If there’s one thing that’s bothered me about Xbox Live since I first plugged in an Xbox 360 and hit start on Star Trek Legacy, it’s the service’s unwillingness to put user-generated content up for everyone to see. Gamerpics have been the poster child for this problem. Someone inside the company seems to share my disdain for them. Xbox One owners are getting the chance to replace them with their own photos, mercifully.
Microsoft detailed the mountain load of new features this week in a post on Xbox Wire. They’re just the latest in a set of new capabilities Microsoft plans to add with the horribly titled but well-meaning Windows 10 Creators Update for Xbox One.
Joining custom Gamepics is Arena tournaments for World of Tanks, easier Arena discovery through the Xbox app and Windows 10, a Join Broadcast button directly from profiles and the option to pin your favorite posts to the top of your profile’s Activity Feed. That’s an idea I’m really sure the company borrowed from Twitter.
Looking For Group posts can be reposted. Organizers of an LFG post can vet everyone that replies through monitoring their kill/death ratio and other stats. Custom images are now supported for Club logos and backgrounds.
Skype, Twitch and Beam can be configured to use Kinect’s auto-zoom settings for video, which is one of the few things that still rule about having one. A category selector lets you quickly go through Xbox One and Xbox 360 games instead of lumping them in all in one list. Finally, you can now connect an Xbox One to public Wi-Fi for easy authentication. Now gamers have one less reason to leave their console at home when they stay overnight at a hotel.
These features are going first to this in the Xbox Insider Program before arriving for users later on. Program participants are already testing Beam streaming support, upgrades for the Cortana personal assistant and a faster Xbox Guide.
