Video game consoles are changing. Since their introduction, home consoles have been released in discrete generations, each different from the last. Unlike previous consoles, however, the One X is more of an incremental improvement, in the vein of smartphones, that offers more powerful capabilities but the same basic compatibility with all things Xbox One.
We sat down with Mike Ybarra, Microsoft’s Vice President of the Xbox and Windows platform at Gamescom several days after the company’s big press conference to talk about the Xbox One X, incremental console updates, and the newly-announced partnership with PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds developer Bluehole.
Mr. Ybarra’s responses have been lightly edited for clarity.
Digital Trends: The line between consoles and PCs has grown blurrier in recent years, both in terms of what’s under the hood and in player expectations and experience. As Microsoft you’re obviously playing a big role in that. How is that merger informing your design philosophy of the Xbox going forward?
Ybarra: I think there’s a couple of things about this — one is the philosophy that Phil [Spencer, Xbox head] instilled and everyone’s rallying behind is to not think about customer segments by what platforms they play on. We think about just gamers being gamers, and how to unite them and bring more people into this hobby that we all love and get to work in.
Gonzalo Arroyo Moreno/Getty Images
So, we’re trying to blur that line a lot, and it’s a journey for some people, but for others it’s like, “absolutely, we’re there–let’s keep going.” And so I like that–I like the fact that Microsoft has made Windows for the last 35 years. Our group not only makes the console, we make all the Windows gaming features, so from our standpoint this is all just kind of Xbox, the global gaming brand for Microsoft.
Developers love the idea of a multiplayer pool that’s one big one vs. three or four or five small ones that sometimes get into a situation where there’s not enough people to play in some areas and whatnot. Just from a strict dev standpoint, Xbox One X is by far the easiest dev platform that we’ve created, because we largely took Windows tools and said “let’s apply them here.” Game developers love that because it means they can save time. So, you combine all those things.
I like the strategy of bringing gamers together and making it easier for developers, letting them make as much money as possible on our platform.
Your partnership with PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds developer Bluehole was one of the most exciting announcements from Microsoft’s Gamescom presentation. Can you elaborate on that partnership and how it works?
We think about just gamers being gamers, and how to unite them and bring more people into this hobby.
The Bluehole/Microsoft relationship right now is an incredible positive. They’re obviously the biggest game, period, out there right now–eight million copies in four months, a lot of good momentum for them.
Now that we’re publishing the Xbox version of it, there’s people on my team and marketing resources that have opened up for Bluehole. We have a number of engineers helping them optimize for Xbox–both the Xbox One version, and the Xbox X version, in terms of the enhancements that they’ll bring to the title.
I think that it’s the standard partnership that we do with developers on specific titles when we really want to work together to bring something amazing across, and that’s a great title from a Windows and Xbox standpoint […]. I love it–I think they’re an awesome developer. We’ve known Brandon for a long time from the mods that he’s been doing, so it’s working out super well for us.
With the PS4 Pro earlier this year and the Xbox One X coming up, consoles have entered a new phase of incremental (rather than discrete) upgrades. Can you talk about this shift, and what it means for gamers, and who these upgrades are for?
Let me tackle your latter question, then I’ll roll into the thought process that we go through when we think about creating a console.
For us, in terms of who it’s for, I really like the product offering that we have now. We have high-end PCs where people spend anywhere from two to fifteen thousand dollars on these devices, and that’s sort of like the .001% who want the absolute highest-end of everything that’s out there. They put in a $700 video card, let alone a $500 or $249 console, so we’re investing in the Windows category there.
Then we have the Xbox One S at $249–incredible value there, lots of choice in terms of the games you can get. We have Xbox Game Pass for $9.99 a month: over a hundred games, with new games coming in, which adds great choice value for the consumers.
Then at $499 we have the Xbox One X, which from a price/performance standpoint there’s nothing that even comes close to what that box is going to deliver, or the experience that you’re going to get. That is targeted at the core gamer that wants to play the best versions of the games, hands-down, usually someone with a 4K TV, although 1080p TVs get advantages as well.
