Xbox feedback analysis: The top issues Xbox fans want to see fixed in 2022

Xbox Series X Source: Matt Brownish | Windows Central

Xbox is on the up and up, with Xbox Series X|S consoles selling faster than any previous Xbox generation earlier it, even the Xbox 360. With Xbox cloud gaming, the biggest studio portfolio in the company's history, and an industry-leading subscription service in Xbox Game Pass, Xbox is poised to have a really dandy panel generation.

As skilful as Xbox has been doing lately, things could always be ameliorate, right? Recently, I asked on Twitter what Xbox fans' biggest concerns were currently virtually the Xbox platform, and solicited over 1,000 replies with user feedback. Over the Christmas interruption, I sabbatum down and analyzed each bit of feedback based on various categories. If a feedback particular appeared only once, I added it to an "other" column. The vast majority of complaints did, in fact, appear multiple times, and the range of feedback was quite broad.

Here's an overview (and wholly unscientific) look at the ~1,000 user feedback sample I gathered, and what seem to be some of the biggest trending issues amid cadre Xbox fans.

Xbox feedback overview

Jez Xbox Feedback Source: @JezCorden on Twitter | Windows Cardinal

On December. 28, I asked Xbox fans in my Twitter following for feedback on the current state of Xbox. Each time I tracked an issue from an private user, I added it to a tally on Excel and produced the above pie chart based on the results.

No single issue wholly dominated for Xbox gamers.

This should by no ways be taken equally scientific, given that it focuses entirely on my personal Twitter following and disregards the experiences of users who are perhaps playing more casually and don't go involved in the online discourse. Still, it gives usa some good indication at what the prevailing pain points are for heavy Xbox users, and may give the states some idea of where Xbox may prioritize development for future features and expenditure.

As you can see above, no single issue wholly dominated for Xbox gamers. The biggest pain points for virtually pertain to the Xbox Game DVR, which records game captures, screenshots, and handles live streaming. Another big pain bespeak was general problems with the Xbox Os, with many complaints about the abundance of "ads" on the dashboard. Another business concern for Xbox gamers is the perception of decreased support from Japanese studios, who increasingly seem to featherbed Xbox in favor of exclusivity deals with Sony PlayStation or Nintendo Switch.

Beneath I'll offer some more details on the complaints, and also we'll start to track where Microsoft is on some of these issues over the course of the next twelvemonth.

Xbox game DVR

Xbox achievements Source: Windows Central

At that place were many, many complaints about diverse aspects of the Xbox Game DVR, and for good reason. The Xbox Game DVR has fallen into a fleck of a country in contempo years, in a variety of means. The style the organisation handles HDR for captures is a bit off, with screenshots appearing washed out and weird when you upload them to a PC. It'due south too weirdly difficult to obtain your captures from a PC, with no system in place currently to access cloud files without manually uploading them from your Xbox to an next service like OneDrive.

Another complaint I combined in this category revolves effectually streaming. Since the death of Mixer, Microsoft had no way to stream directly from the Xbox to streaming platforms until recently, when it finally re-integrated Twitch. However, Twitch isn't the only streaming service out at that place. The Xbox currently offers no native support for YouTube Gaming, for case.

The Xbox Game DVR also has no arrangement for editing clips together, offering just a basic trimming service. In a social media world, information technology seems odd that the Xbox Game DVR is then bare-bones when it comes to some of this stuff. The old "Upload Studio" app was left abandoned and finally deleted entirely from Xbox a little while ago.

Thankfully, Xbox applied science lead Jason Ronald said on a podcast a little while agone that the Xbox Game DVR is a high priority for the team in 2022, so hopefully, we'll see these issues solved sooner, rather than later.

