Updates on the Xbox Ally, Play Anywhere, Game Pass, and More | Official Xbox Podcast

SPEAKER 1: Games in this podcast range from E to M.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Hello, and welcome to the official Xbox Podcast, the only podcast that comes to you from inside Xbox. I'm Ethan, and today we are digging into a whole mess of topics, including updates on the Xbox platform, cloud gaming, Xbox Play Anywhere, and, of course, the Xbox Ally, and to help us out, we have not one, but two Jasons here today, Jason Beaumont and Jason Ronald. They're going to be our experts on all things Xbox. Welcome in, guys. How you doing?

JASON BEAUMONT: Great. Thanks for having us.

JASON RONALD: Thanks for having us.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, good to have you here. I always love getting to be at this table with you both, but most importantly, I see you brought an Ally today. I got to ask the first question we always ask on the show. What are you playing?

JASON RONALD: So for me right now, Balatro is taking the lion's share of my gaming time, but I'm playing a lot on the Xbox Ally. Another game that I'm really enjoying right now is Tony Hawk Pro Skater 3 and 4. Like, it's just so great to go back and just start, like, grinding the rails and finding all the paths that you remembered. So it's just -- it's been a great time playing.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: A little shot of nostalgia. Those games are, like, perfect for handheld play, too, like, hanging out, lounging around, playing some retro games. I was always diving into Oblivion myself recently, like, that's --

JASON BEAUMONT: Oh, the remaster?

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yes, cannot -- it's a problem. It's a real problem. I think I talked about it last episode, which at this point was a few months ago maybe. So yeah, I really can't get enough of it. What about you?

JASON BEAUMONT: Well, I was going to say, speaking of remasters, so my teenage daughter recently discovered Resident Evil.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Whoa.

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, exactly, right? I know. No kidding.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Are you starting with the remasters?

JASON BEAUMONT: I think I'm going to do a release order.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Okay, you are.

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, yeah, but, I mean, that's the debate, right? Do you do, like, chronological, like, it's tough, right? I wanted her to see, like, this is what it was like, this is, like, before we discovered how 3D cameras work.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Right.

JASON BEAUMONT: This is how things operated, right?

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: It did make it scarier, because I knew, like, I knew I was going to miss a few shots, like, on anything.

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, that's exactly right.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah.

JASON BEAUMONT: So, but, like, Jason, I've been playing Balatro a lot, and my friends and I were big survival gamers, so Grounded 2 is coming up on the menu and Abiotic Factor, which I don't know if you've checked that out.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I have not.

JASON BEAUMONT: Oh, it just came out of Game Pass. It's, like, imagine you're the scientist in Black Mesa from Half-Life.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Whoa.

JASON BEAUMONT: Oh, you're trying to survive, like, you're running around the office trying to, like, be like, how do we, like, you know, break apart a desk to turn it into a crowbar?

JASON RONALD: So it's like an average day at Xbox? [laughter].

JASON BEAUMONT: That's right, that's right, so yeah.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: OH, that's awesome. I guess you've talked about Balatro. It's a time suck. It's easy to dive into that and, like, blow your whole Saturday or Sunday playing that game.

JASON BEAUMONT: You're really deep.

JASON RONALD: I am really deep. I'm a completionist, so I'm in the process of getting gold stake on all the decks and gold stake on all the jokers. So as a completionist, it is definitely taking a lot of my gaming time right now.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Which is crazy because I feel like when we kind of turn it back to work, you guys have had a pretty busy couple of months to be playing Balatro.

JASON RONALD: There's one or two things going on right now [laughter].

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, yeah. So yeah, I'd love to talk about what you guys are kind of working on. What's top of mind for you?

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, so we've been working really hard over the last several months. In fact, it's, you know, I've been on the team I think as long as you. I think around eight years or so, seven or eight years, something like that.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Congrats.

JASON BEAUMONT: Thank you. Yeah, there we are. We're in it together. And it feels like the hardest I've ever seen the team working. There's just so much going on right now.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah.

