears of War: Ultimate Edition, but Fallout 4 and Rainbow Six: Siege. Throwing in a cross-promotion sale for all of the DLC around the time that Ultimate Edition launches at the end of this month or backwards computability goes live this fall seems like a no-brainer.

[H/T: Facebook follower Juan for asking the right question.]

[Images via Xbox]