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Xbox One’s big holiday update: Clubs, LFG, group messaging and emojis

Published Nov 10th, 2016 10:20AM EST
Xbox One Holiday Update
Image: Xbox Wire

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If you’re an Xbox One owner feeling a little jealous this week about the launch of the PS4 Pro, worry not — Microsoft has got something for you too. On Thursday, the company started rolling out its Xbox One Holiday Update to the public, bringing several long-awaited features and tweaks to the console.

DON’T MISS: PlayStation 4 Pro review

Clubs are the highlight of the Holiday Update, which the Xbox team describes as “gamer-created and managed groups that can help you meet people and grow communities of gamers who love the same things you do.”

Anyone can create a Club, anyone can join a Club and once you’re a member of a Club on Xbox Live, you can set up a party with other online members of the club, communicate over voice and text chat and even share clips and photos. Once you’ve installed the update, looks for Clubs in the Community tab.

The other major addition is LFG, aka Looking for Group, which allows Xbox One gamers to find other players who want to play the same game online with them. You can set parameters like game mode, language, the number of people you need in your party and set rules as well, like level requirements or no trash talking.

xbox-one-achievement-rarity

Microsoft is also taking a page from Sony’s book and adding “achievement rarity,” so that you’ll know how much of the player base of any given game has unlocked a certain achievement. There’s even a new animation for rare achievements.

Xbox One owners will also be able to participate in group messages, compete with their friends on the updated Gamerscore Leaderboard and express themselves with emojis when typing with the built-in virtual keyboard. If your system hasn’t been updated already, check the settings and see if it’s available.

Jacob Siegal
Jacob Siegal Associate Editor

Jacob Siegal is Associate Editor at BGR, having joined the news team in 2013. He has over a decade of professional writing and editing experience, and helps to lead our technology and entertainment product launch and movie release coverage.