A limited-edition translucent green Series X console was unveiled earlier this year at the Xbox Showcase as the "Xbox Series X25", planned for release in November with no confirmed pricing, alongside a matching Series X|S wireless controller.

Fans who attended the show were told they'd receive one for free, but regular consumers have been left in the dark until an apparent €899.99 European price and November 27 release were revealed by "billbil-kun" via Dealabs' High-Tech magazine earlier today.

It's connected to a previous rumor that potential pre-orders for the translucent controller could start during Gamescom 2026, but billbil-kun couldn't confirm whether that aligns with listings for the Series X25 console. Interestingly, Black Friday lands on November 27 this year, kicking off the holiday shopping season.

How much will the Series X25 cost in the US?

Right now, a standard Xbox Series X "1TB Disc Drive Carbon Black" on the official Xbox Store costs €799.99 in France and $799.99 in the US. The same currency-symbol switch applies in the same way to the "1TB All-Digital Robot White" at €749.99/$749.99, so it's reasonable to assume that the limited-edition Xbox Series X25 could cost $899.99.

Dealabs rightly assumes the same, with another translation explaining, "the equivalent of this price is expected to be $899.99 in the US," putting what is otherwise a functionally identical Xbox Series X console at $100 above its standard variant for the benefit of its "OG Green" shell and green-tinted light on its power button.

It all follows Microsoft's earlier hardware price hike announcement, which increased the Xbox Series X price from $649.99 to its current $799.99. That $150 increase was already unpopular among Xbox fans, and particularly so with our readers, who voted that "Xbox consoles are too expensive now." If the price leak is true, asking for another $100 will presumably be equally shunned.

Since the start of its 25th-anniversary celebrations, I've been more interested in the translucent green controller. The original console is special to me, but I can't justify spending hundreds of dollars on something like a build-your-own OG Xbox console. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for an affordable X25 joypad.

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A buildable recreation of the original Xbox from 2001 is coming from Mattel Brick Shop, technically under the same brand umbrella as the MEGA-branded 3:4 scale Xbox 360 from 2023. Listing the "Microsoft Xbox Building Toy Kit For Collectors" without a firm release date for $329.99 at Best Buy, and even less information at Amazon, the pricey set hides some nostalgic dioramas inside.

Alongside the chunky console itself is a close-enough representation of the original "Duke" controller, and three internal displays based on popular titles from the console's lifespan. Miniature set pieces from Halo, Psychonauts, and The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind have built-in lighting that's activated by the Duke joypad and fit comfortably inside this 1:1 set with 3,509 pieces.

Slightly bigger, but a lot more expensive

I'm admittedly the target audience for this sort of thing; a total sucker for nostalgia. I already own LEGO models of the SEGA Mega Drive (Genesis) console and its controller, displayed on shelves alongside other happy memories from my childhood. A full-sized, 1:1 recreation of the gigantic original Xbox wouldn't fit with it, but I'm sure I'd find somewhere else.

This isn't LEGO, though. It's the other brand, and it's asking a lot more money for this more complicated representation of Microsoft's hardware than Mattel's bricked-up Xbox 360 set that launched for $150 — one I already skipped. Asking over $300 for a follow-up toy feels steep, especially when many of us could find the real console on eBay for less.

On the other hand, the cute Morrowind feature appeals to a very specific part of my nostalgic heart, and ditto for Psychonauts. Still, to show off those parts and have them all visible, I'd need some serious display space. At that point, I'd rather buy the dioramas separately and show those off instead of a set that just looks like the real thing from a distance.

It's a neat way to celebrate Xbox's 25th anniversary, but I'm still patiently waiting for that translucent green Series X|S joypad instead. Rumor has it we'll see controller reservations opening at Gamescom for an October 20 release (via @eXtas1stv). Fingers crossed. I only have so much disposable income to burn on nostalgic accessories before my family starts getting concerned.

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Xbox has been on a bit of a tear recently with platform updates, and Microsoft just announced another raft of improvements big and small.

The biggest features recently include boosts to how Xbox Cloud saves work, the ability to record your own voice in gameplay clips, and improvements on Xbox achievement visibility. Announced today on Xbox Wire, we're now getting some other goodies, set to go live later today to Alpha Skip-Ahead and Alpha members.

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Here's what's new for Xbox Insiders today

• Users can now customize any item in the recent games and apps list.

Using the Menu button (start button) you can remove items from the list of recents apps and games, including the "Play History" segment which some don't find as useful as others. I personally like it, but understand those who don't.

• You can also hide all the home screen tiles by pressing the right stick, leaving your dynamic background to take center stage on your TV.

This is a fun cosmetic change I've seen people ask for. Xbox has a range of dynamic backgrounds which are hidden by the tiles and ads on the home screen. If you want to show off your dynamic background and turn your wall-mounted TV into an interactive work of art, now you can, simply by pressing the right stick. Would be cool if they could add slideshows to this in the future too. A connected OneDrive photos album might be rad.

• Improvements to local game storage management.

Microsoft is now letting you manage local game saves more easily, giving you the ability to sort save files by size. For those using smaller storage solutions, sometimes games can take up deceptively large amounts of space. In the new Settings > System > Storage > Manage Local Game Saves section, you can now see all of your local saves in one place, and delete them at will.

If you eventually want to play the game again, Xbox will download your most recent save file from the cloud instead, saving you local storage. Xbox Cloud saves are free by the way, unlike many other platforms.

• You can now click into profile badges, giving users an explanation of what they represent.

Xbox profile badges are getting a big improvement. You can now click on a user's profile badge to see an explanation of what the badge represents.

Part of me is wondering whether this change is designed to facilitate Xbox's future "Platinum" trophies. I wouldn't be surprised if the reward for 100%'ing an Xbox game's achievements comes not with a "platinum" trophy, but instead a custom badge you can place on your profile instead. It would give developers an extra way to let their biggest fans show off some flair for their games, but we'll have to wait and see on that.

• More wishlist improvements.

Wishlisting games has become a major part of the industry's marketing layer, with Steam wishlists becoming a cornerstone for financial projections on how well a game is likely to perform. Microsoft is also trying to ride this wave, adding a variety of improvements and visibility options for its own wishlisting system.

Now, purchased games will automatically be removed from your wishlist for example, which I think is a good change considering how often I've fallen afoul of this one.

I think Microsoft could/should do more to surface wishlisting features on the web, and I'm sure they're working on doing more in this space.

