Xbox Series X

Xbox Series X which launched at the end of  2020.covering what i like, dislike and any improvements  i would like to see. Now over the last year we   have seen some new updates to the user interface,  new controllers and accessories, as well as   incredible new games. We've even seen the release  of the expansion card if you want to increase your   available storage. So if you're still looking  for a Series X, hopefully today's video will   give you an idea of what it's like. But if you've  got an Xbox already, drop a comment below telling   me your favorite game that you're playing right  now, or what you're looking forward to this year. OK, first up let's talk about games, and more  importantly game pass! Now we know most of the   games available on the Series X can also be played  on the Series S, the older Xbox One and PX. But don't underestimate how good they look on here,  especially the games that have been optimized  for the Series X. We've seen a few Xbox releases  throughout the last year including Forza Horizon 5, Halo and Flight Simulator, which all look  incredible. With Forza, whether you're playing in  quality mode running at 4K30 or performance mode  which runs at a lower resolution but 60 frames per second, it just looks incredible. This game  for me is one of, if not, the best game on the Xbox right now. The car sounds, the open world,  the visuals and the story mode are all decent. One of the biggest advantages of the series x over  the series s is the support for 4k games like back for blood halo dirt 5 and forza horizon 5 all look  incredible in 4k and the fact that the series x is capable of running games at 4k and it supports  120 frames is insanely good now although a lot of games do hit that 4k resolution on the series  x not all of these games will support 120 frames some of the games that i've tested that  do support 120 frames have included dirt 5  gears 5 and warzone there is a drop in resolution  when using this mode as you're not getting 4k  unfortunately but it still doesn't look bad  on the whole we've not really seen that many  exclusive games for xbox in the last year but  that doesn't matter because we've got game pass so over the last year i've been paying for game  pass ultimate which basically means for about 11 pounds or 15 dollars per month you get access  to the entire game pass library now i actually spend quite a lot of time playing games on the  playstation 5. but you'll probably know every new ps5 game that launches you need to pay for  and at about 50 to 70 pounds ago it soon adds up now with game pass though every new xbox game  is added at no additional cost on day one so forza horizon 5 which would normally cost  what 50 to 60 pounds nothing extra halo and flight simulator the same again but it's not just  xbox exclusive games either we've seen new games added that i would normally have bought on the  playstation 5 and the fact that i get to play them kind of for free on the xbox is incredible games  like rainbow six extraction this game is available on the playstation 5 2 but the fact that i can  play it on day one via game pass is a game changer now obviously game pass isn't actually free  so these games aren't free as such but once you've downloaded what two to three decent games  you've pretty much paid for it that's without even considering the ea play access that's also  included so games like need for speed heat dirt 5 mass effect and loads more and then with the  recent use of the activision blizzard acquisition this will be massive for xbox now what that means  moving forwards for exclusive games on xbox or day 1 releases on game pass who really knows at this  stage but either way the fact that xbox could potentially have a whole library of existing and  future games on their platform is just going to be awesome hopefully this doesn't have a negative  impact on playstation but i guess only time will tell can we actually assume that games like call  of duty will be released on game pass for day one but it's not just about the new or optimized games  it's also about how well the xbox can play older games too the fact that this series x can play  almost every previous game for the xbox xbox 360 and xbox one is insane not only from a game pass  perspective but from a physical library point of view now i sold most of my old games years ago but  just last weekend my son wanted to buy a physical 360 game for about five pounds it's awesome  that we're still able to buy install and play these older games without the need to keep those  consoles just pop the disc in download the game file and updates and it's good to go as far as the  look and design of the xbox series x goes it's not a bad looking console i've said this before but  with its clean and minimal design it means it can be placed pretty much anywhere whether i'm  using it on my shelves and plugged into my tv or on my desk setup it looks pretty good i think  it looks better stood up rather than lying down but the fact that you can decide and you can  flip it either way without the need for a stand or additional mount is awesome the vent on  the top has a little pop of green which i think adds a nice color to the overall dark design  i also like the fact that it came in black as standard so it means i didn't need to wrap it  or change the color it actually looks good as it is the performance of the series x has been  absolutely awesome it's rapid not only if games looked insanely good at either 4k or 120 frames  everything just runs silky smooth whether it's booting it up navigating the menus or jumping  between games it really has been effortless now the fact that it supports a vrr or the  variable refresh rate means that if you're using a tv or monitor that can handle this you're going  to get a near perfect tear-free gaming experience i don't think i've ever seen a frame drop while  playing or at least not enough to remember but it's not just the overall running of the  games that's impressed me this year it's the quick resume feature i've said it before but  this is a true next-gen feature being able to jump from one game to the next in a matter of  seconds is awesome it doesn't just load the game up though it resumes exactly where you were last  playing now this might not sound like a big deal but if you are jumping between multiple games you  don't need to worry about loading the game over the last year we've already seen a handful  of new controllers released including the pulse red and the shock blue i think