Microsoft has rolled out a new feature to Xbox One consoles that will allow gamers to start playing downloaded games much more quickly than previously.
FastStart is one of the July Xbox update highlights first revealed during E3, which makes it possible to start playing games you’ve downloaded up to twice as fast.
The feature works by prioritising the essential parts needed to get the game started while the rest of the game continues downloading in the background as you play.
It’s not clear which games will benefit from the faster speeds but Microsoft said it would only work on a “select number” of English language titles from Xbox Game Pass initially.
Users will also need download speeds of at least 20Mbps to make use of FastStart.
FastStart builds on the Xbox One’s existing “ready to start” feature, where players could usually play an initial level before the game is fully downloaded, which Microsoft admits could be “an inconsistent experience from game to game”.
“With FastStart, our intention is to get you into your game as quickly as possible with no extra work required of developers,” the company said.
Alongside FastStart, the update also tweaks Pins so that users can organise games into groups. Searching on the Xbox One has got a little easier too, as users can now press the Y button anywhere to summon the search interface.