More goodies

The Xbox Insider Program has been pretty boring the last few years, with Microsoft's engineering teams focusing primarily on features like Xbox Cloud Gaming and things beyond Xbox Series X|S. With Xbox CEO Asha Sharma coming on board, the focus has returned to the core user base (namely us), delivering many long-awaited improvements a lot of us have been asking for for over a decade in some cases.

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Microsoft says this update will hit Xbox Insiders on the Alpha Skip Ahead and Alpha rings today, with other updates arriving for all users as well more quickly.

If you want to leave feedback for the Xbox Series X|S OS, you should check out the Xbox Feedback Portal over here.

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Back in August 2015, Microsoft was working to link console, PC, and mobile gaming into a single network. Coverage at the time framed this "games everywhere" approach as a major shift, with Windows, ironically, serving as the central hub to keep game libraries synced across devices. Phil Spencer was early in his tenure, working through the fallout of the Xbox One's rocky launch and its controversial DRM policies. Industry observers remained skeptical, and players questioned whether Microsoft could actually pull off cross-platform play and cloud integration.

Eleven years later, that initial push sits at the center of Xbox's modern business model. Under Asha Sharma, Microsoft Gaming has pulled back on its controversial "This is an Xbox campaign," trying to reprioritize the console, while deemphasizing Copilot AI. Indeed, there is a big list of things that need fixing. Oh, and apparently it's now XBOX.

The original questions around brand identity and hardware relevance haven't gone away, but their context has completely changed. Looking back at this 2015 report shows that the foundation for today's strategy was already being built, even if the execution took over a decade to solidify (if you can even call it that). — Daniel Rubino, Editor-in-Chief.

The original article below, "The future of Xbox is bright, and it's everywhere," was published on August 13th, 2015, by Richard Devine.

Gamescom 2015 was a blast for Xbox fans. Just as E3 was before it. Microsoft keeps floating the phrase, "the best games line up in Xbox history," and it's probably true. After a flaky launch for the Xbox One by anyone's standards, under Phil Spencer's stewardship things are going in the right direction.

And that direction is out. Xbox is finally becoming something bigger than the box that sits under your television. Gaming is important to Microsoft, and Xbox is its brand. Everywhere.

There have been smatterings of it outside the console for a while, like Xbox Live Achievement support for Windows 8 and Windows Phone games, and the now revoked Xbox branding for Microsoft's music and video services. With the removal of the latter, Xbox is now exactly what it should be for Microsoft. It's all about the games.

The big push really began in January when Spencer appeared at Microsoft's big Windows 10 event. It was the launch of Xbox on Windows 10 and while it all sounded grand, as the months have passed the vision has become so much clearer. Phones, tablets, PCs, consoles, HoloLens, Xbox is going to be everywhere. Cross-buy, cross-play and game streaming are but the beginning.

Take this quote from Spencer in a recent interview with Polygon as an example:

Our recent trip to Cologne for Gamescom helped further put this into perspective. The vast space that was the Xbox booth was lined with both consoles and Windows 10 side-by-side. Windows wasn't shoved away in a corner; it was right there alongside the biggest new titles Microsoft had to show. Games like Fable Legends and Gigantic played together on both platforms. The only difference, your preference for a controller or keyboard and mouse.

Windows 10 is a big step forward for Microsoft in so many spaces. It's allowing the company to do things that it, nor anyone else has done before. Sure, Sony has dabbled with game streaming, but unless you own a PlayStation and at least one other Sony product, it's useless. How many more people already have what they need to stream Xbox One games? A Windows PC. Sony can't boast what Microsoft is able to do with its games on Windows 10. No-one can.

It's also going to become, I believe, less important to focus on how many consoles Microsoft sells versus Sony. And that's because of the platform. In the same way that a smartphone is a way to deliver Microsoft services to your pocket, the Xbox One will be a way to deliver Xbox to your living room. With Xbox as the games platform available here and on hundreds of millions of Windows 10 PCs around the world, who really gets the bigger marketshare?

And let's not forget that as of Windows 10, official Xbox peripherals, including the forthcoming Elite Controller, are compatible out of the box. Just plug 'em in and away you go.

We're only at the beginning. There's so much to look forward to that we do and don't know about. The new Xbox One experience powered by Windows 10, cross-play games like Gigantic, Fable Legends and Killer Instinct, not to mention Halo Wars 2 in 2016. Engineers have told us that yes, they'd love to reverse the Xbox One game streaming feature, but whether it happens or not is still an open question. The Xbox app on Windows 10 will get better every month and we've got things like Crackdown 3, leveraging the power of the Microsoft cloud, to look forward to.

To sum up, I heard this phrase while at Gamescom that I think says everything. What if you could imagine a future where there weren't Xbox One games and Windows games, there were just Xbox games.

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If you're subscribed to Xbox Game Pass, you'll have a wave of new games hitting your app over the next few days — with titles coming to Series X|S consoles, PC, and devices that support the ever-expanding Xbox Cloud Gaming platform — with new picks hitting Ultimate and Premium tiers.

It starts with Egging On launching today, August 18, which you might recognize from last year's ID@Xbox showcase. If you ever played "A Difficult Game About Climbing" on Steam, or any of its many rage-inducing derivatives, you'll know what to expect from this, and how much patience to bring with you.

You can see more after the jump, but the less exciting news is the expiration of The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt Remastered Edition — leaving Game Pass for cloud and consoles on August 31. The successful and nonlinear monster slayer's "Complete Edition" had only joined Game Pass in February this year, so if you abandoned a half-finished save, your time is running out (via Xbox Wire).

Goodbye Geralt, and shoutout to Starsand

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is one of those gigantic role-playing games with a 50+ hour story, and even more on offer for completionists. It's just huge. The game's Remastered Edition was only recently offered up to xCloud and console players, so I hadn't been tempted by it as a primary PC Game Pass player, but it's a shame to see it leave relatively quickly.

When I had played it, I became so distracted by collecting flowers, herbs, and other busybody side quests that I never actually finished the mainline story. Nevertheless, I know I enjoyed the game and loved roaming its world and listening to its quality voice acting (and noting the interesting accent choices for certain comical NPCs), so try it before it's gone.

I'll get around to it one day. For now, I'm intrigued by the Ghibli-esque life sim, Starsand Island, as it fits the kind of cozy co-op time drainers that my wife and I enjoy playing on a quiet evening. It's definitely different from The Witcher's world, but paying for Game Pass gives us a chance to try it out on PC or console with our Ultimate subscription.

