Recently, rumours started circulating that developers are starting to prepare games for the ‘next Xbox’. The focus title of these rumours was Call of Duty 2026 – it was claimed that it’d be released on whatever hardware the tech titan produces next, but a recent insider has suggested that might not be the case and that the next Xbox device will likely arrive in 2027 and not 2026.
It was also suggested that the next Xbox won’t be a console at all, but more of a gaming PC with defined hardware that developers can better work with.
The End of Consoles for Xbox
For a while, Xbox has been teetering on a precipice. The brand has well and truly lost this generation of home consoles to the PlayStation 5, and the Xbox One generation should be forgotten about entirely at this point. Recently, a marketing campaign from Xbox proved that ‘everything is an Xbox’ and that you don’t even need a console anymore to be an Xbox-based gamer.
A former Xbox executive even went on record suggesting that Microsoft would stop making hardware right now if it had the choice.
In a segment on the most recent episode of The Xbox Two podcast, Jez Corden, an insider with a solid track record, mentioned that something drastic might be on the horizon.
Instead of creating a full-fledged Xbox console for a 2027 release, he said that Microsoft will instead produce ‘a PC in essence but with a TV-friendly shell that also has a specific set of specs in mind.’
Developers will be building for a Windows PC in a way but in such a way that they know exactly what the specs will be, so they can optimise exactly for it.
Corden also leaned towards writing off the Call of Duty 2026 rumours, explaining, ‘the devkit talk is more about what kind of specs they’ve been told to target for the next Xbox. I’m pretty sure the new hardware is not 2026; it’s 2027.’
The general assumption now is that the next Xbox will be a micro-form Windows-powered PC in a ‘console-like’ shell and chassis that can sit nicely under a television.
It’ll be compatible with all manner of peripherals and inputs, and it’ll likely have a ‘switchable mode’ that ports between a gaming interface and a general Windows layout, so you can treat it like a desktop PC as much as you would a home gaming console.
What do you think about these predictions? Let me know in the comments or on the GPlayr forum.
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