JASON BEAUMONT: On the console, a lot of what we're working on is really stuff that's like under the hood. When we release something that's on PC or for cloud gaming or on mobile, we really want that feature to go everywhere, and so that's a lot of the investments that we're making. Also, you know, Jason mentioned the Xbox Ally and Xbox Ally X. We've been working like gangbusters to get that released in time for this holiday, and then on the Xbox experience on PC, there's just feature after feature after feature. I think we're going to be getting into later that we're rolling out in the coming weeks.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: You know, the team talks a lot about the growth on PC and cloud. Jason Ronald -- this is going to be hard. Jason Ronald, my question for you, VP of the Next Generation. I think last time when you got that title, we talked about that for a little bit of, like, what an incredible job title, first thought.

JASON RONALD: Absolutely.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, so good. So what can you tell us about what all this means for the future of Xbox?

JASON RONALD: When we think about the future of the Xbox, we're really focused on how do we put the player at the center of the experience, and when you really look at how modern players play games today, the vast majority play across multiple different devices. You know, and I can speak to myself as an example, like, I was traveling a lot earlier this year, so there's a bunch of games where I would start playing on my Xbox Ally, and then I would come home, and now I want the full fidelity experience when I'm home on my console, on my big screen TV. And so what we're really focused on is how do we evolve the Xbox ecosystem to allow players to play the games wherever you want to play them, while at the same time, we're continuing to build dedicated devices that are optimized for gaming, like the Xbox Ally or next-generation console. So it's really just focused on how players like playing games in the current environment and just designing and building a platform with them at the center.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I love it. Well, as someone who uses that feature as well a ton, thank you. You can tell how stressful my life is based on what games I'm playing, and if I have a lot of Sea of Thieves, if you see me playing a ton of Sea of Thieves or Starfield, or any Bethesda game, really, you know that I'm stressed out. Like, that's like my relaxing --

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, you're just going to be in the other world.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, exactly, and I bought a hammock this summer, which I would say not an accessory for handhelds. We don't talk about that accessory enough. Where's the branded hammock that pairs with this at launch? You know what I'm saying?

JASON BEAUMONT: I set up my hammock just this weekend.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Nice, nice, nice. Are you playing handheld games?

JASON BEAUMONT: And I brought my handheld out there.

JASON RONALD: Barely behind on the hammock game. I didn't know that was a game-changer.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Oh, yeah. Sitting in a hammock, catching fish in Sea of Thieves, that is my summer pastime.

JASON BEAUMONT: It's funny, I was playing a game called "Citizen Sleeper 2."

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Okay, yes, I've heard it.

JASON BEAUMONT: Pretty dark game.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: And you're just [indicating].

JASON BEAUMONT: You know, just like out in the sun, relaxing, and I'm like, well, actually, I'm on a grim space station of the future.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, yeah, a little --

JASON BEAUMONT: Just trying to eat, you know? [laughter]. >> Yeah, so, you know, I wanted to switch it a little bit to you to talk about the investments in cloud gaming globally. That's right, that's right. Yeah, I mean, to Jason's earlier point, you're going to see us continue to invest in this area, and this includes adding new servers to meet the growing demand, but also means exploring innovative ways to reach more players wherever they are. Our goal is really simple. We want to bring more games to more people. Cloud gaming is great at that. So that means looking at expanding Xbox cloud gaming to even more countries around the world so that everyone can play the games that they love no matter where they are. We're not just focused on the living room, although it's really cool, like my living room, I have an LG TV. We have an app that you can just load and play your Xbox cloud gaming there. It's pretty amazing not having to plug anything in or hook anything up, but cloud gaming is great because it's not just about the living room. It's wherever you want to go. So if you're playing on that handheld in your hammock, or you and I are flying a lot recently, maybe not the best place for latency for cloud gaming, but when we get to that hotel, the idea to have all of my gaming library there is going to be perfect, right? So cloud really unlocks that access and community across devices and within communities all over. So it's great stuff.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, Jason Ronald, anything to add around how we're extending cloud and PC benefits to more subscribers?

