Copilot, Microsoft’s AI tool, will be coming to Xbox and PC games. The tool, which was first unveiled in 2024, will “help players have time, find new games you’re likely to love, or even to help ease you back into a game you may have stepped away from.” Members of the Xbox Insiders program will test the feature in April ahead of its eventual wider release.
When its game functionalities were shown off at last year’s Microsoft Surface and AI event, Copilot was used in Minecraft to figure out components to craft in-game items, like a sword. The in-game assist tool will function as a strategy guide players can consult if they’re stumped, or want a new game recommendation.
“It is designed to assist players in various ways,” reads the Xbox blog. Fatima Kardar, the corporate VP of gaming AI, said the player will always be “in control” of the tool and will “decide how and when to interact with the Copilot, ensuring that it enhances rather than disrupts the gaming experience.”
“It’s not just about AI showing up to help you, it’s about AI showing up at the right moment,” she continued. “We really have to think about the experience we’ve built, it cannot be intrusive.”
Xbox and Microsoft are all-in on genAI
Copilot for Gaming is part of Microsoft’s ongoing endeavor to bring generative AI into games. For players, this has also extended to an AI-powered chat bot (or “Virtual Support Agent”) for customer support purposes.
Developer-wise, the most recent example is the previously reported Muse AI tool, which Xbox believes will help with game preservation efforts in some way. Prior to that, it made its interest in genAI known in late 2023 by teaming with Inworld, an AI company tasked with making tools for game narrative and design.
Xbox subsidiaries are also embracing generative AI, namely Activision Blizzard. The publisher recently admitted to using the technology to create in-game assets for Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, and used it to make ads for nonexistent games to determine if certain franchises should be revived.
