Devs handed even more Xbox One processing power, report claims

A further chunk of the Xbox One’s internal processing power has been handed over to developers, leaked information claims.

Eurogamer reports that details obtained by a hacker group say that the console’s latest development SDK allow for game creators to access another of the console’s CPU cores.

Previously only six of the eight cores were freed up for developers, with the other two being reserved for system functions. However as of October this was supposedly upped to include 50-80 per cent of seventh core.

Taking advantage of the extra power comes at a price – namely the omission of game-specific voice commands and Kinect’s infra-red depth perception. Microsoft is also tackling an issue that sees system use of the seventh core vary, meaning devs can’t always be certain how much will be available.

Nonetheless, the site speculates that the changes may be the reason why some Q4 multiplatform titles offered better performance on Xbox One than on PS4, although Sony’s machine still retains some key technical advantages.

Last summer Microsoft’s decision to offer Xbox One without a mandatory Kinect led to developers getting ten per cent more GPU power to play with.