Xbox Avatar
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Xbox Avatars are avatars and characters that represent users of the Xbox network (formerly Xbox Live) on the Xbox 360, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X and Series S video game consoles, Windows 10, and Windows 10 Mobile.[1]
Avatars originally debuted on the Xbox 360 as part of the "New Xbox Experience" system update released on November 19, 2008, updated on Xbox One with "New Xbox One Experience" Xbox One System Software on November 12, 2015,[2] and reimagined with the release of the next generation character for Xbox One on October 11, 2018.[3] They competed primarily with Nintendo's Mii avatars.
History of Xbox Original Avatar
[edit]| Xbox Original Avatars | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Developers | Microsoft Corporation Rare | ||
| Release |
| ||
| Final release(s) | |||
| |||
| Platform | |||
| Type | Avatar | ||
Xbox 360 users are able to customize body shape, sex, facial features, hair style, clothing, and "props".[5] They can then display a 2D picture of their Avatar on their Gamercard (although they are still free to use their previous picture should they so choose).[6]
Xbox Live GM Ben Kilgore stated in 2008 that Avatars will only be available for games that have an E10+ rating or lower only (featuring content that is considered suitable for children under 10 years of age).[7] This may change sometime in the future, though presumably in Microsoft's own games if it ever happens, to monitor their usage in mature games. It was announced at Game Developers Conference on March 24, 2009, that the XNA framework 3.1 would have an API to support Avatars in indie games. With the release of Windows 10 and the New Xbox One Experience, the rendering of the Avatars has been changed to offer a higher quality of rendering across different devices.[8]
Users can edit their current avatar using the Xbox Original Avatars application on an Xbox console, Windows 10 or Windows 10 Mobile device[9] or by using the Microsoft Silverlight based editor on Xbox.com. Across all of these experiences, users will have access to their entire closet of items that they've purchased or have been awarded throughout the Xbox ecosystem.
The Original Avatar Store was shut down on July 29, 2024.
The "Next generation" Avatar
[edit]| Xbox Avatar Editor | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Developer | Microsoft Corporation | ||
| Release | October 11, 2018 | ||
| Final release(s) | |||
| |||
| Engine | Unity | ||
| Platform | |||
| Type | Avatar | ||
On June 13, 2017, during E3 2017, Microsoft announced a complete overhaul of the Avatars, providing a much greater emphasis of customization and inclusiveness, especially by adding limb customization, clothing that supported all characters â as the old system had different clothing for male and female body types â and support for changing asset color at runtime. Other customization includes cloth and hair that are impacted by physics, fourteen different body types with 20 height options, and Moods and Props that are never "put away" when displaying an Avatar. The new Avatar system was delayed originally slated to release in the Fall 2017 but continued to be active in development through 2018. On June 18, 2018, the Xbox Avatar Editor beta â leveraging the Unity engine â arrived to Xbox Insiders,[11] then on August 8, Microsoft released a Q&A on some of the ways how the new Avatars will be displayed on the Xbox One Dashboard,[12] and as of August 16, the new Avatar Xbox Editor beta arrived for Windows 10 testers.[13] and were officially released for all Xbox Live users on October 11, 2018.[3]
For users that have content from their Xbox 360 account, while the new character cannot support the past generation's assets, a backward compatibility mode is available for customers that want to use their existing content. By selecting "Xbox Original Avatar" from the main menu of the Editor, customers can import their entire Xbox 360-era character and use that to represent themselves across the Xbox One Dashboard. Users can continue to leverage their entire Xbox Original Avatar closet using the original app and importing their changes using the Editor, when they want to share a change.
As of the 1811 release, the Xbox Avatar Editor's built-in Closet includes 566 items enabling 142.67 x 10^33 different characters for customers creating an Avatar, which does not take color changing options into account. There is also an Xbox Avatar Store that allows customers to browse and try on new items as they are released to the public.[14]
On November 22, 2024, Microsoft announced that the "Next generation" Avatar Editor would be discontinued on January 9, 2025 due to "low engagement with the program." Avatar purchases made between November 1, 2023 to January 9, 2025 will be automatically refunded. The Xbox Original Avatar Editor will not be affected and will remain available, although the Original Avatar Store was previously shut down on July 29, 2024.[15][16]
List of Xbox 360 games using Xbox Original Avatars
[edit]This is a list of games on the Xbox 360 video game console (both retail and Xbox Live Arcade games) that use Avatars. Some games (marked with an asterisk) get updated to support Avatars when the user updates to the New Xbox Experience dashboard. The player must be signed into Xbox Live to receive the game update for those games.[17] There are no Xbox One games that support Avatars, although some Xbox 360 games that did support them were made backwards compatible for the Xbox One.
 â This color indicates that the game is no longer available for download.
 â This color indicates Xbox 360 games that are compatible with Xbox One.
Xbox Original Avatar Store
[edit]The Avatar Store was launched as "Avatar Marketplace" on August 11, 2009, allowing users to buy clothes and props using their Xbox Live account.[21] Users are able to buy branded clothing, such as Adidas, for their Avatar, as well as game-related clothing, such as costumes from Monkey Island, BioShock 2, Battleblock Theater, Fable 2, Gears of War 2, Halo, Splinter Cell Conviction and Star Wars: The Clone Wars. A player can also update their Avatar's wardrobe by achieving certain goals and unlocking different clothing. New clothes and items are added to the Avatar Marketplace every Thursday.
As of late June 2009, various themed clothing articles were spotted in use by various members of the Xbox 360 community â namely those who work for Microsoft. These articles in question were based mainly around Halo, various T-shirts, shorts, hats and even full-body suit costumes were seen not only being worn by current Avatars but also in Avatar Store demonstration pictures and videos. The people who had access to these also were spotted to have a mysterious achievement in their profile named 'Xbox 360 Beta' and was orange in color with a Beta symbol and the number 09 â it was concluded that they were actually beta testing the new Avatar Marketplace.[22] Most recently, Xbox users that were a part of the Xbox Preview Program were given a special prop featuring a cat dressed like a ninja and riding a T-Rex for use with their Xbox Avatar.[23]
In addition to clothing, the Avatar Store also has animated props available for purchase. Avatars can interact with these props, which include a remote control vibrating Warthogs from Halo, Lightsabers from Star Wars, footballs, skateboards, pets, and even pom-poms. According to