I always tell people that we don’t wake up one day and say “let’s make a new console!” because that would be crazy. We look at industry trends. We started building this box, believe it or not, back in 2012. We were asking “when is 4K going to hit?” because that’s going to be a moment when people are buying TVs and they’re going to expect 4K content and want to push that forward.
So we look at audio, we look at pixels, we looked at cloud technology, everything, and sort of say “when is the next time we need new capabilities in physical hardware?” Then we listen to the fans, who will say “we want more pixels” or “we want X, Y and Z.” With this box we knew that 4K was going to be coming very strong.
I always tell people that we don’t wake up one day and say ‘let’s make a new console’ — because that would be crazy.
We could have created the box a year earlier–it would have been far less than the capabilities of what we have now. We chose to wait because we saw, frankly, in holiday season across the globe 4K TV sales starting to ramp. Last year it was the number one holiday gift in the US, so we feel like we’ve hit that point well.
It’s looking at those industry trends, looking at what consumers want, where developers are limited in their creations and bringing them to life on the TV–all of those are variables that factor into when we do another console. We did this one faster than normal–usually it’s five to eight years, I would say–and in doing that we had to promise customers something: compatibility.
If we’re going to come out in three or four years with a console, all of games have to work, including the 360 back-compatibility, and the original back- compatibility on this box, and all the hardware has to work pretty seamlessly.
I don’t think we’re in a world anymore where a console comes out and you lose your library, you lose your hardware, and you lose your investment anymore. People expect that going forward, and I think that’s a trend from phones and other things as they upgrade.
The Xbox One X launch is imminent, but with the recent delay of Crackdown 3, it seems like your holiday is a little light on games to really champion the new hardware. What’s your plan for convincing players to upgrade?
When I think about our holiday line-up, I think we have one of the best holidays ever. If you want to play racing, you’re on Xbox: Forza Horizon 3, Forza Motorsport 7‘s going to be phenomenal.
PUBG‘s going to be huge. The PC side understands that right now, but console players are saying “we hear about this PUBG thing all the time, but what’s it mean for us, and let’s get into that game. So having Forza Motorsport 7, having PUBG, having things like Cuphead, which is a brand new, stylized game that reminds me a lot of Ori [and the Blind Forest] in terms of just the fun that that game brings when I play it, and Super Lucky’s Tale from a broader audience perspective.
Christian Petersen/Getty Images
I love that we have hardcore PUBG all the way to Super Lucky’s Tale, in terms of what we offer people. Minecraft comes out with new content almost every single month, so I feel great about this holiday.
When I look beyond that, Crackdown, State of Decay, a few more things coming down. The Rare team continues to kick butt with Sea of Thieves, so I feel really good about where we are in terms of the content portfolio.
Any final thoughts?
It’s funny, at E3 last year and here at Gamescom I’m always reminded, it’s very rare that a console launches, and what a special time this is. I have to take a step back and say “Wow, this probably happens three to five times in a career if you’re lucky.” So it’s just fun to be part of the launch on November 7th ramping up. I’m happy with what developers are now starting to show–It’s going to be a heck of a holiday.
At E3 2017, developer Mojang shared plans to bring the various different Minecraft communities across consoles, PC, and mobile devices under one umbrella in the form of the “Better Together” update. That patch is currently being tested by Xbox One players who opted into a beta and the preview confirmed the introduction of a long-requested feature.
The current version of the beta allows Minecraft fans to test Xbox Live multiplayer and other functionality in the new “Bedrock Edition” of the game. On top of that, there is a nifty option hidden away in a menu screen that can be used to select a keyboard and mouse as the primary input device rather than the standard Xbox One controller, according to OnMSFT.
This is pretty big news. Minecraft started out on the PC and as such many players are most comfortable building their creations and navigating the game world with the freedom of control afforded by a mouse. There have been numerous requests from fans for this functionality to be implemented in the console version of the game and it seems that those wishes have finally been granted.
It remains to be seen whether the PlayStation 4 version of Minecraft will also receive official support for keyboard and mouse control schemes somewhere down the line. Sony declined to take part in the Better Together update, so the system is currently positioned separately to the central strand of the game’s development moving forward.