JASON RONALD: Yeah, one of the things that we see is there's a lot of players who use Game Pass Ultimate to access the cloud, whether that's the primary way they play or just, as Jason said, an additional way to play when you're on the go or not around your console or your PC. And so for us, I think it really opens up the opportunity to make it much more affordable and to give more, make it more accessible to more players, whether that's going into new regions or new ways to actually access the cloud, and then I think the other thing, too, that I think about when I look at Game Pass, it's really about how do we add more value for our most dedicated players, whether that's things like adding new first-party or third-party day-and-date titles to the subscription, the ability to stream your own games, which is a new capability, where if you bought a game, now you have the ability to stream it if you happen to be on the go and all your progression moves forward with you, or even things like adding new free-to-play game benefits. We're really focused on adding as much value as we can to the Game Pass subscription.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I love it, I love it, or adding a hammock to the Designed for Xbox program. So that's directly to my boss. So that's, like, we've got to talk about this in our one-on-one. I would love to talk about Insiders a little bit. Jason Beaumont, we've seen a lot happening in Insiders lately related to playing on Xbox and PC. What can you share about what's going on there, news there?

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, absolutely. So a good way to think about this is Xbox is investing heavily in how you experience the platform on PC and places like the Xbox Ally, as well as Windows handhelds, more broadly. We knew players wanted a better experience, so we started with the team, asking ourselves how we could make the user experience feel as easy and frictionless as possible with our console experience really as the inspiration in most cases. And when you pick up a device, like this handheld, you really want the simplicity and kind of elegance of a console experience, but you want that freedom and power of Windows and open ecosystem underneath it. So on the PC, we've been making a lot of investments that have been kind of continuously rolling out to Insiders. I think there's even more coming in the coming weeks. So the first is really about My Library. My Game Library is something in the app now that is across multiple PC storefronts, so when you pick up one of these handhelds, really what you don't want to do is really visit the desktop a whole lot. What you really want to be able to do is play your games regardless of where they came from without having to kind of make a trip to a desktop experience that really wasn't built for a controller and a smaller screen. So what we've done is we've kind of aggregated all of these different storefronts into the library in the app, so if you've downloaded and installed a game on, say, battle.net, it's going to show up inside of your library and in the app.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, super handy.

JASON BEAUMONT: Absolutely.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, that's a huge plus, honestly, just, like, from a navigation standpoint, and frankly, like, any -- there's just so much, our libraries are so bifurcated and, like, we have games everywhere now. It's just a handy piece of -- a handy feature.

JASON BEAUMONT: Absolutely, and we were talking about cloud gaming earlier. You want your cloud games in there, too, right? You don't want to have kind of like just your natively installed games. A lot of times on these devices you want to play something that maybe you haven't gotten around to downloading yet.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: For sure.

JASON BEAUMONT: Or, you know, these devices also have a wide variety of capabilities. Some of them are more powerful than others, but you maybe want to be able to access something that maybe natively doesn't work as well, but cloud gaming can and you can still go play that game.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Nice, yeah. Yeah, surface more of my backlog so I can remember how deep the rabbit hole goes.

JASON BEAUMONT: I mean, for me, that's one of the best things about these form factors, is they're like backlog-crushing machines.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Totally. That is 100% what these handhelds are. That is, like, yeah, so nice. Achievement hunting, backlog crushing.

JASON BEAUMONT: That's right, that's right. Yeah, for me, they started off as a little bit like, I'm going to go do my daily chore in Destiny kind of thing.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, exactly.

JASON BEAUMONT: Right? But then, like, as I played with it more and more, I was like, huh, I really, like, you start looking through your library and you're, like, well, I wonder how this is going to play on this form factor, and so I just end up kind of finding ways, moments to play that, when I'm only able to go in my basement or only able to go in my living room, I just wasn't going to get to some of those games, and having them on handheld makes them more accessible.

JASON RONALD: Or to your point, as you said, we've both been traveling a fair amount this year, so there'd be a new Game Pass release and I'd be on the road and be able to instantly download it to my handheld and play it the day it came out even though I'm not -- happen to be at home.

JASON BEAUMONT: That's right, that's right. So we made an investment. One of the investments we made in the app is really you don't want to kind of have in your head, like, oh, I was playing that game over there, or this other game over there, and that's where it kind of lives. You just want to be able to open up the app, see your most recently played games regardless of what device you were playing them on, and then pick up and play, whether it's natively or via the cloud.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, it's just there.

