Chase Achievements with Xbox One's snappy July update

Most of us have fallen for the allure of Xbox Achievements at some point since their arrival with the Xbox 360. If you're still incessantly bumping your Gamerscore, the Xbox One July update's inclusion of Achievement Snap should be up your alley – rather than stopping your game to check progress, you'll soon be able to track real-time achievement progression with a quick glance to the right side of your screen.

Conquering overly-vague achievement descriptions or challenging feats will also be a bit easier, thanks to a "Get Help" option that will be offered under whichever challenge a user has highlighted. Once clicked, the prompt searches the web for helpful links and videos. You can pin the Achievements they're focusing on at the top of the snapped app, too.

The update will also allow you to launch Snap Center by double-tapping a button. Unfortunately, the Xbox Wire announcement doesn't specify which button that is, and only suggests to "double-tap the button on your controller." If you've already got an app attached, the same double tap will switch between controlling the app and whichever game you're playing. Language options for players in New Zealand, Ireland and Austria will be another addition, with players in those regions soon being able to use the English and German voice models from other countries if they better suit their style of speech.

Users will also be able to "Like" Game DVR clips and posts in their SmartGlass activity feeds, but more interestingly, the update's description mentions support for future digital bundles and compilation discs. This is described as something to grant publishers "options for great digital bundle and disc compilation offerings," with the post suggesting that we'll see "more flexible combinations of game titles and game content" as the feature is tested. Sounds like something that could be used to bundle pieces of DLC or base games together, hopefully with the inclusion of a reasonable price tag.

http://www.joystiq.com/2014/06/14/ch...y-july-update/