Game Pass in August 2026

• Available today
  • Egging On (August 18)
• Coming soon
  • Vapor World: Over the Mind (August 19)
  • BlazBlue Entropy Effect X (August 19)
  • Relooted (August 19)
  • Starsand Island (August 20)
  • Aerial_Knight's DropShot (August 25)
  • Blood Dungeon (August 25)
  • Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy (August 27)
  • Young Suns (August 31)
  • Shelldiver (September 1)
• Leaving August 31
  • Another Crab's Treasure
  • I Am Your Beast
  • Neon Abyss
  • One Lonely Outpost
  • The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt Remastered Edition
• Leaving September 6
  • NBA 2K26

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Console war. Console war never changes. Or well, maybe a little bit.

You all know the story. Xbox ran away from exclusives a couple of years ago to boost margins, but all it ended up doing was hollowing out their own platform, with first and third-party sales declines while giving away its market share to competitors without so much as a fight.

It started with Sea of Thieves, and ended with Halo itself going to PlayStation, robbing Xbox of, potentially, a reason to exist at all. "If PlayStation has its own exclusives and Xbox's exclusives, why ever buy an Xbox?" Some might ask.

Fast forward to 2026, and things are changing. Incoming Xbox CEO Asha Sharma is intent on giving Xbox exclusives again, starting with Gears of War: E-Day and Clockwork Revolution next year.

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But, at the same time, you can't help but wonder "why" on paper.

This week, Xbox CEO Asha Sharma teased The Elder Scrolls 6, which seems to be subtitled "Sentinel."

Following the tease, debate began spreading across social media about whether or not Microsoft should truly go all in and bring the big guns: for Xbox Helix, would it move the needle if Elder Scrolls 6 or Fallout 5 were console exclusive, or would Xbox simply be cutting its nose off to spite its face?

The argument against Xbox console exclusivity

It feels like the era of hardware subsidization is pretty much over. As the bulk of playtime hours go to games like Fortnite, which have very fickle monetization per user, platform holders are increasingly looking to the point of purchase itself to make money. Sony itself said it will no longer sell PlayStation hardware at a loss, and it seems Xbox is following suit.

In that world, it potentially makes far more sense to meet players where they are. With console hardware more expensive than ever, players are less likely than ever to switch platform or buy multiple consoles potentially.

It's pretty simple, really. By skipping PS5 or Nintendo Switch 2 and taking Elder Scrolls 6 Xbox console exclusive, you're potentially going to be harming the very expensive game's margins and profitability, at least on paper. It's not as if PlayStation's audience would deliver a 100% attach rate for Elder Scrolls 6 or Fallout 5, but there are many millions of potential customers who would potentially simply skip the game were it not available on their platform of choice.

Is turning The Elder Scrolls 6 and things like Fallout 5 into a "loss leader" something 2026 Xbox and Microsoft is willing to do?

The argument for Xbox console exclusivity

Microsoft and others don't really really release data on how many users own both an Xbox Series X|S and a PS5, but some analysts suggest it could be up to 50%. Indeed, I've been told that a lot of the users Xbox sees across its network show up on different platforms, suggesting that even if Elder Scrolls 6 were exclusive, it would still have a pretty huge addressable audience to the tune of tens of millions even without PlayStation.

If Microsoft were to take Elder Scrolls 6 exclusive, it would send a very strong signal that Xbox is truly in it to win it (particularly if Elder Scrolls 6 is actually very good) and, the sales would come in strong regardless. If users can't buy it on PS5, they'd probably either grab it via Steam (which I can't see Xbox ditching any time soon) or their dusty Xbox Series X|S they haven't had any reason to turn on for several years.

By the time The Elder Scrolls 6 launches, Xbox will also have a range of new Cloud Gaming initiatives in the market place too. Direct-to-WiFi Xbox controllers will be available, shaving a non-trivial amount of latency off proceedings. Elder Scrolls 6 exclusivity might not just be a "loss leader" for Xbox Helix or Xbox Series X|S in that context, it could also be a marketing vehicle for "buy-to-own" Xbox Cloud Gaming, which I presume Xbox will be looking to market more seriously by the time the game launches.

If sales could become an issue under a console exclusivity package, Xbox could also take the step of keeping it off Xbox Game Pass Ultimate for a time, similar to what we're seeing with Call of Duty — although I imagine such a move would be pretty unpopular.

Poll: What do YOU think?

I can see both sides of the argument. Xbox Helix would have a massive boost in visibility with a tentpole exclusive like The Elder Scrolls 6 for its launch, but I'm not sure if The Elder Scrolls alone would be enough to convince users to drop a potential $1000 dollars on a video game console in this economy.

Xbox would need a steady cadence of high quality exclusives, and a visible strategy that says "if you buy this; you can expect more of these types of exclusives." The sorta "one offs" here and there with Gears of War: E-Day and Clockwork Revolution aren't going to cut it, I really feel like they need to be all-in and have all studios shoulder the burden of such a strategy, that would take years potentially to ferment.

The other argument is pretty simple: Xbox might end up just harming its studios' potential by limiting access arbitrarily. It's something CEO Satya Nadella touched on in court while explaining to lawmakers why Call of Duty would never go exclusive: the business model revolves around blanket market access.

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The Elder Scrolls is arguably not like that, though ... nor are single player games in general. Xbox, PC, and Cloud Gaming should give Elder Scrolls the addressable audience to do gangbusters regardless. I heard Starfield was profitable before hitting PlayStation, for example, and so was Avowed. But is "profitable" enough for Microsoft shareholders, who are already likely annoyed by Xbox's drag on Microsoft's overall profit margin?

I think Xbox needs exclusive games to survive, and I think The Elder Scrolls 6 going exclusive would give the platform its best chance to make up lost ground over the previous two generations. I think a healthier Xbox is better for the industry, better for third-party developers, and better for Xbox customers in general. It's just unclear whether making The Elder Scrolls 6 exclusive actually would lead to a healthier Xbox ... since it would need to be part of a wider, and more visible strategy that I'm not sure Microsoft has the competitive spirit for in 2026.

At the end of the day: what would PlayStation or Nintendo do if they owned The Elder Scrolls 6 or Fallout 5? I think we all know the answer ...

But, what do YOU think? Vote in our poll above, let us know your thoughts in the comments.

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Scrolling through social media recently, I stumbled on a Reel (and I'm sorry; I forgot to save it, so my apologies to its creator for not being able to link out) where a dad was explaining how he cancelled Disney+ and saved money in the long run.

But he did it by buying an Xbox One S.