JASON BEAUMONT: Exactly, exactly. So we added this kind of roaming, so it kind of, you know, if you played a game on, say, your smart TV app or you played your game on your console or on your PC, and that most recently played games list, that's kind of like right front and center, you're going to see those games kind of like show up across all of them. So that's been a big feature we've added recently.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I also love that you brought up, like, just the, I mean, we've talked about a little bit surfacing games are not usually playing because not only, like, beyond cloud remote play, beyond, like, Game Pass surfacing games to me and getting to try games I never played, I feel like this form factor also, like, sparked something in me where it's like I'm trying games I never played. You know, like, I was never a Coffee Talk guy until I had something like this.

JASON BEAUMONT: It's set in Seattle.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, I know, I know. That was definitely cool for me. I really liked that. But, like, those kind of games are like, like Pentiment, I loved Pentiment so much, and that was a perfect, like, that was my fall-asleep game, like, play it right before bed for an hour, and that, like, again, like, some games, I just don't know that I would have given them as much of a chance if I wasn't just, like, laid up with a handheld, you know, cozy.

JASON BEAUMONT: Well, and the cozy part, it's funny you mention that because the form factor is something that I can, like, have while, like, laying in bed or, like, when the family is, like, doing something, I'm there, like, next to them, my youngest daughter and I have been playing a bunch of cozy games on it, so, you know, there's like a little to the left, you know, unpacking. I think there's one called, like, "My Cozy Bedroom," just set up a --

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I know what the game is just from --

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, like, I don't think I need to describe the plot. I think you got it.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, it's not a Kojima game.

JASON BEAUMONT: Right, right, but it's a great way to kind of, like, play side by side.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, totally.

JASON BEAUMONT: Even though it feels like a very individualized device, just the fact that it's portable means you can have it on these different locations in the house.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, now, as a player, I love the choice you're giving me and my fellow gamers here, but I'd love to know what we're seeing from our community, what we're hearing and seeing from our community and the devs in that regard.

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, I mean, the big thing from the community is that they're playing Xbox games in more places than ever before, and so that's why so many of our investments are about being able to kind of pick up and play your games no matter where you are and what device you're on. A big part of that investment is our continued expansion of cloud gaming and making that just more accessible to more and more people, and I'm really excited about a bunch of the announcements that we're going to have in the coming months along those lines.

JASON RONALD: Not only that, are we seeing the really good response from players, and as you said, we all enjoyed ourselves, we're also seeing a really strong alignment with developers as well. You know, one of the things that we see is for titles that support Xbox Play Anywhere, they're seeing more play because now the game's available in much more, many more screens, so there's many more opportunities for me to play. And then when I think about Game Pass, in this past year, we had record Game Pass revenue, and we had our all-time high on payouts to developers that participate in Game Pass. And in addition to that, we're also seeing double-digit growth in both our first-party and third-party transactions as well. So whether or not you choose to subscribe to Game Pass or you choose to buy games from Xbox, it's just providing many more opportunities for developers to reach players within our community.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Okay, so we've talked about cloud gaming. We've talked about PC. We've talked a little bit about the hardware, but I'd love to dive in more to the console specifically, right? So Ronald, I think this question is for you, but recently announced Xbox's partnership with AMD on our next-generation hardware lineup. I'm not going to lie, I was super excited to see that, obviously, and I'm a little partial. I am in hardware, I will say it. You know, cards on the table. But what can you tell us about that?

