While Xbox increasingly pursues a multiplatform strategy, it's not giving up on hardware yet. Microsoft has just announced a "multi-year agreement" with AMD for new hardware across a variety of device types, including next-generation consoles.
"The collaboration aims to uplevel the player experience by delivering advanced graphics with enhanced visual quality, more immersive gameplay using the power of AI, and compatibility with players’ existing Xbox games library," the company says in a press release. "Together, Xbox and AMD hope to enable play across devices in entirely new ways, delivering an Xbox experience designed for players – without being confined to a single store or tied to one device."
While this covers a wide variety of device types, including PC, handheld, and cloud hardware, Xbox president Sarah Bond specifically calls out "next-generation Xbox consoles" in a video message to fans.
"This is all about building you a gaming platform that's always with you, so you can play the games you want across devices anywhere you want, delivering you an Xbox experience not locked to a single store or tied to one device," Bond concludes. "That's why we're working closely with the Windows team, to ensure that Windows is the number one platform for gaming. The next generation of Xbox is coming to life, and this is just the beginning."
Of course, we still don't know exactly what a next-gen console from Xbox might look like here in the modern era, especially given that "this is an Xbox" marketing line the company has now been promoting for some time.
That promise of Windows being "the number one platform for gaming" is particularly curious. Are we looking at a future where new Xbox consoles are essentially Windows-powered PCs built for the living room? That's not far off from the model adopted by Valve for the Steam Deck, and we've already seen Microsoft invest in something similar with the Asus ROG Xbox Ally.
Somehow, it's nearly been five years since the launch of Xbox Series X (and PS5, for that matter). In many ways, it feels like this generation has barely gotten started, but historically speaking a half-decade is a pretty long time for a console generation to keep running. Whatever shape the next Xbox ends up taking, here's hoping it'll prove worthy of a generational upgrade.
Here are the upcoming Xbox Series X games you need to know about.
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