When it first released, one of the killer features beyond being a slimmed-down, brick-less Xbox One was its 4K UHD Blu-Ray drive. We take it for granted now, but the Xbox One S was the first in the family to get that hardware. For $300 you got the ability to play 4K Blu-ray discs, significantly less expensive than most of the dedicated players out there.

Being an affordable 4K Blu-ray player is still one of the strengths of the Xbox One S; only now, it's generally even cheaper. Though yes, let's acknowledge before anyone says it in the comments, obviously you don't get Dolby Vision.

Seeing the aforementioned Reel made the penny drop. It could actually be a viable way to break free of the endless cycle of subscribing to streaming services and buying digital content that we now know for sure could disappear at any time.

The Xbox One S and physical media has always been a winner

The crux of the Reel that inspired this post was that buying a used Xbox One S, plus picking up their kids' favorite movies used on Blu-ray, was cheaper than a year of the Disney+ plan they were paying for.

Obviously on Disney+ there's a ton of content, but the value is only there if you're consuming it. It'd be like paying for Xbox Game Pass for a full year and playing only one game; it doesn't make sense. In this case, most of the content was never being watched, so it worked out cheaper to cancel and just buy the discs.

But Disney+ is just one service. We went from a world where breaking free of cable TV was exciting and a way to save money by only watching what we wanted without the guff. But now we're in a worse position, because the content is locked behind so many paywalls that by the time you add it all up, you may as well have just had cable.

It's frightening, frankly. Looking at my own bills, I'm subscribed to Netflix, Disney+, TNT Sports on HBO Max, Apple TV+, and Amazon Prime Video, though the latter I don't really count because Prime is worth it just for the free shipping.

But counting the first five, I'm paying at least what I used to pay for my premium TV package back before I became a 'cordcutter.' And I don't even get everything I want when I want it!

I've always been a fan of physical media. I love my games; I love my movies. Hell, I still have a stack of music cassettes and a Walkman. Today's generation may be finding this stuff for the first time; some of us never let it go.

But depending on how much you spend versus how much you actually watch, maybe it does make sense to buy the physical versions of the stuff you actually care about? At least it won't disappear.

Not owning your content isn't really the answer

If you already have an old Xbox One S spare, or even a One X or your current Xbox Series X (sorry, Series S owners), you're already in a prime position. If you don't, you can pick a used One S up right now at least fairly cheaply. Though as ever, location will have an effect on that.

Xbox also had a leg up on PlayStation, remarkably, which didn't have 4K Blu-ray capabilities on any of the PS4 lineup, despite being able to play games at 4K on the PS4 Pro.

It's a prudent thing to think of, though. There's a whole community out here of folks who like to digitize their own media with a Plex or Jellyfin server, but if you have the discs, this is far simpler.

The argument has been brought to light recently by Sony. First by removing video content from its customers' libraries that they had paid for, and then by deciding to end physical game production from 2028. When you buy digital, you have no ownership of your content.

When you buy a piece of digital content, you're buying a license to consume it. But only for as long as you're allowed to, which apparently isn't forever. At least when it's a physical item in your possession, you have the control.

I'm going to deploy my Xbox One S again

I won't be cancelling the various streaming services I subscribe to anytime soon, more's the pity. When you've got two kids who watch most of them regularly, familial bliss is the price to pay for the, well, price. That and I do enjoy some of the content on them you can't get anywhere else.

But if it's a piece of media I care about and want to truly enjoy for years to come, I already lean towards buying a Blu-ray. The quality is better, it's mine, and I can digitize all of my Blu-Ray discs on my PC and toss a copy onto my NAS.

I have been using my Xbox Series X, but I don't generally keep that in the front room attached to my 4K TV. I'd actually forgotten until thinking about this post that I still have my old Xbox One S stashed away. So it's going to be coming out of retirement to live a second life as a full-time movie box. I think I still even have a PDP Xbox remote control somewhere.

But whether it's to free yourself of the streaming services, throw a middle finger up to the digital future being forced upon us, or you just like to own your stuff, the Xbox One S is still a great value way to enjoy high-quality content. Owned, not rented.

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The excitement for Gears of War: E-Day continues to build as Xbox announces brand-new, limited-edition Gears of War: E-Day-style Xbox controllers, now available for pre-ordering on the Xbox website.

One controller is pre-made with a design to resemble the Gears of War logo, while the other controller features a custom-made Xbox Design Lab faceplate along with several buttons, triggers, and joysticks that the player can customize the look of to fit their fashion sense.

Here's everything you need to know about these awesome-looking controllers.

For starters, these accessories are regular Xbox Series X|S controllers with modified cosmetic looks inspired by Gears of War: E-Day, meaning they'll feature all the high-quality ergonomics, responsive controls, and satisfying feedback that earned them a spot among our favorite Xbox controllers.

The pre-made Gears of War: E-Day controller features 3D-molded, laser-etched details meant to resemble the cracked asphalt of a road giving way to a Locust Emergence hole, with the Gears of War logo shining brightly in the middle.

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Additionally, the pre-made controller has a mix of sharp black and red buttons and joysticks to help it stand out more, firm textured grips to make it more comfortable, and a painting of a COG tag on the battery door as a fan-servicey reference to all the dog-tag-style COG tags players collect throughout the Gears of War series.

The limited-edition Gears of War: E-Day Xbox controller will cost you $89.99 and is available for pre-ordering on the Xbox Store or at your local retailer.

The custom Xbox Design Labs Gears of War: E-Day Xbox Controller features a custom faceplate with bloody, heavy-metal-style artwork by Luke Preece, who created official artwork for heavy metal bands like System of a Down, Metallica, Black Sabbath, and more.

As with any Xbox Design Labs controllers, players will be able to augment the controller with cosmetic upgrades like metallic triggers and D-Pads, rubberized side and back grips, and a personalized engraving to make it their own.

If you're going to Gamescom this year, you will be able to see them firsthand, as they'll be on public display at the Xbox Booth, where players will get their first playable taste of Gears of War: E-Day's story campaign mode.

The Xbox Design Labs Gears of War: E-Day Xbox Controller will be available for purchase and customization on September 30, 2026, on the Xbox Store.

But wait, there's more. 8BitDo is collaborating with Xbox to create a special charging dock designed to be paired up with the pre-made Gears of War: E-Day Xbox controller, and it is called the '8BitDo Ultimate Charging Dock for XBOX Controllers – Gears of War: E-Day'.

This charging dock is also compatible with regular Xbox Series X|S controllers and Xbox One controllers, and it includes an 8BitDo rechargeable battery pack to save you the trouble of buying one separately for your controller to work with this dock.