JASON RONALD: Yeah, so Xbox and AMD have had a decades-long partnership really innovating and driving the next generation of gaming and we're excited to continue that relationship as we look forward to the future of Xbox. So last month, we announced a multi-year strategic partnership that spans multiple products across console, cloud, PC, and handheld, and we're deeply focused on hardware and silicon innovation and how we can push the boundaries beyond the current generation of devices. But this is really all grounded in the work we're doing to create a unified platform that allows players to play across devices and in entirely new ways, and it's really about ensuring that gameplay is not locked to an individual device or an individual storefront, and it's really just the recognition of, like you said, if we built our libraries across a whole set of different services, we want to put that entire library front and center no matter where you choose to play. So together with AMD, we're designing dedicated silicon and hardware to enable the next generation of gaming experiences, and so that means we're investing deeply in the next generation of rendering technologies, such as neural rendering, which will bring a new level of fidelity to the quality of the games that you're having, and it's really about deepening the immersion between you and the gameplay experience that you have. We're also investing in dedicated silicon to enable the next generation of AI capabilities that will be transformative in how you actually experience your gameplay and also provides a new surface that developers can actually take advantage of and deliver new kinds of experiences that they've never been able to deliver before. And all of this actually even starts with, this year, with the Xbox Ally, because the Xbox Ally X has a dedicated NPU, which allows us to start experimenting and trying some of these AI-powered experiences well before we get to our next-generation console. And when I think about it, this really reminds me a lot of the early days of the original Xbox. We had a vision of where console gaming could go, and we believed in this notion of being able to connect gamers all across the world, and ultimately, that became Xbox Live, but from a hardware perspective, we knew early on we had to invest in things like a hard drive and an Ethernet port, and at the time, the vast majority of people were gaming on 56K modems, so it was kind of like out of left field for us to be investing in the hardware, but we believed in our vision. We knew we had to dedicate the resources to have the dedicated hardware there, and so for us, it's really about betting on the future as opposed to against the future. We're really focused on where players are going and where the industry is going, and we want to deliver the right platform to allow developers to deliver on their creative vision.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I like that you brought up the original console comparisons just because it does feel with, like, the way systems on chips have improved and all the other things that you're kind of implementing into this device and looking at, like, we're kind of in this jumping point for, like, handhelds where it's like, I don't want to say "golden age of handhelds," but, like, it just feels different. It feels like a really good time to be checking these out. Like, the sheer -- I'm always amazed what I'm able to boot up on these devices and play and I just, yeah, I think childhood me playing with a Game Boy is just like blown away by what can be in 2025, you know.

JASON BEAUMONT: That example of kind of betting forward on the hardware, you know, you and I were talking about how we've been in the division for Xbox for, like, seven, eight years now. I remember before I joined, you know, I was always an Xbox fan. I bought, you know, the first one, and I remember buying the first one and it was, like, why does this thing have an Ethernet port? I think I was coming from like a Dreamcast that, like, hooked up into my modem, but I had, like, an Ethernet port at home. I was, like, what is this?

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, totally.

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, and then I remember with the 360 that jumped to HD, I was like, I don't have an HD, like, TV.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

JASON BEAUMONT: who has an HDTV? And then, like, a year later, like, oh, everyone has an HDTV.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, it didn't take long.

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, and so, like, when you just kind of bet forward a little bit, like, the industry kind of, like, starts to move, they have something to build towards, to your point, and I'm really excited about that with AI. I'm really excited to see kind of what happens next with it.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, yeah.

JASON RONALD: And I think one of my favorite parts of my role, as you said, I have one of the coolest titles in Xbox, is to actually go and actually meet with developers and really talk to them about the future vision we have, where the industry is going, but even more importantly, listening to developers on where they see their games going, where they see their technology going, what is their creative aspiration, and all that feedback, just like the feedback that we get from players, really comes back to us, and then we say, okay, how do we design and build the best platform, not only for players, but also for developers. Because ultimately for all of us, it's just the games that we all want to play, and we want to be able to leverage the technology to enable these games to be played in entirely new ways.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Totally, totally. It's a good vision. Well, you know, we're talking about the Ally. Obviously, it's kind of the hot topic in the Xbox community right now, so I wanted to kind of dive into maybe some -- kind of switch it up and dive into some quick questions and stuff. The producers were lovely enough to get Copilot to compile a list of the top questions from across forums and social media to help us kick this off. Does that sound good to you all?

JASON RONALD: Sure.

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Okay, sweet. All right, question one. Is it comfortable to hold for longer gaming sessions?

JASON BEAUMONT: It is, it is, and I'll tell you what --

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: You can pick it up. Feel free.

