Xbox forms ‘Labs’: Microsoft responds to wave of AI mods and ports
Xbox CEO Asha Sharma is setting up an experimental group under CTO Scott Van Vliet. The tools it builds are to be shared with the industry.
Archive image · Photo: Coolcaesar / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped and resized)
Xbox CEO Asha Sharma announced a new group called Xbox Labs in a note to staff on Tuesday, according to VGC. It is meant to experiment with new ideas around games. It will be led by Xbox chief technology officer Scott Van Vliet, who is assembling a small group of game makers, engineers and scientists. The aim is to turn emerging ideas into things players and developers can try for themselves.
The move follows a wave of AI-powered mods and ports: mashups such as Mario platforming in Elden Ring or Call of Duty running in a web browser are circulating online, along with PC games translated by AI to run on Apple computers. Sharma argues that games, much like code, are well suited to AI agents. More than 72 billion hours a year are spent playing Xbox games, she said.
According to Sharma, the group will build in the open, and success will be measured by whether more people play and create. Xbox plans to share the tools it develops with the wider industry. Existing priorities and its responsibility for its own franchises and their communities remain unchanged.