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Menus on Xbox Series X will look a lot like those on Xbox One
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After multiple iterations I feel like the current interface has reached a sweet spot in usability while also keeping the focus on gaming.
I certainly dont miss Mixer being pushed into my face every time I shuffled around the dashboard.
That being said, speeding up the interface is a welcome improvement even if it's the only significant change this cycle.
I certainly dont miss Mixer being pushed into my face every time I shuffled around the dashboard.
That being said, speeding up the interface is a welcome improvement even if it's the only significant change this cycle.
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Simply having the fast SSD could account for that, with no work needed. As well as the lower memory usage, since now you can load things off the SSD as you need them (that would take a little work).
Oh well, faster is faster.
Edit: Since this is coming to XBox One as well, the SSD can't account for it. @Null_Space is correct. So expect it to be even faster on the XBSX.
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Faster, harder, scooter... for those who remember 
Anyway, the XSX just might be my first console. As a fresh father, gaming will certainly need to become more simple for me... and somehow I just resonate more with the Xbox messaging than the PS (no flame intended)
Anyway, the XSX just might be my first console. As a fresh father, gaming will certainly need to become more simple for me... and somehow I just resonate more with the Xbox messaging than the PS (no flame intended)
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The Xbox One doesn't have a SSD.
The above are the numbers for the existing one, not the Series X.
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Brad Oliver
Ars Tribunus Militum
I haven't used my Xbox One nearly as much as my 360, so take this with a grain of salt but...I found the last 360 UI to be the best one Microsoft has released to date.
I find the Xbox One UI frustratingly unintuitive.
I find the Xbox One UI frustratingly unintuitive.
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I don't think anyone loves it, but it's basically usable, roku-style, grid of squares with the selection highlighted. Perfectly cromulent for TV interfaces.
Now, the Apple TV with touchpad remote?! THAT'S what you should try and let me know which is the 'WORST' UI. They knew better a decade ago and never put a square touchpad on an ipod, so why did we get this ... thing?
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The dashboard is the worst part about the Xbox currently, so I would certainly welcome this. It's just so laggy even on my XboneX
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Anything would be appreciated.
I long for the old xbox 360 blade interface, everything was organized and fast to get to (no space for advertising of course).
I long for the old xbox 360 blade interface, everything was organized and fast to get to (no space for advertising of course).
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I think it's probably like anything else in life, once you use it, you get used to it and even begin to appreciate it.
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I'm sitting here trying to think... and no, i don't think there's a single thing in the Xbox interface which requires a double tap. Long-press... the only thing is the main Xbox button (single press brings up the Xbox menu, long press brings up the option to shut down the console?)
I think maybe there are some shortcuts for things like screen and video capture that involve some of that, but they're all... purely optional (meaning you can achieve the same things without ever using the shortcuts). Everything else is either "select it using stick, and then push A", or "push on-screen button indicating desired action". Is it perfect? Heck no. Is it laggy? Sometimes painfully so. Is it wildly different than how to interact with a Switch, or a PS4... also, no. For the record, I think it was just this week that they fixed the wonkiness with the purchase screen when redeeming Xbox Live Gold games for 360 and OG Xbox offerings (which I would've offered up as one of the most egregious failings of the UI). I also think I would've sympathized more with your pain if we were talking about the prior iteration (with the "tabs" for Mixer, Store, etc); now there's pretty much two main navs (your homepage, with sections for whatever things you have chosen to put on your homepage), and the pop-up menu accessed via the guide button wherever you are.
Personally, (and this might just be an issue of familiarity as I've spent far more time on the one than the other), I find the PS4's interface to be maddening. I hated the crossbar UI when they launched the PS3, and I find it barely improved on the PS4. And it makes me immeasurably angry that media services I do not want, and do not subscribe to, have priority placement (literally pushing the services I actually do use into deeper pages of the menu) when I go to launch something like Netflix. (Caveat: my PS4 is on loan, so if they've fixed any of this in the last couple of months, I haven't seen it yet)
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“ Still, it's odd to see an entirely new console with a system menu that looks more or less identical to that on the console it's replacing.”
