The next Xbox, Project Helix, is likely at least a year away
It looks like it isn’t time to shuffle Microsoft’s underperforming Xbox Series X/S consoles into the “unused tech closet of shame” just quite yet. While the company announced its next system last week, Project Helix, it is likely still at least a year or two away. Today, Microsoft’s “VP of Next Generation” Jason Ronald said that the company will send out “alpha versions” of Project Helix to developers starting in 2027.
Console manufacturers usually send out alpha versions of these systems ahead of time so game studios can tinker with the new hardware in advance. That process generally starts about a year or two before the console is released. For the PS5, there were reports of dev kits being sent out in early 2018, while the system launched in November 2020. The Xbox Series X/S dev kits were reportedly sent much later than the PS5 kits (which led to a whole bunch of performance problems when they both launched around the same time), but it’s unclear if Microsoft will make that same mistake twice.