JASON BEAUMONT: I'm going to pick it up. So one of the things, when I first saw it, it was laying flat on the desk, and you see that, like, it's a little bit angled.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, it is.

JASON BEAUMONT: Right? And I was, like, ah, what is that? Like, it should kind of be flat. And then once you realize, once you hold it is, is like the nice counterbalance in the weight, and just the ergonomics feel like the controller that I've been used to, like, playing on for, like, hours and hours in my, you know, more like days and days in my life.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, you can be honest.

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, so it feels really balanced and really comfortable to me. Jason, what about you?

JASON RONALD: Yeah, exactly the same thing. When I first got my hands on it, it feels very natural for me as somebody who's played with the Xbox controller as long as I have, and then I was mentioning earlier playing a game like Tony Hawk Pro Skater where it's like you have these great combos and these lines that you just have this muscle memory and it instantly translates to this because it just feels very natural. It feels very distinctly like an Xbox controller to me. So we do have internal reports showing how much people are using their devices and take home, and I might have just recently been outed as I had the highest usage out of anybody on the team a week or two ago.

JASON BEAUMONT: I think you were at 36 hours in one week.

JASON RONALD: Okay, I wasn't going to share the actual number, but it's a great --

JASON BEAUMONT: I saw the dashboard.

JASON RONALD: It's a great example of just it feels very natural for me as a player, and it just offers me more hours of the day that I can actually play, even when I'm not in front of my TV.

JASON BEAUMONT: Tony Hawk is such a great example because it's one where you just have to turn your brain off to, like, what you're actually doing on the controls because you're, like, chaining so quickly. That's such a good example of if the controls feel right on the device, you know you can play that game.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, I've definitely spent the least amount of time at this table on one of those, but I have, I mean, I am a handheld dork as far as that or that, like, platform goes, and it is one of the most comfortable I've ever played on, like, dare I say. Yeah, it helps with, like, the length of time. I feel it right here less, you know, I would say, which is a good thing. Let's talk about the key differences. Next question, key differences between the Xbox Ally and the Xbox Ally X.

JASON RONALD: Sure. So the Xbox Ally is really designed for 720p gaming on the go, so it uses AMD's Z2A processor, includes 16 gigs of memory, and it includes 512 gigs of storage. So it's really designed to be the more mainstream, more accessible version of the Ally. Whereas, the Ally X is really designed for the most demanding gamers who want that premium experience, so that's leveraging AMD's AI Z2 Extreme SoC. It comes with 24 gigs of memory, and it's got a full terabyte of storage, and that's designed around 1080p gaming. And I will definitely say, as somebody on the go a fair amount, like, the Ally X is by far my preferred way to play when I'm on the go.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, yeah, of course. Yeah, I believe it. Do you want to talk about what games you're playing on there that are quite demanding?

JASON RONALD: So it's been really interesting. So we've been playing literally thousands of games on the devices. Not me personally. I have not played thousands of games on the device, but everything from Balatro to Tony Hawk Pro Skater all the way to things like Expedition 33 or Doom the Dark Ages or Indiana Jones are great examples. So it doesn't matter what kind of games you play. This is going to be the home for all of your games, and as Jason said, even some games, they can be streamed from the cloud as well, because it's just really about allowing me to play the games that I want wherever I may be.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, yeah, and remote play as well. I know we keep talking about cloud, but remote play, a piece of the puzzle as well.

JASON BEAUMONT: Absolutely, and, you know, I really do want to kind of like hype up remote play a little bit and have people give it a try if they haven't played with it recently. We did an investment this year to really combine the cloud gaming, Xbox cloud gaming, and remote play tech stacks to really improve the quality of both, and I've been using remote play a lot more, and so this idea that you don't have to know where your games are, you can just play them, you know, on the device you're on, that feels just like a really natural way to play these days.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, yeah, I couldn't agree more. I'm also a big fan of remote play. So let's talk about native games offline. Can it play native games offline?

JASON RONALD: Mm-hm.

JASON BEAUMONT: A hundred percent. Yeah, absolutely, yeah.