The fact that Minecraft is adding keyboard and mouse support on the Xbox One might suggest that this control scheme will become a more prominent component of the console’s identity. Microsoft has made no secret of its intention to bring Windows 10 and the Xbox One closer together and since so many of its big releases are cross-play and already have keyboard and mouse control schemes established, it should not be too difficult to set up.
The Better Together update for Minecraft will see the Xbox One, Windows 10, Nintendo Switch, and mobile versions of the game drop their platform specific-branding and enable players using different hardware to create alongside one another. There is currently no official release date for the final version of the patch.
It’s another day, another patch for the Xbox One and the Xbox 360 versions of Mojang’s much loved Minecraft. Whether you’re enjoying the game yourself, your kids maybe enjoying the game, or you’re just using the different variations to bump up the Gamerscore or possibly use the big ratios to help survive this year’s Leap Frog or/and GTASCevents, you can always count on Mojang to keep the game as glitch and issue free as possible.
The latest patch comes with a decent list of fixes, changes, additions, and improvements. Check out the list which will be Content Update 49 for the Xbox One and Title Update 57 for the Xbox 360:
Added Glide Myths Track Pack; Drift through the clouds of Icarus, dive into conflict in Excalibur, and ride with the Kelpies in Celts.
Added “Strangers – Biome Settlers 3” Skin Pack.
Fixed slow moving mobs in water.
Endermen and Endermites should always be hostile to each other.
Polar Bears should not attack the player when in peaceful mode.
Wither Skeletons no longer fear daylight, and will attack anything that lives.
Skeleton Horses can now be tamed and leashed.
Zombie Horses can now be leashed
Skeletons shouldn’t attack Village Golems.
Strays now flee from Wolves.
Wolves should not become hostile against mobs that they can’t directly see.
Fix for Farmer Villagers not planting seeds often enough.
Crafting any kind of Boat now requires a Wooden Shovel.
String can now be crafted from Web.
Purpur Stairs and Slabs can now be crafted from both Purpur Blocks and Pillars.
Stone Slabs, Redstone Repeaters, and Redstone Comparators can now be crafted from Stone, Granite, Andesite, Diorite, and their Polished variants.
Observers should register changes to Item Frames.
Observers should register changes to Doors.
Observers should register changes to Flower Pots.
Observers should not output extra signals for fire block state changes.
Observers should not output multiple signals when lava or water is place in front of them.
Pistons can now push Daylight Sensors.
Potion durations have changed.
Fixed area in the Mini Game Lobby that caused players to become invulnerable in the Mini Game if they were in this location when the round started.
Fix for MCCE-5523 – Pick Block in Creative.
Fix for MCCE-5549 – Hotbar is not centered in splitscreen battle..
Fix for MCCE-2000 – Zombies get stuck in water.
Fix for MCCE-2868 – Levitation effect all in Capitals.
Fix for MCCE-5539 – Unable to earn Free Diver Achievement.
The bold text in the last line of the patch is not a part of the patch for the Xbox 360 but the rest of the list is the same, as well as these two additional lines below:
Update UI renderer.
Fix for MCCE-5108 – evocation fangs
The latest patch for the Xbox One and Xbox 360 versions of Minecraft are already live.
With the new Minecraft update today on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, and PlayStation Vita, 4J Studios has added support for the Glide Myths Track Pack and Strangers: Biome Settlers 3 Skin Pack. The update is out now in Europe/Japan and will be coming to North America later today.
“Stretch your wings in this legendary Minecraft Glide Track Pack. Drift through the clouds of Icarus, dive into conflict in Excalibur and ride with the Kelpies in Celts,” the PlayStation Store says of Glide Myths, which is £2.49. The Skin Pack is £1.69 and the description says, “Get this pack and make your home in distant lands or ocean depths!”
Here’s the full patch notes for Minecraft update 1.56:
Additions
Added Glide Myths Track Pack; Drift through the clouds of Icarus, dive into conflict in Excalibur, and ride with the Kelpies in Celts.
Added “Strangers – Biome Settlers 3” Skin Pack.
General
Endermen and Endermites should always be hostile to each other.
Polar Bears should not attack the player when in peaceful mode.
Wither Skeletons no longer fear daylight, and will attack anything that lives.
Skeleton Horses can now be tamed and leashed.
Zombie Horses can now be leashed
Skeletons shouldn’t attack Village Golems.
