One of my biggest pet peeves with Xbox is how clunky its Windows 10 app is. It's functional for party chat, accessing your Game DVR, and things of that nature, but it's painfully slow, particularly so for text-based communication, which is dominating gaming right now. Steam chat, Discord, and various other services are simply far faster than the Xbox app when it comes to sending messages at any sort of scale. In a recent Q&A session at E3, Phil Spencer touched on the topic, noting that progress on the Xbox app has slowed down, due in part to Microsoft rethinking how it approaches PC gaming. Spencer said that rather than bring console-like features to PC, it will focus on bringing PC gamers playing Xbox games on their computers features that emulate what's already out there, such as Steam and Discord. Best VPN providers 2020: Learn about ExpressVPN, NordVPN & more We got a glimpse of at least some concepts Microsoft is working on to achieve this goal, starting with changes to Game Hubs and Xbox Clubs.

Official Clubs

Microsoft is exploring ditching Game Hubs entirely, replacing them with what they're referring to internally as "Official Clubs." Official Clubs will function similarly to Clubs, but they will be owned by the publisher or developer of the games they are attached to and will come with robust features to help developers engage with their customers over Xbox Live. If Microsoft moves ahead with this plan, Official Clubs would get links wherever they're contextually relevant, such as a Microsoft Store page or within the Xbox Guide menu.