I guess? I find it more odd that this blurring of generations hasn’t happened sooner. Microsoft is treating consoles more like phones now, where games work across hardware for longer, and the system menus are part of that. Personally I think this is better for us, the players. I am excited to see games freed from being tied to specific hardware.
I should add, I’m not commenting on the usability of the Xbox UI. I think it could be better. Just noting that I’m glad it’s being decoupled from hw generations.
I guess? I find it more odd that this blurring of generations hasn’t happened sooner. Microsoft is treating consoles more like phones now, where games work across hardware for longer, and the system menus are part of that. Personally I think this is better for us, the players. I am excited to see games freed from being tied to specific hardware.
I should add, I’m not commenting on the usability of the Xbox UI. I think it could be better. Just noting that I’m glad it’s being decoupled from hw generations.
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It's not odd; it's by far the historical norm. Almost every console from every manufacturer up through the fifth generation had system menus that were identical, in that they were all non-existent.
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Stochastic
Ars Scholae Palatinae
There are pros and cons to decoupling games from hardware generations. The benefit is that gamers stuck on last-gen consoles get to keep playing the latest games for a few more years. The downside is we probably have to wait 2-3 more years before we get a large number of proper, next-gen experiences.
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All this info is pretty irrelevant when they still refuse to give a date and price.
It's not perfect by any stretch, but it's order of magnitude better than the confusing, spread out mess that the PS4 has. You can quickly get to anything you would want to get to with the slide out menu that you get by hitting the XBox button.
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Snarky Robot
Ars Legatus Legionis
The last update they did made it better. Being able to reorganize the columns on the side menu (the one in the third to last picture) made it really easy for me to put things I'll never use waaaaaaay off to the right. Microsoft still has too many "things" at the top of that, but being able to rearrange them is at least a way to make that faster. I'm not a "blades" diehard, but there was something nice about being able to have an immediate idea of where you were and have it look very different. Now most of the "sections" look identical. An updated blade layout with a dash of the "metro" look would probably look nice.
I've never liked the crossbar, though the PS4 version is enough of an improvement. I find myself getting lost more often in PS4 (other than the setting menu, which Microsoft has never designed well). Pinning things works slightly better on Xbox, for me, but the thing I think I appreciate the most is being able to have two "views" of the menu. The "full" menu is your home, and can be useful in that context. But the "side" menu pops up in the middle of a game. It doesn't take you "out" of the game as much, whereas on PS4, hitting that drops you back to the main menu.
Both have segments they do better, but overall, I'd pick Microsoft's. There seem to be more things I can customize to fit my use. Though I really wish I could have a choice to tone down the pictures. I don't mind the boxes, but it's very...cluttered, even when you try to make a simple thing. A text-only option that looked like the original Zune menu (yes, I loved how it looked) would do wonders for me. Something closer to cross-bar but with better control over it.
I've never liked the crossbar, though the PS4 version is enough of an improvement. I find myself getting lost more often in PS4 (other than the setting menu, which Microsoft has never designed well). Pinning things works slightly better on Xbox, for me, but the thing I think I appreciate the most is being able to have two "views" of the menu. The "full" menu is your home, and can be useful in that context. But the "side" menu pops up in the middle of a game. It doesn't take you "out" of the game as much, whereas on PS4, hitting that drops you back to the main menu.
Both have segments they do better, but overall, I'd pick Microsoft's. There seem to be more things I can customize to fit my use. Though I really wish I could have a choice to tone down the pictures. I don't mind the boxes, but it's very...cluttered, even when you try to make a simple thing. A text-only option that looked like the original Zune menu (yes, I loved how it looked) would do wonders for me. Something closer to cross-bar but with better control over it.
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The new Xbox Store App was actually built in JavaScript/typescript with React Native compiled for UWP (at least the UI layer was), which I believe is part of how it achieved such huge performance gains. I'm curious if the new home screen was similarly written in React Native or more classic XAML?
