For the past few months, Microsoft has been making some changes to its gaming department. A few weeks back, it had laid off some employees from the Xbox team. Now on Wednesday, Microsoft announced that it will merge features from the Xbox Game Pass app into the Xbox app for mobile platforms. Soon the new features will be rolled out to iOS, Android, and iPadOS.
Microsoft claims that this change will offer a more streamlined experience to users as they will now be able to manage their Game Pass memberships, browse the full Game Pass catalogue, and receive alerts for upcoming games all within the Xbox app. Microsoft will discontinue all new downloads of the standalone Xbox Game Pass app from November and fully transition to the unified Xbox app.
If you are an existing Game Pass Ultimate user then you will also benefit from this update. You can claim exclusive perks and stream select games using Xbox Cloud Gaming directly from their mobile devices. This will make the overall experience more simplified and will combine core social and gaming features, such as party chat, game updates, and remote installation, all in one place.
Further, Microsoft is also rolling out new features for PC and Xbox console gamers. The Xbox Game Bar Compact Mode which is specifically designed for smaller screens and gaming handhelds, is now widely available. It will make it easier for players to access game launchers, capture gameplay, and quit games directly from the Game Bar’s Home widget.
On top of that, Xbox console players can now pre-download updates for select games, allowing them to start playing as soon as the update goes live. Even the notifications for wish-listed games have also been improved. Users will get better alerts when a game is released. This feature is also now added to Game Pass.