It’s official at last: the Xbox One. Live on stage at Microsoft’s press conference in Washington tonight, Xbox boss Don Mattrick revealed the brand new console and PS4 rival. We’ve got all the details on it here! As we’d heard previously, the Xbox One packs PC-like innards, much like the PS4, along with a Blu-ray drive, speedy USB 3.0 ports and a beefy 8GB of RAM. It comes with a new Kinect which packs some serious smarts including a full HD sensor that recognises more joints, even your wrist and shoulder movements. Microsoft says it can even read your heartbeat – it’s even listening out for your voice when the console is powered off. You just say “Xbox, on”, and it powers up and logs into your account homescreen for you. Though it comes with a gamepad, the new Xbox One is being positioned as a living room entertainment machine as well as as games console, pulling in internet TV and switching from game to app to app on command in a matter of milliseconds. It lets you snap two apps on screen at once, much like Windows 8 tablets, connect through Skype, and on ESPN’s sports TV app, even pings you alerts when a player you’re following scores. Keeping all the new software services together is a revamped Xbox Live, powered by 300,000 servers across the globe. Matchmaking can now happen in the background, and as with the Sony PS4, you can record and share your feats, and Microsoft is promising more meaningful achievements, though what those will be remains to be seen. So, are you in? The Xbox One goes on sale later this year, though Microsoft isn’t talking price yet. Expect more details at the big E3 gaming expo next month. gadget-show This post has been promoted to an article