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Snarky Robot
Ars Legatus Legionis
I keep hearing this, but...why? What hardware power is necessary for an experience that cant be replicated (with lower settings) on older hardware? People today can play the same games with a custom $3,000 rig and something that's 5 or 6 years old. Do they get the same experience? No! The high-end gamer gets the benefit of ray tracing and 4k and higher framerate.
But that isn't held back in any way by the fact that older computers use lower resolution, worse framerates, turn down shadows, etc. They've been doing this for years in PC-land. All that's happening now is that instead of having to support 500,000 different computers and allowing user toggles, they're being told: here are 4 hardware specs. Create visual settings for each one that people can't toggle that make it so people can play the game.
Will you see balls-out gorgeous games on next-gen. Sure. Will that improve over time? Of course! As they get familiar and optimize, games naturally look better. And older consoles will fall out as they go, just like PCs. But...there's not really anything being done in the space that cannot be done in any way with lesser equipment. The one exception, VR, is...niche. But most games? Yeah, I don't see any game coming out for either system that couldn't be done (albeit with some graphical changes) in current gen. Especially not graphics-wise.
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Why is it irrelevant? They're already pointed out that the Series X is coming out November 2020. It's nice to have a preview of what's coming.
The price isn't going to affect my purchasing decision, assuming it's not outlandish. And the likely reason for the delay on the price is they want to meet or beat Sony, so they have to wait for Sony to make the first move. If MS was to announce a price, then Sony announced a lower price, it wouldn't do MS much good to drop their price in response: the PR damage will be mostly done by then. So Sony's gotta make the first move, then MS will meet or undercut them even if they have to take a loss (and make up for it in game royalties, subscriptions, and DLC sales).
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I think the bigger news (at least for this crowd) is the switch from XAML to React Native for the UI layer. They've implemented this change in the Xbox app on Windows, and the Microsoft Store on Xbox (both still in various pre-release stages). It looks like they are making a similar change to the Xbox UI as a whole.
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Finally hardware has reached the point where they can render a grid of thumbnails quickly.
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They fixed the "ui is low" issue more than one update ago (I use One X, so perhaps it's not quite so fast on the regular xbox/S), and other than the store sometimes taking an extra second to load this or that, I feel some of these percentage increases are getting into diminishing returns (but faster is faster, so who am I to complain about that?).
As for whether you like or not, it's all subjective, I feel some of the 'haters' are really exaggerating, or it's that thing of being use to some other UI and not grocking (spell?) to the differences because you use the other more and the Xbox not frequently enough (like having to switch to Mac or to Windows from the other, but only once in a while).
As for whether you like or not, it's all subjective, I feel some of the 'haters' are really exaggerating, or it's that thing of being use to some other UI and not grocking (spell?) to the differences because you use the other more and the Xbox not frequently enough (like having to switch to Mac or to Windows from the other, but only once in a while).
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How about instead of showing off the interface, they tell us what the actual price is going to be? We are 3 months out from the launch and still just using guesses and estimates. It feels like without E3 forcing the issue, MS and Sony are now just playing chicken to see who can hold out longer before announcing it so the other can match/undercut them.
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yes, moving away from being Electron-based made a huge difference in performance.
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HDD vs SSD is only going to make a difference in initial load time. Hard drives of any type just store information for future use/access. Once the assets that make up the Xbox UI or a game are loaded, they are stored in RAM. So any speed gain will be through code optimization and a reduction of (or better compressed) assets (images, videos, 3d models, sounds, etc) required.
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As an Xbox fan, Im hoping they release it for $400 and eat the cost just to make Sony wince.
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I feel like people who work on the dashboard aren't game devs. If they were, it would be written in C++ instead of Javascript and never drop a single frame or lag at all.
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Microsoft has been internally at odds with themselves over user experience / user interface for years now. They let superfluous advertisement and pop-in loading leak into the most basic element of a system - the menu, the first thing you see and interact with. Sony isn't much better, and can be worse when loading sub-pages.
