https://youtu.be/s946FOBDmDk
In the four years since its release, the Xbox One has been a perfectly acceptable next-gen system, delivering Xbox fans new entries into the Halo, Gears of War and Forza franchises with intermittent updates to the systems software leading to cool features like Xbox to PC streaming. As Special Agent Dale Cooper would say, it’s a “damn fine” system. Damn fine. It does have its issues, however. Mostly the clunky navigation of the dashboard which can turn a fun night of gaming into a slog.
Thankfully, after years of complaints, Microsoft has completely reworked the dashboard, and laid the groundwork for the Xbox One X launch on November 7th. The biggest change users will notice is the speed of the dashboard. No more slow loading times that hang up the act of shifting from page to page, or going to the friends list. It’s a major quality of life upgrade that will save people time and hair-pulling. No more digging and digging just to get to friends or a game page.
The whole dashboard can still get a little convoluted, and it’s not perfect (the PS4 dashboard is close to perfect in my humble opinion), but it’s getting there. The ability to make the dash your own is a huge deal, but also worrisome if an update comes and wipes out your hard, customized work.
Here’s what Microsoft snuck into the update that will benefit both Xbox One X users and gamers who are sticking with the original Xbox One, via Major Nelson:
- It’s now faster and easier to move left and right through horizontal tabs with the left thumb stick or bumpers.
- When you bring up Guide while in an active party or broadcast, Guide will automatically open the party or broadcast section by default for faster access to controls.
- Transfer your games to an external drive so you can connect it to your new console and play immediately. Just unplug the drive from your current console, plug it in to your new one, and you’re ready to go.
- Existing Xbox One owners can back up their games and console settings to an external drive so that they’re ready to be applied to the new console during setup.
- Copy your games and apps over your home network from one console to another via network transfer.
- Make Home uniquely yours. Add your favorite games, friends, Xbox Live Gold, Xbox Game Pass, and more directly to your Home screen with a new concept that we call blocks. Once you’ve added blocks, you can remove or change the order of the blocks as you see fit.
- Have up to 40 pins! All these pins will appear in the Pin block on Home, as well as the Pins flyout in the new Guide.
- Easily discover new things, such as friend activities, leaderboards, LFG posts, tips, quick links to Game Hubs, across both your console and Xbox Live at the top of Home.
- Choose dark, light, or high-contrast theme option in Settings.
There are plenty of other big changes for streamers and people who love to watch streamers. You can see the full changelog here, and download the update now.
(Via The Verge)