Microsoft corporate vice president Phil Harrison, in a interview with Official Xbox Magazine, stated that Xbox One launch titles Ryse: Son of Rome, Forza Motorsport 5, and Dead Rising 3 don’t fully utilize Xbox One’s hardware specs. The three games only scratch the surface of what the system is truly capable of doing, and as developers become more familiar with the hardware we should expect to see more advanced games on the platform.
“When you’ve been around for a long time, you know what platforms are like,” Harrison said. “The games you celebrate and are proud of in the first year, when you look back at them from the perspective of ten years from now; you’d be amazed at the difference. It’s a combination of the tools getting better, developers beginning to understand the unique architecture to work with.”
A significant feature Xbox One has over its predecessor, Xbox 360, are the cloud servers. Harrison that these cloud servers will allow Microsoft to also understand and discover their own system’s full potential.
“That can grow and scale indefinitely–of course there is a practical limit but in effect you’re uncapped,” Harrison said. “And I think, from a player’s perspective, that’s the most exciting part; that it’s not just about the chips in the box under the television or wherever you position your console of choice, it’s about what the platform will provide you with over time. We’ve not had that in a console generation before.”
And thanks to the cloud, things such as features and even system performance can improve-making the system pretty elastic.
“There are more ideas and vision for what games can be than available time to build them into the launch games,” he said. “So for every feature you’ve seen in the launch titles–SmartGlass, GameDVR, use of voice with Kinect–there are five features in the queue waiting to come out, either in an update or a sequel or in a future version of a game. The kind of creative and technical innovation that we’re seeing in the industry–it’s a really good time.”
Xbox One has reached a combined total of 1.6 million units sold worldwide, besting the 360’s launch by a compelling margin. Xbox Live’s Major Nelson provided a few tips on how find an Xbox One this holiday.
