Xbox is attempting to win back fans, or at least satisfy the ones they already have, by making changes, big and small. The latest update comes directly from Xbox CEO Asha Sharma.
Shama posted an update yesterday that voice chat will be included in captures on Xbox, and it is also adding new ways to view achievements, more control over cloud saves, and having more games on wishlists. For now, these are available to Xbox Insiders.
However, Sharma made further news responding to a fan asking about an equivalent to the PlayStation Platinum trophy, tied to the Xbox Achievement system. On PlayStation, collecting Platinums for different games is an enjoyable hunt for many players, and Xbox fans want something like that as well.
Sharma replied by saying that the “team is working on something for later this year!” That is coming up rather fast as we are now in August, so it may not be long until we hear something further about this.
Sharma has implemented a number of changes since she arrived earlier this year, ranging from making the Xbox logo green again to drastically lowering the price of Game Pass after a wild hike before her tenure. Of course, the most noteworthy thing that’s happened with the new administration is an enormous slew of layoffs, the largest in Xbox history, spinning off studios without closing them, but there were thousands of job losses across every part of the brand. It’s part of the “path to growth” Xbox is hoping to achieve in the next few years, but it was a brutal event.
The largest challenges Xbox has before it are a hundred times more pressing than Platinum trophies. It is focused on getting better and bigger games out more quickly, as many of its franchises have been stuck in the mud for years now. Past that, Xbox has to figure out how to crawl out of the hole that is its console market, which has cratered in recent years. A new console, Xbox Helix, is on the way, but faces the challenge of both appealing to departed fans and being at all reasonably priced in a market with exploding component costs due to AI (AI, of course, that Microsoft is heavily invested in).
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The little things matter, however. It’s a “we’re listening” policy for the brand, so the easy stuff that fans have been asking for endlessly can be solved one request after another. So why not do that? It is, as best it can.
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