Strays now flee from Wolves.
Wolves should not become hostile against mobs that they can’t directly see.
Crafting any kind of Boat now requires a Wooden Shovel.
String can now be crafted from Web.
Purpur Stairs and Slabs can now be crafted from both Purpur Blocks and Pillars.
Stone Slabs, Redstone Repeaters, and Redstone Comparators can now be crafted from Stone, Granite, Andesite, Diorite, and their Polished variants.
Observers should register changes to Item Frames.
Observers should register changes to Doors.
Observers should register changes to Flower Pots.
Observers should not output extra signals for fire block state changes.
Observers should not output multiple signals when lava or water is place in front of them.
Pistons can now push Daylight Sensors.
Potion durations have changed.
Fixes
Fixed slow moving mobs in water.
Fix for Farmer Villagers not planting seeds often enough.
Fixed area in the Mini Game Lobby that caused players to become invulnerable in the Mini Game if they were in this location when the round started.
Fix for MCCE-5523 – Pick Block in Creative
Fix for MCCE-5549 – Hotbar is not centered in splitscreen battle (PS4, PS3 only)
Fix for MCCE-2000 – Zombies get stuck in water
Fix for MCCE-2868 – Levitation effect all in Capitals
The Xbox One/Xbox 360 version of this update is out, and the Wii U/Switch version of this update will be out today or tomorrow.
As a reminder, the Better Together update for Minecraft isn’t planned for PS4, but Mojang is still in talks with Sony about it.
Microsoft and several of its big tech partners are hoping virtual reality will be a hot seller during the holidays.
Microsoft said on Monday that HP Inc. (hpq, +0.16%), Lenovo, Dell, and Acer would introduce virtual reality headsets based on Microsoft’s Windows operating system in time for the busy holiday shopping season.
Additionally, Microsoft (msft, +0.30%) said it had created its own motion controllers that are compatible with those upcoming headsets. It did not say if it plans to sell the motion controllers separately.
In terms of headsets, Microsoft said the new Dell Visor VR, which will be go on sale in fall, would cost $360 (or $460 with Microsoft’s controllers). It did not provide any details about the other headsets.
But earlier this year, Acer said that its VR headset would cost $300.
Microsoft also said that several VR versions of popular video games would debut for the new headsets. One of the games is the blockbuster world-building and crafting simulator Minecraft, which Microsoft bought along with that video game’s developer Mojang in 2014 for $2.5 billion.
Special virtual reality versions of the first-person-shooter Halo will also debut, but Microsoft technical fellow Alex Kipman didn’t reveal any specifics about the timing. Kipman also said that the Steam video game and VR distribution service would work with the new Windows-based VR headsets.
This is noteworthy considering Steam parent company, Valve, is the software partner of Taiwanese-smartphone maker HTC, which sells the Vive VR headset. Steam is one of the most popular ways for people to access VR games and apps, but they need Vive headsets to play or use them.
The fact that the new Windows-based VR headsets will work with Steam means that people won’t have to own a Vive headset to access VR software from the distribution service.
Microsoft’s latest VR news comes amid recent price cuts by Facebook(fb, +0.48%) and HTC to their respective headsets. Earlier in August, HTC slashed the Vive’s price to $600 from $800, after Facebook temporarily dropped the price of its Oculus Rift to $400 from $600 as part of a summer sale.
Although the prices for VR headsets are cheaper than they have ever been, the headsets are still far from being mainstream hits, according to analysts. They also require fairly expensive personal computers to operate.
The lowest-priced computer that will power the new Windows-based headsets costs $500, according to Microsoft.
Still, Microsoft’s VR announcements Monday show that big tech companies still see the immersive technology as a potential big business—and blockbuster holiday gifts.
USA TODAY’s Marco Della Cava demonstrates how Microsoft’s augmented reality headset shows how one day we may only interact with digital content in holographic form. Martin E. Klimek, USA TODAY
SAN FRANCISCO — Microsoft still hopes it can put the “reality” into virtual reality sales.
The Redmond, Wash.-based tech giant announced Monday its holiday season foray into what it calls mixed reality will be marked by $399 headset/controller bundles from partners such as HP, Lenovo, Dell and Acer, along with a selection of games and other VR experiences.