The '8BitDo Ultimate Charging Dock for XBOX Controllers – Gears of War: E-Day' will cost you $39.99 and is available for pre-ordering on Amazon and 8BitDo's eShop.

Windows Central's take

Xbox has had some wild tie-in controllers over the years, but these Gears of War: E-Day controllers are possibly the coolest ones I've seen in a long time.

The pre-made is definitely my favorite, as its well-done design gives off the cool effect of the Gears of War logo erupting from the ground, and the overall black and red color scheme looks so sick.

I can't wait to get my hands on one of these controllers and play Gears of War: E-Day with it when the game comes out on October 30, 2026, for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox Game Pass, and PC.

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Yesterday, on August 11, 2026, a post in the r/Controller subreddit shared images of what appears to be the long-awaited Xbox Elite Series 3 controller, a successor to one of the best Xbox controllers, which we gave a near-perfect score to back in 2021.

The original poster deleted their "leaked" gallery of the implied prototype (potentially in response to an unconfirmed cease-and-desist order from Microsoft). Still, the images were nonetheless preserved and shared again by The Verge's Tom Warren, who clarifies how the original post claimed the poster purchased it from "OfferUp", an online reseller marketplace.

As with any rumor —or supposed leak — it's always best to take them with a pinch of salt, as any could turn out to be fake, and these images of the Xbox Elite Series 3 controller are no exception. Then again, there are plenty of hints in its design that this is indeed a prototype that was never intended to be seen publicly. The Verge's report even confirms that the battery pack says "Prototype, not for sale".

Still, these could be knockoffs of the official Xbox Elite Series controller or an early, unfinished model that looks nothing like the final product. However, the fact that these images were quickly removed implies they may be real.

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If it is genuine, it at least doesn't appear at a glance that the Elite Series 3 has changed much from its predecessor, other than a slightly different rubberized grip design and different-looking trigger locks.

However, The Verge's analysis shows some new features. These include two new scroll wheels along the bottom edge, a wireless mode that would connect directly to Xbox Cloud Gaming servers, and a 'Pair' button that switches the controller's connection between Cloud Gaming servers and an Xbox console.

Either way, we will have to wait for Microsoft's official announcement of the Xbox Elite Series 3 controller to see whether this design becomes the final product or an outdated prototype/knock-off. Gamescom is coming up, so we'll see.

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I've long been a fan of XCOM, which is why when I heard two of my favorite franchises were about to collide on Xbox and PC, my interest was immediately piqued.

This is Star Wars: Zero Company, an upcoming turn-based tactics game set in the legendary sci-fi universe that needs little introduction.

Developed by Bit Reactor, who themselves are comprised heavily of XCOM and Firaxis vets, I recently was lucky enough to talk to the team behind the game, as well as go hands-on for the first time.

Bit Reactor's Greg Foertsch, art director of XCOM fame, was candid on the game's origin story. It was actually the late great Vince Zampella of Titanfall and Call of Duty fame who offered it up first, and the rest is history: "Star Wars was not on my bingo card, to be quite honest, till Vince brought it up, and frankly, I was a little terrified at first, but I had to say yes."

Terrified they might've been. But from what I've seen, I think they've absolutely nailed it and have nothing to fear whatsoever. Star Wars Zero Company is now a personal game-of-the-year contender, if indeed the full game continues to be as infectious and intriguing as the demo slice I played.

Bit Reactor noted that they felt the turn-based tactics genre still had a big story to tell, even as Take Two essentially wound down the XCOM franchise in favor of focusing on Civilization. What better way to introduce the genre to a new audience than via one of the biggest franchises in the world?

But Bit Reactor has also been keen to modernize every aspect of it for modern sensibilities: photorealistic art, a third-person camera, high-quality story writing and cinematic treatment, and a Mass Effect-like character bonding system that has enormous potential.

Star Wars: Zero Company launches on Xbox and PC on August 27, 2026.

A heaping of XCOM, a dash of Mass Effect?

In Star Wars Zero Company, you take command of a "dirty dozen" style mercenary outfit, which immediately gave me Mass Effect 2 vibes.

This ragtag group of rejects, bounty hunters, and warriors of fortune come together under a variety of difficult circumstances. The Clone Wars are in full swing, and the Republic needs mercs willing to undertake missions that are perhaps beyond their remit (and missions that skirt the law ... and perhaps even basic morality.)

As such, you play as Captain Hawks, a fully customizable humanoid and former Republic officer who has gone into business for himself. You can fully tailor Hawks' identity and pick from a variety of iconic Star Wars species to lead your crew.

As you get further in, you'll meet other heroes who join your squad for a variety of their own reasons. There's Tel-Rea, who is a former Jedi Padawan, Trick, a "forcibly retired" clone trooper, and Cly, a Mandalorian driven by vengeance.

The eclectic cast led Bit Reactor to create its "Bond system," which gave me a ton of Mass Effect 2 vibes. As your crew collaborates both in missions and during trips to The Den (your base of operations), they build relationships and synergies that benefit your tactical options and also develop their characters.

"I wanted that to have a long arc of play over the course of the whole campaign… you’re not just learning to power your characters up, but you’re also having them develop relationships that’s evolving in your head," game director James Brawley explained to us. "Characters grow stronger as a result… that’s why they’re able to beat these overwhelming threats, because they know how to work together."

"This is your Star Wars game… how you get there, what you experience, the characters you build, the relationships and bonds you make — they’re all unique to your playthrough."

The team explained that the events of Zero Company take place adjacent to The Clone Wars, in the shadows, using an entire cast of new characters. And indeed, like any good XCOM-like, permadeath is a feature here. If you have two characters that synergize well and unlock powerful abilities as a result, having one of them die not only severs that bond but also deprives you of access to those powerful abilities. The stakes remain incredibly high as a result, in true XCOM-fashion. You'll also lose the resolution of their stories and experiences too, making every playthrough potentially unique (unless you save scum, that is ... but there are auto-saves-only Ironman modes for those who don't want to be enticed into such heretical gameplay styles.)

I didn't get to experience too much of the combat gameplay, but from what I played, it felt every bit as satisfying and fun as previous official XCOM-style games I've played from the team here. Bit Reactor is comprised of XCOM and Firaxis vets, as noted, and you can feel that pedigree in every aspect of play. The team said Disney was on hand too to verify the Star Wars authenticity but was also incredibly open to Bit Reactor's own agency therein. The team said they "couldn't praise Disney enough," in what sounds like a very productive working relationship.