JASON RONALD: So to the point of giving the team a lot of feedback, earlier in the year, the team was getting a lot of feedback from me on areas that we could improve the offline experience, because there's nothing worse than being on a long plane or being away from an Internet connection and wanting to play your games and not being able to, so the team's done an incredible job of really improving the offline experience so that I can easily transition between being online versus offline, and not only do my games move with me, but also my progression does as well. So I can be playing a game, advance, get a bunch of achievements, and then when I connect online, now all of a sudden my achievements are popping on the service and whatnot. So the team's done an incredible job really improving the offline experience.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: That's great. Yeah, good answer for folks on the go.

JASON BEAUMONT: It is, and the offline play is a good example of a thing where what you experience on day one as a customer isn't what you're going to experience on day 30 or 60 or 90. Offline play, save game syncing, cloud and remote play, these are all areas of continual investment and refinement, so you're just going to keep seeing these features getting better and better and better as we go. To Jason's point, you know, I would say most of the feedback at the beginning of this calendar year was frustration on people doing offline play, and you just keep delivering more and more and more features into it, and now what you're seeing is, like, oh, I was really surprised. I hopped on and all of this just worked, my save game synced. And you're still going to find squirrely areas where it's not, but that's why you keep just iterating and improving every single month.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, I've been lucky enough to interact with a lot of folks that you've been working with on some of this over the last two years, and it is, like, truly a passionate bunch of games, like, it really -- they really are digging into the details here of, like, how to make this the best experience they can.

JASON BEAUMONT: There's no better way to get somebody to fix or improve an area on the product if they want it themselves. Like, if they're, like, oh, man, I was playing a game and then this happened to me, like, I'm going to go in and fix that. So kind of cultivating that on the team. We have, you know, a lot of just sessions throughout the week where we just play games together, and that's a great way to kind of find areas to refine and evolve.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Oh, yeah, I love that.

JASON RONALD: Yeah, and as we've talked about, I mean, hopefully it's coming through, like, we are active members of the community ourselves, but really, it's the feedback from the community that really drives our priorities, that helps us define our vision. So we're excited to get the Xbox Ally and all the improvements that we've been talking about flighting in people's hands, but we listen to the feedback from the community, and that feedback has a direct impact on our priorities, so please just keep giving us the feedback, because ultimately our goal is to just make the best platform possible for players. And I mean, one thing that's really important for us as we think about the future of the platform is really investing in Xbox Play Anywhere, because Xbox Play Anywhere really allows us to deliver this experience that we're talking about of maybe I start a game on my Xbox Ally, I pick up and resume on my console, and then I start playing it from the cloud. Xbox Play Anywhere is what really enables that to happen with cross-progression and that ties into the Xbox network so that we can really deliver that seamless experience no matter where you choose to play.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, that's great. Now, the next question, another one I think we've talked about a little bit. Can I install and play PC games from Xbox Game Pass on the Xbox Ally? And yeah, this is a -- it's a good one because I do think there's some, like, questions around where I can play, and we've talked about remote play. We've talked about cloud gaming and native gaming.

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, but maybe we should talk a little bit more about Xbox Play Anywhere, so, Jason, maybe you want to do that one.

JASON RONALD: Yeah, so since this handheld is based on Windows, you can download and install any game from the PC catalog, whether that's from Xbox, whether that's from Game Pass, whether it's a game you purchased, or even from a third-party storefront, so the device is designed and able to play your PC games natively on the device, and then what we're really focused on is how well do these games play on the handheld form factor. Some games are designed for controller out of the gate. In other cases, it's thinking about how does it fit on a smaller screen. So we're really focused on identifying those titles that play best on the handheld so that we can let you know as a player what quality of experience you will have, and then over time, we'll continue to work with developers to really design and optimize their games for the different form factors that are part of the Xbox platform.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, yeah, it's not like the work stops when this launches, right? We got plans.

JASON BEAUMONT: A hundred percent. Absolutely, absolutely.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: All right, this is the last question from the rapid-fire questions, and we might have to do a little dance so we don't get in trouble here. But can I connect to external controllers or peripherals?