That pricing is roughly in line with the competition. Facebook is now selling its Oculus Rift goggle and controller bundle for $400, slashed from $700, reflecting tepid consumer appetite for one of tech’s most-hyped hardware forays.
Clunky, tethered headsets and the lack of a “killer app” have dissuaded all but hard-core gaming enthusiasts from buying virtual reality headsets, leading to slashed industry forecasts and lowered prices.
Microsoft is gamely trying to change that story. Its VR content includes the travel-focused HoloTour, offering virtual tours of destinations such as Peru’s Machu Picchu, as well as games such as Minecraft, Luna, Space Pirate Trainer and Fantastic Contraption. The new gear, which connects to the computer, will also be compatible with content featured on SteamVR.
The company also hopes the ubiquity of the Windows operating system will result in developers producing a rash of new content for its mixed reality gear.
But the bigger sales pitch is both ease of setup and compatibility with less powerful computers, both of which Microsoft hopes will draw new fans to its Windows Mixed Reality platform. Microsoft officials say holiday shoppers will be offered two new lines of Microsoft PCs and laptops that start at $499.
For comparison, when Oculus first launched, the goggles cost around $700 and ran on large PCs priced at around $1,000.
“This is the future of computing, and we want everyone on the journey with us,” said Greg Sullivan, who leads communications for the company’s Windows and Devices unit and gave USA TODAY a demo of the product late last week.
Looking into a Windows Mixed Reality headset, users are greeted by the cartoon-like dwelling called Cliff House, set amid a landscape of mountains and ocean. Hopping from floor to floor and room to room brings you face to face with screens featuring everything from email programs to Skype video calls to a Minecraft portal.
Moving around is accomplished through triggers on the handsets, which takes some getting used to if you’re not a gamer. While the brief experience was novel, it remains difficult to see how it could supplant working on a laptop or PC just yet.
“Someday we’ll all expect to interact with digital objects the same way we interact with physical things, in 3D,” he said.
To push that agenda, Microsoft engineers have leveraged the body-positioning sensors in its $3,000 developer-only HoloLens augmented reality headset. The new Windows-compatible headsets detect the position of the hand controllers based on the lights and sensors inside those controllers.
That means there’s no need to set up external cameras near the computer, which typically forces users to play only in that one room. Beyond portability, Microsoft says setup time is less than five minutes.
The lower-price ($499) standard PCs will feature integrated graphics and be capable of processing images at 60 frames per second, while a line of more expensive so-called ultra-PCs will feature discreet graphics and run at 90 frames per second. Frame refresh rate, which controls image latency, is critical to having a VR experience that isn’t nauseating.
Although most experts would call Microsoft’s tech virtual reality, it prefers the term Windows Mixed Reality because it mixes an occluded world (where users cannot see the real world) with sensors that sense both hands and body movement. But the new Microsoft gear really is virtual reality fare.
Gear from Oculus Rift and HTC Vive work in much the same way, and all of these devices require goggles to be tethered by wire to a computer or laptop.
Consumer excitement at the prospect of teleporting to new worlds with computer-powered goggles has yet to translate into big sales. What’s more, industry advisors Digi-Capital recently predicted mobile augmented reality — think using your smartphone to find Pokémon Go! figures — could become the primary driver of a $108 billion VR/AR market by 2021, $83 billion of which would be claimed by augmented reality.
That sort of prediction doesn’t seem to bode well for anyone playing in the tethered gear space. Apple has noticeably remained on the virtual reality sidelines, but CEO Tim Cook has been vocal about his enthusiasm for AR.
Apple is expected in a few weeks to hold its annual fall gathering, where new products such as the next generation iPhone are expected to be announced. Experts anticipate new iPhones will offer augmented reality experiences.
Microsoft continues to reinvent itself under CEO Satya Nadella, pivoting from a legacy software seller to a cloud- and enterprise-focused company. That move has resulted in a record-setting stock price that has risen steadily over the past year from $58 to $72.
But while recent quarterly reports show continued gains in its Azure cloud business, PC sales remain a consistent drag on profits. For Microsoft, inventing the next great computing platform couldn’t come soon enough.