Disney hasn't always handled the Star Wars IP as well as I would've liked ... but it's hard to deny that they've had some absolute bangers on their hands. Rogue One has been a particular highlight for me, but also the games. Cinematic delivery I'd argue is more important in a Star Wars-adjacent title, which obviously comes with certain expectations. You can expect great characters, a grand adventure across the galaxy, and big cinematic moments sprinkled throughout Zero Company, the developers tell me. But crucially, also dark villains.

The Clone Wars are in full swing in corners of the galaxy, but while bounty hunting, Hawks and his crew get caught up in a uniquely dangerous situation. The separatist-aligned cult known as the Infinite Coil rears its head early on. Its members seem infected with a mysterious space plague that, if I were a betting man, potentially has dark side origins.

The Jedi Fallen Order franchise has been well-received, and before Vince Zampella's passing, it seemed like EA was on an upward swing with its Star Wars license stewardship. Zero Company looks set to continue that legacy and also maintain the quality bar Jedi Fallen Order established.

Indeed, I was surprised to discover how far Zero Company diverges from the typical XCOM formula from a story perspective, where most of the characters are throwaway soldiers designed to ultimately be expendable. The detailed characterization of the heroes in Zero Company are every bit as cinematic and interesting as any story-heavy action game or big-screen Star Wars experience you might expect.

Zero Company makes heavy use of a traditional third-person over-the-shoulder camera for some of these sequences too, making the game feel almost more like a CRPG in the vein of Baldur's Gate 3 or Wasteland 3, as opposed to a pure tactics game. Tactics games with fixed isometric cameras often come with stylized art given that the camera is zoomed out a lot of the time. Zero Company went deeper on visuals to accommodate its more cinematic delivery, and the results speak for themselves. Zero Company feels painstakingly authentic.

"We should be better looking, not worse. We should be better frame rates, not worse. We should have more stories, more immersion," Bit Reactor explained. "We’re just making a great game — it just happens to be turn‑based.”

If you've never played an XCOM-like before, its RPG systems might be what entices you most

I was incredibly encouraged by Star Wars: Zero Company's preview cycle. I was immediately drawn to the characters and intrigued by the potential of the game's Bond system. What events and storytelling opportunities would I be able to unlock? What consequences would befall me for mismanaging those bonds and potentially getting some of my heroes killed? What exactly is the Infinite Coil, and what do they want?

Star Wars: Zero Company is a bit of a rarity in 2026, as big publishers chase service games, infinite experience, and microtransaction hellscapes. Take Two itself no longer seems to want to service the XCOM franchise sadly, and other companies that have attempted it have often struggled to broaden their appeal. Truly "AAA"-grade tactics games have become vanishingly rare.

Star Wars is the perfect universe to offer a take on this genre in my view, particularly in the Clone Wars era. But Bit Reactor's clear efforts on the cinematic and story-delivery side give Zero Company broad potential that similar attempts at the turn-based tactics genre have missed in recent years. Baldur's Gate 3-style cinematics and character delivery, atop modern high-quality visuals and focused XCOM-style tactical play? Zero Company has everything I didn't know I needed from this quarter's very busy slate of games.

Star Wars: Zero Company is something every Star Wars and turn-based afficionado should put on their wishlist.

If you have any questions about the game, drop them in the comments and I'll get them answered!

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Xbox is legally required in some territories, such as the UK and, more recently, Australia, to verify the age of its users in order to access certain features.

Whether we like it or not, there's no way around it. Governments will always government. But what most of us objected to more was the use of faceless third-parties that were being used to verify some of our most personal information. In Xbox's case, it was Yoti, a company that's found itself in hot water before over its handling of data.

Fortunately, at long, long last, if you've held out on completing Xbox age verification, it looks like you won't have to. A message is hitting the inboxes of those accounts that haven't yet verified their age through other means but have been determined as having an "adult account" through their activity.

Our own Ben Wilson was one such holdout and got the message himself last night. Here's what it says in full:

Due to longstanding account activity, we've estimated your Xbox profile to be an adult account and updated its age verification status to "Verified." You are no longer required to complete full age verification for uninterrupted access to social features on Xbox. While no further action is required, you can update your privacy and safety settings on Xbox at any time. For more information, click "Learn more" below.

Reddit is likewise lighting up with folks who've had the same message and have been released from the requirements to verify their age for full access.

This seems to be taking place predominantly in the UK, with Australian age verification recently hitting the news as frustrated users see what us Brits were faced with at first.

But since Xbox can clearly identify your age effectively using your account data, why isn't it applied automatically to everyone immediately?

I don't personally care whether I have to be verified as an adult or not, but I do care about being asked to hand over biometric data to companies I have no usual business with. I remember many years ago, being told by a local shop they wouldn't photocopy my passport for me because they wouldn't handle personal information such as this.

Now we're being asked to funnel all that into a computer somewhere, trusting that they're going to behave responsibly with it.

But a win's a win. Even if it's a win that took a little long to get here. Hopefully it can roll out quickly in any subsequent markets that require age verification.

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A couple of weeks ago, Xbox's live services suffered the biggest outage in the brand's recent history. For over a day, Xbox players couldn't access online services, their game library both online and offline, their apps, and more.

The outage was so bad it even prevented physical Xbox game discs from working, as it stopped their entitlement checks from functioning.

Fast forward to today, and the CTO of Xbox, Scott Van Vliet, took to social media to provide Xbox fans with a detailed explanation of how this disaster occurred, what Xbox's engineers did to fix it, and what their plans are to ensure this never happens again.

Scott reiterates from his interview with The Verge that this outage was caused by an update made to an underlying service within the Xbox's digital ecosystem that was required for Xbox Home Console sharing, Xbox Game Pass purchased content, and PC scenarios to function, putting them in an unresponsive state.

While this update was happening and causing these systems to shut down, a bug within the Xbox client software stack caused other digital game licence checks to fail. These multiple issues combined created a domino effect where the accumulating failure scenarios blocked some players from launching games while causing issues with library enumeration.

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To combat this, Scott says Microsoft is transferring ownership of the underlying licensing service to the Xbox team while Microsoft's engineers work on improving the stability of Xbox Live's services and infrastructure for future updates.

As for the client bug, it will be fixed in an update to the Xbox that rolls out today and will become mandatory to download on August 17, 2026.

In addition, Scott says Microsoft has plans to roll out new features for players along with quality-of-life improvements for system updates as it looks for more ways to improve the stability of its products and services.

Windows Central's take

On the one hand, it's nice to see Xbox be a little transparent for once regarding its mistakes and its attempts to fix them, as it shows there are people higher in the company who do care about the quality of their product.

