Xbox One April Update Comes With Voice Messages, Party Chat Servers And More

Microsoft rolled out new features to its next-gen Xbox One console in its April preview update to allow gamers connect with friends easily.

Xbox One is getting its share of monthly preview update, bringing on board a series of useful features. The April preview mainly focuses on seamless communication between friends and new people. To do so, Microsoft introduced most-requested features such as voice messages, which helps players to easily send recorded voice messages to friends and new people on Xbox One and Xbox 360 consoles, Major Nelson, the Director of Programming for the Microsoft, said on Thursday's Xbox Wire blog.

The April preview update change-log comprises three major upgrades, voice messages, dedicated servers for party chat and What's On. The introduction of voice messages on Xbox One consoles comes after several requests from users on the Xbox Feedback site. Microsoft acted upon players' request and enabled voice messages to Xbox One preview program members.

Players can simply double tap the Xbox button to access the snapped messages app, where all the recorded audio messages will be stored. Users can compose and playback voice messages from the messages app in the next-gen console. Although, voice messages is a part of Xbox One preview update, recorded audio can be exchanged between Xbox 360 and Xbox One consoles.

Next in line is the improvement to party chat and What's On. According to the blog post, the party chat now has dedicated chat servers that bring reliability to the service by eliminating NAT issues.

Finally, the popular What's On area in the Xbox One console brings highlights of popular games, movies, TV shows, game broadcasts and clips to users in Canada and the UK. Also, the Staff Picks follow players' recent game activity to suggest personalized content.

The latest update is the second wave of Xbox One April preview, which follows the series of improvements pushed to players last weekend. The first update preview features improvements to Achievement notifications and game hub pages. More features are on way for the privileged Xbox One preview program members.