Xbox One allows users to play games before they finish downloading

When Microsoft’s Xbox One was revealed back in May, we weren’t positive if users would be able to start playing their latest video game before it finished downloading. This week a Microsoft representative confirmed to Polygon that users would in fact be able to "play games while they’re still downloading to the console."

This announcement comes as a relief to gamers in a world where we don’t all have the fastest internet speeds and the ability to download a video game title with the snap of our fingers. The same attribute applies to disc-based games; they can be played while being installed to the system’s hard drive.

At this time, the PlayStation 4 currently supports the "play while downloading" model. Microsoft’s announcement will be a warm welcome to Xbox One fans who can now confirm they have the same feature as their Sony friends.

How important do you think "play while downloading" is?

Source: Polygon, Thanks to pbroy for the tip!

Michael Archambault