But on the other hand, it's going to take a miracle for Xbox or anyone else to convince me to trust digital games ever again, especially when companies like Sony are so keen on killing physical media and the risk of Microsoft blocking people's entire accounts for no fault of their own if they get hacked.

To me, getting DRM-free games (like the ones you see at GOG for example) with their own dedicated launchers and storing them in external SSDs is currently the best way to preserve your modern games library and play them without being shackled to licence entitlements or online services (unless you're playing multiplayer-only games like Overwatch or World of Warcraft, in which case, you're out of luck).

Either way, time will tell if this new update to the Xbox client will prevent any future fiascos for Xbox Live's services.

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Recently, the Australian gaming journalist website Press Start has confirmed that Xbox players in Australia are now forced to verify their age to play games rated for people aged 18+ and over on Xbox Series X|S and PC.

This was done because, according to Microsoft's email notice sent to Australian players, and I quote, "As part of our compliance program in Australia, beginning late August 2026, adult XBOX accounts must verify their age to be able to access apps and games rated 18+ on the Microsoft and XBOX Store. Access to such content may be restricted unless you verify your age. Apps and games you already own won’t be affected. Select below to verify now. Please ignore if you’ve already verified.”

Players consigned to this must verify their age either through Email-based age verification, facial age estimation by taking a self-portrait using their camera, providing credit card details, or providing government-issued ID like a driver's license, passport, national ID, or residence permit.

Around the same time this happened, Australia had banned "The Halloween: The Game", an upcoming Xbox horror game based on the iconic Halloween movie franchise because of the presence of a controlled substance, rather than the violent murders that occur in the game.

A bleak glimpse at the digital future?

Now, Australia banning a horror game is nothing new, as the country has a long history of censoring games or outright banning them in the past, such as the Grand Theft Auto series and South Park: Stick of Truth.

Although some games do manage to get released under the "Adults Only" rating, such as Hotline Miami, Outlast 2, and We Happy Few, to name a few.

However, what is concerning is the age verification enforcement, as we're seeing more Western countries like Australia, the UK, and several states in the US implementing it across many websites, online services, and video games, bottlenecking what we can or cannot access.

As physical discs come under attack and governments act as a morality police over the types of content adults are allowed to consume, gamers and game developers like Hideo Kojima are increasingly concerned that we're on a slippery slope where eventually we'll own nothing digitally and what we do own will be so censored that it's not even worth owning.

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Not to mention there's the big risk to our private freedom, with gaming activists like Stop Killing Games proclaiming these age verification systems are just another means for corporations and governments to gatekeep content, collect sensitive data (which is at risk of being stolen or leaked by hackers), and make the open web harder for everyone to use.

Either way, between this and the ongoing memory crisis hiking the price of Xbox Series X|S and other related tech, the gaming industry is in a volatile and chaotic state right now that I pray we recover from soon somehow because, if things keep going the way they are...I think it may be time to invest in a new hobby we actually have ownership and freedom over.

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Sony's decision to kill physical games from 2028 is the discussion that won't go away, and we're still waiting to see what the Xbox stance will be.

But wading in today is Strauss Zenick, CEO of Take Two (via IGN), otherwise known as the company that counts Rockstar Games among its portfolio. The same Rockstar Games that recently printed a ridiculous sum of money when GTA 6 pre-orders went live.

Only this time, and for the first time in the franchise, there will be no physical version at all. If you buy it from a retailer, all you get is a download code. Naturally, Zelnick is all for this.

“Our business is well over 90% digitally distributed,” Zelnick said. “It's already a digital business. So in certain instances, especially if it's a big game, discs just — and note I said discs — don't really make sense for the consumer.

Also, most instances you have to register online to play anyhow. So if you're already connected, who cares if you download digitally? It's all the same and it's much more convenient."

Granted, I'll give Rockstar Games specifically a little more slack here. GTA V came on two discs on the Xbox 360 originally because the game was too big for one (PS3 used Blu-Ray and was a single disc). Likewise, even on the larger capacity discs for Xbox One, Red Dead Redemption 2 suffered the same fate.

Nobody wants to get up and have to change discs. Not to mention more raw materials, manufacturing costs, etc. But I take particular exception to the second part of the quote above.

It's not our fault we have to register online to play a game. It's not our fault we need to have a Microsoft or Sony account, probably also a Rockstar Games account created alongside either of those. A subscription to play online. Alongside an account for every other different publisher who says we need to have an account.

Are digital games more convenient? Of course they are. But let's not pretend that this has anything to do with making our lives easier. Without a physical copy of something in our hands, we know that at any point it could just vanish without a trace.

It's not remotely surprising GTA 6 is digital-only. Even ignoring the likely technical issues fitting much of it onto a disc, it kills the resale market stone dead. Used game stores won't have copies of GTA 6 on the shelves after players are done with it. GTA Online is the cash cow, but there are still plenty of us who will play the campaign and call it a day. Those players can't sell on or trade in their copy anymore.

Curiously, Zelnick also said that "It doesn't mean that we won't have physical additions now and then, I'm sure we will in the same way that there’s still vinyl in the recorded music business." I don't even know where he's going with that one.

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Everyone knows Xbox isn't doing so hot these days, but new research from Statista Consumer Insights has put that common belief to the test.

Xbox is "unhealthy" according to new CEO Asha Sharma, which has led to thousands of layoffs this summer and many more throughout the next fiscal year. Gaming as a whole is struggling from a variety of headwinds, including the memory crisis, dilution of attention, competition from non-gaming hobbies, and potentially an unhealthy dependence on free-to-play forever games like Fortnite.

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Indeed, Microsoft's gaming division saw a decline to the tune of 11% last fiscal year, which sources tell me almost entirely revolves around Call of Duty having an off year. I suspect diversifying the Xbox business would probably be a good idea to reduce dependence on the firm's handful of mega-games, but that's a discussion for another time.

It's no secret that Xbox One was ill-received by the core gaming community, and Microsoft is still paying for those mistakes over a decade later. New data from Statista Consumer Insights put common beliefs about Xbox's performance to the test, surveying over 3,200 gamers in the United States.

Users were asked which console platforms they frequently play on specifically, with PC and mobile excluded from the picture. Of console players in the United States, some 85% frequently play on PlayStation platforms, 76% play on Nintendo platforms, with Xbox coming in last at 58%. The figures suggest that most people own multiple consoles and frequently play across different platforms. What is perhaps most striking is how popular the Xbox 360 still is, which is even giving the Nintendo Switch 2 a run for its money. It aligns with what I've previously heard about Xbox 360 engagement, which is uniquely sticky for Microsoft.

