Xbox One News: Microsoft Planning Update to Improve Social Features of Console

The Xbox One will soon be updated to allow users to find different social features on the console much easier than on the Xbox 360, according to Xbox chief product officer Marc Whitten.

At CES 2014, Whitten explained that while Microsoft is thrilled that the Xbox One has sold 3 million consoles since being launched on Nov. 22, the company is continuing to try and improve the console. One such way is making various social features on the console easier to access than they were on the Xbox 360, he said. 

"The feedback we've gotten is pretty valid; some of the social stuff is hidden or harder to use than it was on the Xbox 360. So you're gonna see us come out with an update where, well, we're going to fix those things. As a person who's been pretty involved in building Xbox Live for the last decade, I take it pretty seriously when people say it's harder to get into a party, and the defaults aren't right, and I don't like the model. So what I'm trying to do with the team is kind of theme some stuff up. Let's take an update and really go through a big list of what we're hearing from customers, what we know is broken with the architecture, areas that we want to improve or complete. I think that's a theme you'll really see us push on -- that Live experience," Whitten said, Engadget reported.

The executive did not provide what exact features will be improved by these updates, but considering Microsoft's push towards increased connectivity between gamers, Xbox One owners should be seeing across the board improvements to the system.

Whitten also clarified that the Xbox One will be updated in different ways than the Xbox 360. While users should expect Dashboard updates, the console will see several different changes as time goes on, he said.

"The Xbox 360, which I'm still very very proud of, the software architecture was built in 2003. Rethinking [updates] based on everything we learned from 360 was a lot of what went into the Xbox One...You're still gonna see the big, 'Hey, here's the cool stuff we're doing.' But you're also gonna see the box just get better faster than you did in the past," Whitten explained. 

In any case, look out for more Xbox One updates as the console begins to settle into a more long-term planning stage.