If an iPhone/Android phone, a device limited by ARM CPUs, battery, and spotty service can provide a screen with everything I need to know and customize as soon as I unlock it, then surely the "most powerful system(s) ever" can let me do the same.
I don't want to see 4 big boxes and three ads. I don't want to see a string of my most recent apps trailing off into nowhere, sprinkled with apps/ads I didn't intentionally pin or install.
I want to see a store icon and all my installed games/apps on one view, without going to a management menu.
If an iPhone/Android phone, a device limited by ARM CPUs, battery, and spotty service can provide a screen with everything I need to know and customize as soon as I unlock it, then surely the "most powerful system(s) ever" can let me do the same.
I don't want to see 4 big boxes and three ads. I don't want to see a string of my most recent apps trailing off into nowhere, sprinkled with apps/ads I didn't intentionally pin or install.
I want to see a store icon and all my installed games/apps on one view, without going to a management menu.
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I've never felt like the UI on my xbox One was especially slow, but then I got one of the Elite models with an SSHD in it. My kids have a One S, and it is noticeably hitch-ier, and slower to load Netflix or BBC iplayer. I got the Elite for cheap, when they were selling them off after One S came out, and I feel like I was right to prioritise system responsiveness over a slight GPU speed bump, especially since it ended up being my main streaming TV (TV, TV) box for a good while.
UI-wise, I'd say the current Xbox UI is decent. It's better than Fire TV, Android TV, Xbox 360 and PS3. It'd probably be better than Switch if I had as many games installed on that as I do on the Xbox. Never used a PS4 much, so I can't comment on that.
UI-wise, I'd say the current Xbox UI is decent. It's better than Fire TV, Android TV, Xbox 360 and PS3. It'd probably be better than Switch if I had as many games installed on that as I do on the Xbox. Never used a PS4 much, so I can't comment on that.
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Where is this referenced? I can't find it in the article or video transcript.
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It probably only shows 7 games because that's all the AAA titles a 1 TB drive can hold.
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Here's an idea: get rid of the lame NXE-successor UI that was clearly originally designed around Kinect and "center of the living room" BS. Move the ad tiles inside the Store and Rewards apps, and make it so I don't have to go through 4 layers to see if something on my Wishlist is on sale. Keep the main screen clean and focused. The most usable part of the current interface is the part that pops up on the top left when you hit the guide button with quick access to recently launched games/apps, profile/friends/parties, and configuration bits.
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The ads are there because they get paid to put them there and because they generate revenue. They aren't going anywhere. Just use the popup menu where everything is right there, it's why they made it.
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The react native implementation uses WinUI, unless you think there's a hidden Xbox React Native backend we don't know about. The WinUI implementation is either the same built-in version or a decoupled one that also could run a XAML app.
In essence, it's still UWP.
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Faster, harder, scooter... for those who remember
Anyway, the XSX just might be my first console. As a fresh father, gaming will certainly need to become more simple for me... and somehow I just resonate more with the Xbox messaging than the PS (no flame intended)
I feel like it's hard to justify getting an Xbox if you already have a gaming PC, considering the extent to which Microsoft is bringing Xbox gaming stuff to PC. The days of stuff like having to frequently upgrade your graphics card have long since passed, as long as you don't care about maxing out the occasional system-pushers that come along (e.g. Witcher 3), and a lot of games will recognize if you have an Xbox controller plugged in and give you the appropriate icons on prompts and menus (I've even seen them give you the Playstation controller button icons on prompts if you get a Playstation controller hooked up to your PC).
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I think a lot of people's frustration with the Xbox one UI is they don't realize you can do a lot of customization on it. All those vertical groups on the home screen can be completely removed or changed to show only what you want. You can have "game group's" on the games tab of the pop-up menu, to sort with stuff like "RPG's" or "Xbox one enhanced games".
The Stock UI is a bit underwhelming.
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