Xbox OS customization and improvements

Xbox dashboard Source: Windows Cardinal

For this, I lumped many complaints near the Xbox dashboard into a unmarried category, since there were many issues that were a little less specific. The most prevailing complaint revolved around the affluence of tiles perceived as "ads" on the dashboard. The larger tiles across the lesser generate "recommended" content from various sources, including achievements, game recommendations, and so on. Many users seek the power to hibernate this row of panels and desire a "cleaner" dashboard that showcases more of the groundwork.

In that location were other complaints, ranging from the lack of HDR on the dashboard which causes flickering on some TVs while switching HDR modes. Also, general speed of the dashboard ofttimes came upwards as an upshot, too. There were some complaints well-nigh the complexity of the Family Settings system, too, while others requested Discord integration for messaging and voice chat.

Support from Japanese studios

Yakuza Like A Dragon City At Night Source: Windows Primal / Zackery Cuevas

Another frequent concern revolved around back up from Japanese and other third-party studios.

With Sony buying upward exclusivity deals around the Final Fantasy franchise, and other franchises similar Persona simply arbitrarily ignoring Xbox all together, it's articulate that many Xbox fans feel Microsoft needs to piece of work harder to get some of these developers interested in building for the platform.

Xbox has seen a bit of success here and there from Japanese studios. Microsoft helped bring Phantasy Star Online ii to the Due west via Xbox, for example, and Sega likewise brought the entire Yakuza franchise to Xbox, after years of exclusivity on other platforms. Microsoft has even garnered some wins from Square Enix, nabbing Octopath Traveler for Xbox Game Pass. Yet still, major gaps in the lineup persist. While non Japanese-made, Genshin Touch on skipping Xbox has proven a pain point for some, and Atlus' continued absenteeism on Xbox frustrates JRPG fans everywhere.

Microsoft has previously described Japan equally 1 of its fastest-growing markets, then perhaps the state of affairs will change in the coming years. But it'south clear Xbox even so has a lot of work to do in this surface area.

Xbox achievements

Source: Windows Central

Some other large bout of feedback fell confronting the Xbox accomplishment organisation, which has been a bit neglected in recent years. Save for the inclusion of a special "rare achievement" toast notification, there take non been any meaningful additions to the system in years. Meanwhile, PlayStation'southward Trophy system has become the object of some jealousy, given that it offers a more than granular expect at how players tackle achievement hunting.

Many players were asking for some sort of recognition for 100% completions of games, while others desire to be acknowledged for their dedication to a single title. It's certainly true that professional gamers may spend more time in a single game learning to play at a higher level, rather than hunt downwards achievements in many carve up games. Additionally, there were complaints about some indie publishers who deflate the quality of achievements with purposefully easy Gamerscore harvesting opportunities, devaluing the system as a whole.

Xbox first-party concerns

Xbox Game Studios list Source: Microsoft

In that location continues to exist concerns about Xbox's kickoff-party output also, despite the acquisitions Microsoft has made in recent years. Many of these complaints were nigh dissimilar specific things with regards to starting time-party, ranging from requests to revive old IPs like Banjo, to the perceived lack of information well-nigh major upcoming games like Land of Disuse 3, Perfect Night, Fable, and others.

It'south clear that Microsoft however has some work to do to fully repair the perception that it can't run across Sony's PlayStation platform on raw quality. They've had a large range of positive wins last yr, with more award nominations than whatsoever time in recent memory. Flight Simulator, Age of Empires 4, Forza Horizon 5, and Halo Infinite were all well received, and go along to bring people to the platform who may have never considered Xbox before. That being said, games like God of War, Horizon Zero Dawn, Ghost of Tsushima, and others on PlayStation just seem to still be at a level of quality Xbox hasn't been able to reach yet, despite the variety that Microsoft is putting out.

Players in the thread continued to request loftier-quality cinematic 3rd-person activity games, akin to the likes of God of War and Horizon. There were also calls for Microsoft to explore superhero games, in response to Sony'southward confident command of the Spider-Human IP. Fixing this perception will take fourth dimension, still, probable frustrated further by the pandemic and work-from-home disruption of the past two years. In 2022, some of the most predictable Xbox games include Starfield and Redfall, as the purchase of ZeniMax starts to comport fruit for Xbox.