In a universe where some service games last "forever," there are arguably few reasons to upgrade from a PS4 or an Xbox One if all you enjoy playing is Fortnite or Minecraft and the like, which are still updated and fully functional on older platforms. At least it shows that users remain engaged, even if they are playing on older platforms. The challenge is figuring out how to convince them the upgrade is worth it.

Grand Theft Auto 6 is exclusive to Xbox Series X|S and PlayStation 5, which in a usual console cycle would likely have a dramatic upward impact on the current-gen systems. That uptake is likely going to be a tad muted for Xbox, which is struggling to source memory at reasonable prices for its Xbox Series X|S range. The box is already more expensive than ever, and has firmly slipped beyond your average luxury purchase.

It'll be interesting to see how Xbox CEO Asha Sharma addresses the delta here. Xbox PC and Xbox Cloud Gaming are obviously excluded from the results here, and both of these platforms represent a huge growth area for Microsoft. Microsoft has barely marketed Xbox Cloud Gaming arguably, and Xbox Game Pass on PC remains a fantastic deal too. Putting more investment into these products (and maybe I dunno, marketing them?) could make for an easy win.

Sharma said that there are "200 million" Xbox players last month, but it's unclear exactly how Microsoft arrives at this figure. Does that include Minecraft players on PS5 or Nintendo Switch for example? It's hard to parse. What isn't hard to parse is the scale of the challenge facing Xbox, whose identity has been rocked by a variety of experiments that landed with mixed results.

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Xbox has a new console on the horizon, in the form of Project Helix, but so too will PlayStation. The competition for the future will remain fierce, but it's unclear if Microsoft still has the stamina to keep investing in gaming as shareholders heap demands for more AI.

It'll be interesting to see how Xbox weathers the next few years, with no end in sight for memory shortages, demographic shifts to PC, and the rise of free-to-play perpetuating something of a race to the bottom.

We've seen where the United States prefers to play, but where do YOU prefer to play, Windows Central reader? Vote in our poll below!

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Five years ago back in 2021, a game was released with a famous franchise attached that initially slipped me by. I'm talking about Aliens: Fireteam Elite.

I don't really have any affinity for the movie franchise, so that's likely why I didn't even give it a look. But after catching a couple of streamers playing it, I took a punt, and boy was I in for a surprise.

To this day I think Aliens: Fireteam Elite is woefully underrated. I can't speak to whether it's a truly authentic Aliens experience, but it's a fun game with plenty of replayability, without being too serious or requiring all your time. And it's about to leave Xbox Game Pass in 9 days as I write this, so consider this your notice to check it out while you still can.

You've got various classes and loadouts to build out, perks, different weapons, and hidden caches to find to get yourself some of the better loot. It has mild elements of a looter shooter in its mechanics, but it really isn't one.

It's a run-and-gun action game where your objective primarily is slaying alien creatures. Lots and lots of alien creatures. My former colleague, Miles Dompier, summed it up perfectly in our original 2021 review.

"Aliens: Fireteam Elite genuinely caught me off guard. I was excited about the idea of playing another co-op shooter in the Aliens universe, but I wasn't confident it would be a quality title worth spending a great deal of time with. However, my squad and I are already strategizing our loadouts for the more extreme difficulties. Despite my initial reservations, I'm fully expecting to spend the next several weeks playing Aliens: Fireteam Elite with friends."

This is exactly what happened to me, though I played more solo than with others. While it's more fun with friends, it's perfectly playable solo from beginning to end.

Better still, the Pathogen expansion is currently heavily discounted, too, and I'll be honest, that passed me by. I own the game (and it has Xbox Play Anywhere, too), but with Aliens: Fireteam Elite 2 coming really soon, it's as good a time as any to revisit this gem.

But seriously, if you're stuck for something to play right now and you have Xbox Game Pass Premium, Ultimate, or PC Game Pass, take it for a spin. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

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Xbox has been on a bit of a tear when it comes to new platform features lately.

Yesterday, Microsoft announced the latest build for the Xbox Insider Program, with a variety of new features big and small. The features included better management for Xbox cloud saves, better sorting of your games library, and other bits and pieces. The headline act, however, is voice clip recording on the Xbox Game DVR. This is a feature people have been asking Microsoft to add for over a decade, all the way back to the Xbox One era.

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When you have an epic gameplay moment with friends, it would be awesome if you could also capture their reactions without having to use a complex capture rig. You'd need to use a streaming PC with StreamLabs OBS or a capture card like the Elgato 4K S to extract the audio alongside your Xbox gameplay. But yesterday's update has made it a million times easier.

Here's a clip from a quick gameplay session on Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 I had this morning, showing how the first iteration works.

As you can see (or ... well, hear) the audio levels aren't ideal out of the box. You can barely hear me in this capture over the audio of the game. You would have to lower the gameplay sound a fair bit in order to be able to hear me, but it would be ideal if Microsoft would add settings for this.

In order for this feature to work, users have to enable it in the settings. Only users who have enabled game or party chat audio capture will appear in the sound mix, giving you total control over whether or not your reactions are captured (potentially saving your more embarrassing gameplay moments from going viral.)

You can also set whether your voice is clippable in public audio settings too, such as lobby chat on Call of Duty (oh boy) or in proximity chat games like Arc Raiders and the like.

Hopefully, Microsoft will add audio mix granularity sliders in the future, as it's far too quiet in my opinion as of writing. Additionally, capturing a clip seems to temporarily freeze a game for 0.2 seconds when you have voice capture turned on. I'm not sure if that's a consequence of the feature or an instability in the latest Alpha build, but I'm sure the experience will be improved before hitting general availability.

It's potentially exciting how this feature could evolve in the future. Xbox CEO Asha Sharma is a former Meta executive, and likely has thoughts on how to leverage social media virality as a vector for growing Xbox's footprint. Perhaps there's a future where Xbox supports webcam picture-in-picture clipping too, and maybe we'll even get direct sharing to social networks back again some day on top. Perhaps even native Xbox Series X|S video editing tools will return as well, who knows?!

Microsoft has been listening to user feature ideas more aggressively lately via the Xbox Player Voice portal over here. The top most requested feedback is still "Xbox exclusive games," which Xbox has delivered in the form of Clockwork Revolution and Gears of War: E-Day. Xbox also confirmed it will deliver "Platinum" completion achievements later in 2026.

What features would YOU like to see Xbox deliver? Let us know in the comments.

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