Xbox Labs will explore browser ports and game remixing
Xbox CEO Asha Sharma has set up a small team to turn new ideas, such as WebGPU browser ports and remixed games, into things players and developers can try.
Xbox has set up a new group called Xbox Labs. CEO Asha Sharma announced it on 13 October in a memo to staff, which Xbox also published on Xbox Wire. Scott Van Vliet will stand the group up. Sharma calls it "a small group of game makers, engineers and scientists" whose job is to turn new ideas into things players and developers can try.
The memo says why now. In recent weeks, games have been decompiled and rebuilt to run on hardware they were never made for. Windows PC builds have been moved to Apple Silicon or ported to run in a browser with WebAssembly and WebGPU. Sharma says WebGPU is now close to 90% global browser support. She also points to big games being remixed into each other's source code.
Sharma says Xbox Labs will "build in the open, learn from what people do," and judge success by whether more people are playing and creating. She also says Xbox will share the tools it builds with developers across the industry as it learns. She adds that Xbox's other priorities, including its hardware and its care for IP and communities, are not changing.
The memo names no products, dates or games.
Why it matters: A platform holder now treats browser ports, WebGPU and game remixing as real directions. For web and indie developers, it's worth watching which tools Xbox Labs shares.
Source: Xbox Wire (official post, opens in a new tab)
