Although Microsoft gaming chief Phil Spencer previously hinted at a portable Xbox console, Microsoft vice president of next-gen Jason Ronald said that gamers should expect news about portable Windows PCs this year.
Although Microsoft gaming chief Phil Spencer previously hinted at a portable Xbox console, Microsoft vice president of next-gen Jason Ronald said that gamers should expect news about portable Windows PCs this year.
According to The Verge, Ronald was a panelist at an AMD and Lenovo event called «The Future of Gaming Laptops,» which was largely dedicated to showcasing Lenovo’s new Legion Go S. He hinted on stage that Microsoft «plans to bring the Xbox experience to Windows PCs, not the other way around.»
«We’ve been innovating in the console market for a long time, and as we collaborate with other companies in the industry, it’s about how we bring those innovations that we’ve developed in the console market to the PC, as well as the portable gaming market», — Ronald said.
He confirmed that Microsoft is considering merging Xbox and Windows capabilities together, and that gamers could see the changes as early as 2025, rather than waiting for a portable Xbox console that may only arrive a few years later.
«I would say it’s the best of Xbox and Windows, because we’ve spent the last 20 years building a world-class operating system, but it’s really locked into the console. We’re focused on how to bring those experiences to the broader Windows ecosystem for gamers and developers», — says Ronald.
Windows doesn’t currently work very well on portable devices, so Valve’s SteamOS could be a much better way to pick up games and play them. «We’re focused on making this as simple as possible and making it more like a console experience. Our goal is to put the player and their library at the center of the experience, not all the [Windows] work you have to do today», — said the Microsoft vice president.
How Microsoft pulls off the Xbox-Windows merger will be a key point, but it doesn’t seem like the company is suddenly going to port its own Xbox operating system to Windows. It’s more like Microsoft wants to make Windows better at gaming by adding Xbox capabilities to it, while keeping the desktop, notifications, and other non-gaming Windows features as far away as possible.
Modern gamers can be divided into two types. The first prefer console gaming, which requires a minimum of effort and hassle with settings, but has a closed system, more expensive games and other restrictions. The second play on PC, which offers a wide scope for customization and settings, but requires expensive hardware and sometimes does not work «out of the box». Therefore, if Microsoft manages to combine the best of both worlds and get rid of the shortcomings, it may gain another trump card in the competition with Sony.
«I think ultimately our goal is to make Windows great for gaming on any device. The reality is that the Xbox operating system is built on Windows. So there’s a lot of infrastructure that we’ve built for consoles that we can bring to PC to deliver a premium gaming experience on any device», — said Jason Ronald.
Recall that earlier, a gaming insider with the nickname TheGhostOfHope, who mainly publishes leaks about Call of Duty, stated that the next-gen Xbox console «will be released in 2026 and will be called Xbox Prime.»