these were the  first two that i bought after that i've got the scoff instinct pro controller with the removable  faceplates then later we saw the 20th anniversary controller and the forza horizon 5 edition i  actually did dedicated videos on both the scoff and the 20th anniversary controllers which i have  linked to below as for the controllers themselves they still feel great and i'm a huge fan of  the triggers and even after a year xbox a lot more than i do and the pulse red one  is used by my son practically every day and the fact that it still looks and works like new says  a lot about how well they're made when it comes to charging the controllers i'm still using  the power a dock and battery packs these are perfect as that means i've always got one or two  controllers docked and ready to go now these are all the controllers i've got so far but i'm still  really tempted to pick up an elite controller not only to do a hands-on review but to compare  it to the scuff if you're interested in knowing my thoughts on the elite controller drop those in  the comments and i might pick one up next month when it comes to the available storage on  the xbox series x it's not bad it has a one terabyte drive of which around 800 gigabytes are  usable now in the first few months this wasn't really an issue as there weren't that many games  i needed or wanted to install but as my children and i have started to download more i found  myself needing to delete games more frequently now although you can actually use an external  drive to store your games on you cannot play games from that drive if they're optimized for  the series x or s so games like forza horizon 5 i'm back for blood the only external drive at the  moment that is supported is the seagate expansion card i'm using the one terabyte option but it's  also available in a 5 12 and a 2 terabyte too but these are not cheap but if you need to expand  the storage on your console these are very useful plus these are stupidly small and they won't  take up any usb ports on the back of the console by adding this card it has more than  doubled my available storage which hopefully should mean i won't need  to delete any more games this year if you are interested in knowing more about  these i have linked to these in the description now as much as i would like to have seen a new  dashboard or a completely new design i have gotten used to it now it doesn't feel next-gen to  me but it is functional it's fast snappy and feels fluid when navigating around one of my biggest  criticisms i had last year was the resolution of the dashboard it looked terrible the images and  the text looked blurry as they were not running at 4k now this meant as you were jumping between  games and the dashboard it looked pretty jarring but in october or november last year we did see  the 4k updates to most this might not seem like a big deal but to me this was a very noticeable  and decent update everything now looks cleaner and sharper especially the text the quick menus  and the additional settings all look nice and i'd say everything feels user-friendly another new  feature that we saw is being able to adjust the brightness of the controller and the console light  so if you're using your xbox at night to watch movies you don't need to worry about having the  lights on you can actually turn it completely off now the series x does have a disk drive on the  front it's not something that i use that often as i buy and play my games and movies digitally  but i do have a handful of movies i have played on here it will play dvds blu-rays and ultra hd  blu-rays as well as games so if you all plan on using it for movies the disk drive is incredibly  quiet the xbox app has definitely gotten better over the last year it's also been able to see  who's online just by glancing at your friends list or your notifications you can see things  like your friends requests or any updates now to get the most out of the app you definitely  want to link it to your console and once you've done that you're able to view your game capture  straight from the console via the app you can also see all of the games you've got installed how much  storage they're taking up and you can manage them from within the app on top of that if you wanted  to download a new game from game pass or the store just search for it and you can download it  straight to the console within a few clicks i'd actually go as far to say that the mobile app  is easier to use in the console especially when it comes to searching for games or viewing  your library i actually really like the app so during the earlier months i had an issue  where my controllers would randomly disconnect i had to then reboot the xbox entirely for them  to start working this only happened in the first few months and it must have been fixed via  an update but other than that i've had no other problems with the series x it loads up  first time every time it's never crashed on me and it's been pretty easy to use now there's only  one single improvement that i would like to see but it's more of a ui thing than anything else  so your most recently used games or apps show up across the top and that's absolutely fine  but if someone else logs into their account on your xbox and plays a game it still shows up on  your recently played list it means every time that my children use the sierra's axe any games  that they play including roadblocks or minecraft it would then show up across the top  even though i've never played these games i know it's only a very minor  request but that's pretty much it right so these are my final thoughts on the xbox  series x over the last year is really shown just how capable this console is and we've not really  even scratched the surface games like forza and even flight simulator have looked very very  impressive and run incredibly smoothly it's quiet fast and the quick resume feature is a literal  game changer but what really amazes me is game pass and what the future holds for xbox being  able to get a huge library of games on day one as well as the possibility of cross  plat games especially at no extra cost is awesome so the bottom line is if you're  looking for a new xbox and you want that 4k or 120 hertz the series x is definitely the way  to go but if you're not sure whether to go for the series x or the series s i actually did a  review on the series s a few months ago so you can check that out next well that was my long term  review on the xbox series x thank you.

Buy Now> Xbox Series X