JASON RONALD: So yes. So absolutely you can connect external peripherals to it. One thing that we are focused on is how do we really improve that experience over time? So to Jason's point, you can absolutely do it at launch, but there's a number of areas that we've already gotten feedback from the team that we're really focused on improving to make it a much more magical experience, and we'll have more to share about that later this year.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yes, more to share. Stay tuned. And actually, I think this is a nice segue because we're getting near the end of the show, but we absolutely cannot not talk about Gamescom, right? Did I say that right? Hope I did. It is coming up. It's like very, very soon. So, you know, for you guys that are going to be attending or watching at home, Xbox is returning to Gamescom this year. We'll be at opening night live on August 19th. Then we'll be at the show, on the show floor, August 20th through the 24th, with over 20 titles to play, including the first public hands-on opportunities for multiple games and the Xbox Ally, as well as the Ally X. Ooh.

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Pretty exciting, pretty exciting.

JASON BEAUMONT: Very cool.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yes. Also, I think there's going to be a chance for attendees to get to play Hollow Night Silksong. We talk about that at the booth. That's some of the first folks to play a demo on PC. And then there's also going to be a theater experience for The Outer Worlds 2. You guys are going to have to tell me how that is because I won't be there. I'm so excited for that game as well, so I can't wait to see what that's like. Black Ops 7 is going to be revealed live on the 19th. That's a pretty good one. That's going to be during opening night live at Gamescom, along with the World of Warcraft Midnight expansion. Yeah, whoo.

JASON BEAUMONT: Those are some big announcements. That's awesome.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Seriously, seriously. Yeah, I'm going to have no free time this fall. Xbox FanFest, I got to shout out my FanFest fans. Xbox FanFest turning 10 this year, a decade. A decade of Xbox FanFest. We're celebrating a bunch of unforgettable moments and really just trying to champion our community at Gamescom 2025 in Cologne. This is one I'm really bummed I'm not going for. Obviously, I've been fortunate enough to, I mean, you've been to a lot of FanFests. I've been fortunate enough to host a few game shows in my day with Malik and Kelly and so many others. Met incredible people. Like, FanFest is one of my favorite things we do at Xbox. So for the folks going, if you're going to be at the anniversary, I hope you guys have the best time. We're going to see you guys at Gamescom?

JASON BEAUMONT: Oh, yeah.

JASON RONALD: Yup.

JASON BEAUMONT: Yeah, we're both there. Packed schedule.

JASON RONALD: Yup, packed schedule, but similar to you, like, Gamescom is one of my favorite shows of the year, and especially FanFest, so there's nothing better than just hanging out with some of the most passionate members of the community, hearing their feedback. A lot of them will have a chance to get hands-on with the Xbox Ally and many of the games that you were talking about, so just getting that feedback from the community, like, that's why we do what we do, is just spending time with the community.

JASON BEAUMONT: You could find us and tell us which Jason you think is better.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, Jason A., Jason 1, Jason Prime. We were trying to come up with nicknames before the show.

JASON RONALD: There is only one answer to that question.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Oh, I'm not even going to guess. I'm not even going to guess, man. I love that you guys are both getting to go. We're all gamers at this table. It is so fun to go to Gamescom. There's nothing like it. The energy, the magic, the sights, the sounds, the smells, it's all a good time. I'll be living vicariously through you both.

JASON BEAUMONT: Very excited. I love these kinds of shows.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, it's going to be great. It'll be like that Russell Crowe meme from Master and Commander where I'm just looking out my window at Studio B. All right, we're out of time. I appreciate you guys putting up with me and sharing all these announcements for our fans. Jasons, thank you both for joining us. Any parting words?

JASON BEAUMONT: I don't know. I don't think I have any parting words, actually.

JASON RONALD: I just --

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Thank you.

JASON BEAUMONT: I'll do "thank you."

JASON RONALD: Yeah, more than anything, thank you, and we can't wait for you to get some of these great things that the team's been working on in your hands, and just keep giving us feedback.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Absolutely. Can't do it without you guys. The Insiders, the community, we just can't do it without you. Jasons, always a treat to get to talk to you both today. And to you, to everyone else that's watching, we'll see you in the next episode of the official Xbox Podcast. Bye for now. [ Music ]