Even more information has been leaked on Microsoft’s next gen console plans, with a new hybrid device aiming for a 2028 launch.
In what continues to be an unprecedented leak of information from an official source, we now know even more about Microsoft’s plans for the next generation Xbox, thanks to court documents that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) was supposed to keep secret. [Update: in a major plot twist it turns out it was Microsoft that accidently uploaded the documents, not the FTC – so, err… good luck on the job market to whoever pressed the wrong button there.]
You can only imagine the size of the lawsuit the FTC is going to be hit with over this, as it revealed not only Bethesda’s future software plans and Microsoft’s attempts to buy Nintendo, but also details about a redesigned Xbox Series X and S due out next year.
There was also information on Microsoft’s plans for a next gen Xbox console in 2028, but at first the details were limited… until the FTC leaked yet more documents, describing plans for ‘cloud hybrid games.’
Microsoft has been pushing cloud gaming technology for years now, ever since the ill-fated Crackdown 3, and so it’s no surprise to find that this would influence their next generation hardware plans.
The leaked description talks of plans to, ‘Develop a next generation hybrid game platform capable of leveraging the combined power of the client and cloud to deliver deeper immersion and entirely new classes of game experiences.’
It’s not entirely clear, but it seems that, rather than the traditional £400+ box under your TV, this would be a sub-£99 portable device that would require a permanent internet connection.
The only caveat is that this is from a presentation made in May 2022, so there’s no guarantee that it’s still Microsoft’s plan now, even if it does sound like exactly what you’d assume they’d do.
If it is still the plan it may well already be underway, as the leaked information calls for a deal with AMD for their Navi 5 graphics tech (it currently only goes up to Navi 3) to have been signed in the first quarter of this year.
There’s then a detailed roadmap about everything else that has to be done, leading to devkits going out to developers in 2027 and the first games being made in 2024. (Again, you can only imagine how angry Microsoft must be that all this information is getting out.)
‘We are building four types of computers: (1) cloud everything, (2) a hybrid Xbox, (3) hybrid Windows, and (4) hybrid HoloLens,’ writes Microsoft boss Satya Nadella, via The Verge. ‘We need to bring the company’s systems talent together to align on a unified vision.’
One idea, in a document entitled Roadmap to 2030, suggests a new Xbox controller should be the common element, used across all devices and services. ‘Controller becomes the hero’ reads on slide.
And wouldn’t you know it, but a new Xbox controller has already been leaked by the FTC and according to their information should be released next year, alongside revamped Xbox Series X and S consoles.
Although the leaked documents also include rough images of a potential device that look very much like an Xbox version of a Switch, complete with what seem to be detachable Joy-Con controllers.
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