While you might not have a lot of reasons to use the Xbox app right now, Microsoft has added a new feature that immediately caught our interest.
That's right, it must be 2016 again, because the Xbox app now has Snapchat-style (or perhaps Instagram-style) "Stories" that you can post to your platform profile. If somehow you aren't familiar, the appeal of "Stories" is that they self-destruct after a certain amount of time (in this case 72 hours), which means they don't clog your profile forever.
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After all, those clips of you losing to Malenia in Elden Ring 10 times in a row might be amusing today, but probably not six months from now. In general, we haven't seen "Stories" vaunted as a major feature on social media platforms in a while, but given the popularity of clips of people playing video games, this is a smart addition to the mobile app.
According to the announcement, you can also share achievements and screenshots with the new feature, not just gameplay clips. So when you finally do beat Malenia, you can show it off to all your friends with the press of a button. I know that I certainly want to do that when I finally get the platinum trophy on a hard game.
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We can only hope that other gaming platforms (perhaps a certain PC storefront) can learn a lesson from their green brethren and embrace the future of Stories as well. Unfortunately, when it comes to Nintendo, we're not holding our breath. After all, the company just added the ability to tell if your friends are online to its mobile app, so it's got a ways to go. Here's hoping a hypothetical Switch 2 will bring some necessary changes.
