Opinion: How Windows 10 Can Improve The Xbox Community

We don’t exactly know what the upcoming plans of Xbox on Windows 10 are but this is one of the most interested things I’ve thought of regarding the Xbox One app on Windows 10. Apart from being announced, bringing back Xbox and PC Cross-Play since Shadowrun for Games for Windows Live and Xbox 360 for Fable Legends. Being able to stream your Xbox One to any Windows 10 PC, Laptop or Tablet on your network.

As we can see from the Xbox app on Windows 10 (as shown closer below), it shows your recently played PC games. We now know that Xbox is officially supporting Steam with this, as a nod was given by Phil Spencer during yesterday’s Windows 10 conference. But what if your recently played Steam games also show up for you on your Xbox profile for all your friends-list to see? Also, as you can see from the image, PC games without Xbox achievements will still appear in your feed.

But also what if Xbox could add Xbox achievements in their database to any Steam game when used on Windows 10? This is a possibility, as the required information could automatically be grabbed from existing Steam achievements (providing 0 Gamerscore, otherwise it will need to be calculated) or supplied by Developers/Publishers themselves.

As an added bonus, we know Windows 10 will also include Xbox One GameDVR, like features built in to catch that epic moment (or fail) without having a screen capture recording application (Fraps, XSplit, Open Broadcast Software etc) running at all times while gaming and it will also show up on the Xbox One activity feed (there’s already filters in place to only display whether Steam activity shows or not). All this will boost activity in the Xbox community, Xbox One has loads of gamers using built in GameDVR features without owning capture kits to share clips with their friends and even live stream via Twitch. I know there’s also other people like me that still love gaining Xbox achievements.

This will be a big improvement for Microsoft, instead of competing against Steam with their previous Games for Windows Live. We’ve seen 1st party consoles support Steam before with Sony on the PS3, but with this being built into the Xbox community directly, it would be an official equivalent of many gaming community sites that link gaming networks community data such as Raptr and PlayFire.

Please let me know what you think of this idea over on Twitter and if you think Microsoft are considering doing this in the future for Xbox and Windows 10, you can also vote for the idea on Xbox’s Official Feedback Uservoice Forum if you would like these features in the future.

If you missed the Windows 10 conference yesterday, you can catch up with all the details via the video below.