Microsoft has rolled out a new update for Xbox One. The May 2020 update is aimed at improving the overall UI experience, specifically in regards to simplifying the Guide and making it easier to navigate.
“The new Guide is designed to be cleaner and easier to read,” Xbox Experience principal program manager lead Jonathan Hildebrandt wrote in a blog post. “We’ve reduced the total number of tabs by combining related experiences and introduced a new default, left-to-right tab order, making it simpler to move around. App and system notifications are now found with the rest of your Alerts, right when you open the Guide.”
Here’s a quick rundown of all the changes:
- The People tab has been simplified–Friend Suggestions has been moved under Find Someone and Discover Clubs has been removed entirely
- Discover Clubs is now found on the Clubs page
- There is now a new Parties & Chats tab, putting all text and party chat communication into one place
- There is now a new Profile & System tab, allowing you to sign-in, access your profile, mess with settings, and go to the Help page all from one place
- The Profile & System tab is getting a brand-new Customize guide tabs option, allowing you to adjust the order of all of your Guide tabs
The remainder of the update addresses community concerns in regards to Xbox One’s pages. The Community page has been divided into four channels (Shared by friends, Official posts from games, Club activity, and Popular on Xbox Live) to make it easier to find the content you’re looking for. The My Games & Apps page now has more filter options, allowing you to now also organize your collection of games by genre and player count. The Mixer page has been updated too–it now provides live thumbnail previews to give you a peek at a stream before fully opening it.
These are all welcome changes, but it would be nice if Microsoft did a little more when Xbox Series X releases this holiday season. Fixing the Xbox Achievement system would be a good place to start, in order to remove the possibility of getting a Gamerscore that’s a prime number. We’d also like to see the addition of a service that offers similar features and benefits to Xbox 360’s Xbox Live Arcade.
