Just one of the many non-gaming social applications for the Xbox One, Skype will receive it’s first update this week. The new update plans to deliver an enhanced chat experience between the Xbox One and other platforms (i.e. PC, Mac, Mobile), along with new features and a tutorial for first-time users.
One of the main issues that the new Skype update tackles is the Chat feature. Skype’s developers are aware that several users “jump between using Skype on their PC to their phone and now to their living room”, and conversations can sometimes get lost in the transition. As an example, if a user begins a Chat conversation on a Mac, and later resumes that session on a PC, some previous messages may not immediately sync. According to the Skype’s blog, the improved version of Chat on Xbox One will have better cross-platform synchronization. As with the mobile and computer versions, the Xbox One version will now have “push notifications” that will alert the user to new messages. The message history has also been increased to a 1,000 message archive limit, as opposed to the original limit of the “past 7 days”.
Due to a cross-promotion partnership with Marvel, Skype now features “hidden heroes” emoticons, based on the upcoming superhero sequel Captain America: The Winter Soldier. The new “action-packed” emoticons are currently available in the PC/Mac versions of Skype, and will be available in the Xbox One version post-update.
Another feature already in the other versions, Skype for Xbox One will now include Contact Filtering. Originally, users had to scroll through their entire list of Contacts in order to see who was online, and who was not. With the new update, users can simply set a filter to easily find those who are online, without having to sort through their complete Contacts list. The idea of using Skype on a console may seem far-fetched to some; fortunately, a new tutorial will be integrated into the Xbox One version to ease users into the new interface.