The two most surprising things would be
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that they would make paid multiplayer a thing in game mode, but not windows mode. That actively incentivizes people to leave game mode (even if just to play the same owned Xbox game on the Xbox PC app) which should be the opposite of what Xbox wants.
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That specifically only Steam and Epic are supported because at least according to this Battle Net (a launcher Microsoft owns) isnāt yet supported. That seems weird. Maybe if this information is true itās just because third party developers canāt develop for Battle Net? This would in theory be information given during GDC to third party developers about getting their games ready for Helix
Otherwise everything sounds totally possible. I am very curious to see the final product (and get my hands on it). I wonder if the āpurchaseā wondering is accurate there, and after you link Steam & Epic all owned games just populate your library and you can install and uninstall them at whim without leaving game mode. Thatād actually make it insanely easy to use either launcher. I could purchase Steam games from the mobile app for example and then just resync my library. If itās that you must go to windows mode to purchase AND install Steam & Epic games then thatād be more of a hassle and more of what Iād expect.
The only thing I actively want to know now is if the velocity architecture is the same for storage and our expansion cards will continue to work. If they say yes to that then Iāll slap the 4TB one on my wishlist. Also, I imagine this would be later down the line, but they really should work on some type of official mods program across Xbox games (something to make it easy for gamers to submit and publishers/devs to approve) for Xbox game mode. I think the more they can do to take advantage of the architecture without telling everyone to go to windows mode and do it themselves at their own risk, the better. Most gamers wonāt want to leave game mode and game mode would also be where Xbox makes the most money from software purchases.
Edit: Also, Windows Helix (or maybe itāll be Windows Xbox when it launches commercially) does indeed sound like something thatāll exist beyond this first party Xbox hardware. I 100% expect them to make that the *recommended (default) OS mode for gaming PCs in the future.
Well this is exactly what I guessed outside of the Helix OS part which means itās a stripped down Windows gaming OS which is great and theyāre going to optimize the game like consoles in that mode.
And windows mode is going to be exactly like using a Windows 11 PC with and AMD GPU for people who want to tinker that sounds great.
The only concern from what Iām reading long term is that if devs choose not to create a Helix build then you have to deal with the Raw PC build it seems which for me is fine but for console gamers could be annoying.
Letās hope since itās a PC that devs just put Helix settings in which should in theory now be minimal work.
Thatās really bad, pay for multiplayer for Steam Games if in game mode itās terrible. For sure a lot of people will play in Windows Mode.
They have to stop to ask for money for multiplayer, but the greed donāt let they do this.
I knew people would focus on this, but itās version 0.1.4 and itās answering questions based on ānowā, right?
Weāre 16āish months away from this thing possibly launching and turning off the 20+ year MP money-spigot is something theyād do at launch and not before.
Sounds like a mess. Eww.
I hope they will support the Series X for a long time.
But who knows what it will look like when it is actually revealed, or if any of this is even true.
Again, and Iāll always say this about insider/leak culture. Never take any of it as gospel or fact.
I think the most worrying thing is that it requires Game Pass Core to play MP games in Game Mode. There is no such thing as Core anymoreā¦ could be an obstacle.
Thoughts on Windows mode requiring a pro license or something of that nature to access. For example, a one time $99 fee per device to upgrade. Then theoretically could mix a semi-subsidized console base with more flexibility for this willing to pay a bit more. DOA?
Zero percent chance.
I agree that MP should probably be free in game mode for native helix games but I think itās fair that playing games through back compat would require online because they are legally still Xbox non Helix native games.
Battle.net is probably excluded at the moment because yeah my guess is your guess that itās not relevant for a third parties to put games there because theyāre never going to put games on there.
I think they just want people to use the default store at the end of the day so I understand why theyāre making it an extra step to purchase games that arenāt on their store in my opinion.
But everything else I 100 percent agree with you on and I hope we hear more about how things work official relatively soon over here more from what theyāre saying at GDC.
That makes me feel that this was all done when Core was a thing and they didnāt update it.
Or this info is incredibly old and was part of a presentation to devs from a long time ago. Which makes me think they maybe closer to having a full Windows 11 Helix build than we know.
This is of course my hopium
Iāve updated the article, after talking with people who would know, issa fake
Was just going to share this after looking at it a bit closer:
Awfully BRITISH spelling for āOptimizedā for a mostly American Company and American Developers working on the project. The screenshot incorrectly uses āoptimisedā.
Too late, Iāve already chosen to believe only the most negative parts as fact.
/s
Guess were waiting til next weeks presentations get some info out there. Also I guess using Helix(Core as well) as a name for Windows felt a bit weird since, Helix is likely the project name for Xbox specifically.
Yeah the biggest tell that this at least isnāt āupdated informationā is that Game Pass core hasnāt existed since they restructured & priced the tiers last year. That was several months ago now, and I wouldnāt expect Xbox themselves to misname their GP tiers in official presentation information.
Really this seems like a standard leak: nothing here is really easily disputable; itās a tame mix of good and bad information that may or may not be true or have been true. It could be made up or from old materials or could be exactly what theyāre going to present at GDC minus typos, but even then thereās still over a year before it releases at the earliest and even then a lot of this stuff (especially paid online) are software level changes that could be made post launch. Thereās all to say thereās no real weight at this stage. Itās fun to speculate though and is getting exciting as we start to get real tangible official information. Yeah all this stuff was leaked by insiders like Jez Corden months ago, but it is so much more interesting & exciting when Xbox themselves are outling the future of Xbox.