
- USING XBOX ONE AS A PC AND CONSOLE WINDOWS 10
- USING XBOX ONE AS A PC AND CONSOLE SOFTWARE
- USING XBOX ONE AS A PC AND CONSOLE PC
“This is the critical factor for our teams to gauge our success, because that’s what our partners want to know,” he said. Spencer reiterated the company’s commitment to abandoning console sales figures, in favour of monthly active user (MUA) data, like smartphone and online multiplayer game publishers. We want to work hand in hand with our partners to make sure we have the best platform we can have.”
USING XBOX ONE AS A PC AND CONSOLE WINDOWS 10
Over 40% of the people running Windows 10 are playing games. “PC gaming is as important as its ever been in the company,” he said. He promised that UWAs will support multiple different graphics processors and that issues with V-Sync ( a setting that matches the game framerate with your monitor’s screen refresh rate) would be resolved.
USING XBOX ONE AS A PC AND CONSOLE PC
The Xbox chief ended his keynote by reiterating the importance of the PC as a gaming platform. In other words: purchase, say, Tomb Raider on PC, and that will also get you the Xbox One version. He also stated that the games division within Microsoft is working to provide experiences like cross-platform play between different devices, as well as giving publishers the ability to sell a game on one platform that will then be available to consumers on other Windows 10 devices. Spencer went on to claim that uniting the Windows 10 PC and Xbox One ecosystems has meant that there are now more Xbox games in development than there have ever been before. I don’t have to jump generation and lose everything I played before.”
USING XBOX ONE AS A PC AND CONSOLE SOFTWARE
Hardware innovation continues and software takes advantage. “We can effectively feel a little bit more like what we see on PC where I can still go back and run my old Quake and Doom games, but then I can also see the best 4K games coming out. It allows us to focus on hardware innovation without invalidating the games that run on that platform. “We’ll see us come out with new hardware capability during a generation and allow the same games to run backwards and forward compatible because we have UWAs running on top of UWP. “We believe we will see more hardware innovation in the console space than we’ve ever seen,” said Spencer. In theory, because games will be written as UWAs, older titles will remain compatible with the new machines. What this could mean is that the Xbox One becomes more like a PC, with Microsoft releasing updated versions at regular intervals with more powerful processors and graphics hardware. “We’re allowing ourselves to decouple our software platform from the hardware platform on which it runs.” “In other ecosystems you get more continuous innovation in hardware that you rarely see in consoles because consoles lock the hardware and software platforms together at the beginning and they ride the generation out for seven years or so,” said Spencer. Gears of War: Ultimate Edition is another big Xbox franchise now available on modern PCs. This could have radical implications for the console model, which so far has always been based on the idea that the hardware has to remain largely unchanged throughout the machine’s lifespan. Now it seems Microsoft’s plan is to shift the entire development model towards universal applications that run across PC and console – indeed any machine that’s compatible with the Universal Windows Platform. In late-January, Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella told attendees at the dotNet conference in Madrid that UWAs would be coming to Xbox One, but did not specify in what capacity. Then, in November, the Xbox One was updated to be compatible with Windows 10, bringing a new interface and features to the console. In January 2015, Microsoft announced that it was bringing an Xbox app to Windows 10 PCs, allowing cross-platform play and a cohesive friends list across both platforms. This is, he explained, the culmination of the company’s vision over the past year. “Building out a complete gaming ecosystem for Universal Windows Applications.” “That is our focus going forward,” he told reporters. It also looks likely that the Xbox One will become more PC-like with backwards compatible hardware upgrades in the future.ĭuring a press event in San Francisco last week, Spencer said that the Universal Windows Platform, a common development platform that allows apps to run across PC, Xbox, tablets and smartphones, would be central to the company’s gaming strategy. Microsoft is planning to unify its PC and Xbox One gaming platforms into one ecosystem running Universal Windows Applications (UWAs), the head of the company’s Xbox division Phil Spencer has announced.
