Did Microsoft just tease a new Xbox UI?

Microsoft showed off the “unchanged” Xbox UI for handhelds, consoles, and cloud gaming at the time Xbox keynote at the Game Maker Conference in March. At the time it was hard to see if there was anything new about the UI from the videos and pictures taken at the event, but Microsoft has now given us a good look thanks to a new movie of the main points published earlier today.

Jason Ronald, VP of next-generation at Xbox, revealed the UI where he says that players have seen “a lot of fragmentation” across devices, and overall instability. “What the team has been doing behind the scenes is doing a lot of work to provide a consistent experience, so I feel very good and clear Xbox regardless of where you choose,” says Ronald.

At first the UI, shown above, does not look very different from what is available today, but there are subtle differences between different devices. The home screen of the Xbox console is slightly different, with the user on the right side and three advertising spaces at the bottom instead of the usual four. The same interface can be found manually in the screenshot, but the PC app in the upper right corner looks like the new Xbox Cloud Gaming interface.

When Microsoft started testing the new Xbox Cloud Gaming UI I wrote that it was kind of comforting than ever before, thanks to a variety of new animations, a new library section, and an all-round design. Microsoft’s slide shows that the same feature could be coming to the Xbox PC app. Ronald says the UI will not be the same on all Xbox devices, “because we think about things like screen size, or things like input.”

Later in the Xbox game update video, Microsoft also shows what appears to be a new Xbox store on Windows. I’ve asked Microsoft to comment on the new Xbox UI and store changes, and if I hear back I’ll respond accordingly.

In the meantime, if you’re interested in Ronald’s full GDC keynote then I recommend watching it, below. The video for Microsoft’s Xbox game update is about 90 minutes long, but the content below will start with Ronald’s main theme.