Other Xbox concerns

Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S Source: Matt Brown | Windows Key

There were various other concerns that appeared frequently in the thread. Localization issues continue to be a subject area of business concern outside of U.S. and U.K. markets specifically, with many users upset at the lack of support for Microsoft Rewards in their region. Every bit someone who uses Bing and Microsoft Edge across PC and mobile, it almost gets me enough points every few months to effectively pay for Xbox Game Pass for free. It'due south understandable that people would be mad about missing out on this, but unfortunately, information technology'due south not on the Xbox squad to solve this i, since Microsoft Rewards is handled by a different office of the company. However, information technology likewise includes concerns such as poor linguistic communication support for commencement-party games, with many games receiving no local dub in their language of choice, or in some cases, not even subtitles.

Many users were also requesting some sort of Xbox Game Pass family unit programme, for multi-console households. Correct at present, you tin can share Xbox Game Laissez passer with upwardly to one other user using the console-sharing workaround method, but for people with multiple kids and multiple Xboxes, those costs rack up quite quickly. Because fifty-fifty Office 365 has a family unit plan, information technology seems a chip of an odd omission that Xbox Game Laissez passer does not. Hopefully Microsoft and its partners can work this one out.

Xbox Game Pass Source: Matt Brownish | Windows KeyWhere is the Xbox Game Laissez passer family plan?

Many users were likewise bringing up forced crossplay between consoles and PC on games like Halo Space and Phone call of Duty, exposing Xbox gamers to hackers on PC and perceptions of unfair competitive play when you lot commencement mixing controllers with mouse and keyboard players. Many users besides complained well-nigh the quality of the Xbox apps across mobile and PC, which have inconsistent features at best, and horribly bad performance at worst. The Xbox app on PC is particularly bad, and something we've written about extensively here on Windows Central.

Some other upshot that came upward frequently was the quality of backward-compatible games on the Xbox Serial S. On the Xbox Series 10, astern-compatible games apply their Xbox One X resolutions and frame rates, but even though the Xbox Series S should be capable enough to handle these higher resolutions in older games, the organization downloads the Xbox 1 S versions of backward-compatible games by default. This may be a precaution to ensure polish gameplay, but I'chiliad sure Microsoft could explore workarounds to make these features a little better on the Xbox Serial S, considering many users probable picked up the smaller console as a secondary platform to take advantage of astern compatibility.

A never-catastrophe process

Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S Source: Matt Chocolate-brown | Windows Primal

I think the fact the bug people have are adequately spread out could be interpreted as a adept thing. There's no central major problem facing Xbox for most users right now, with nigh aspects of the platform boiling down to refinement of things that are already at that place. I suspect in earlier years, concerns over the showtime-party lineup would've by far made up the majority of fears nigh the hereafter of the platform, but it seems confidence in this area has gradually improved over time.

With more investment than ever earlier, gamers ultimately stand to benefit.

Microsoft does have its work cut out when it comes to things like localization, back up from Japanese and other third-political party studios, and the constraints on the Xbox operating organisation. The Xbox OS is starting to show its age a scrap potentially, given the limited resources allocated to running system-level features on the box. Opening the dashboard while running an intensive game reveals just how sluggish it can all the same be in certain scenarios, and the quality of the Game DVR and stagnation of the achievements organization remains a flake painful.

Ane thing is for certain: Feedback and platform development is a never-ending procedure. Competition between the platform holders leads to innovation, which in plough leads to requests for more features and content. It felt a fleck like Xbox was being run on a shoestring budget at the start of the terminal gen, but this gen, things admittedly experience completely different. With more investment than always before, gamers ultimately stand to benefit, just we should keep up the (constructive, respectful) pressure on Microsoft to ensure that the complacency of yesteryear doesn't return.

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