Xbox One Sees Sales Increase; Microsoft Promises Biggest E3 Yet

Although Microsoft had a somewhat lackluster holiday season this past year, it's still on the up-and-up when it comes to Xbox business. Not to mention it has big plans for what's around the corner.

The company's latest Xbox Wire news post talks about the milestones that Microsoft managed to attain during 2018, including a slight increase in sales. It also hinted at what's on the horizon with its E3 showcase, set to take place on June 10.

It acknowledged the "passionate community of gamers" and thanked them "for a record-setting start to the year" and then broke down into details. "Today we're witnessing a record-setting number of players, playing at record levels and engaging in new ways," the company noted in its post.

"Xbox Live players are up 13 percent and Xbox One sales are up 15 percent over the same period last year, but that's not all. We've seen more than 600,000 friendships forged with the Looking For Group feature and there are now more than 1.2 million Clubs on Xbox Live.

"We're seeing tremendous engagement of mega-hits like Fortnite and Far Cry 5, both of which play best in 4K Ultra HD on Xbox One X, joining the more than 200 games that now feature Xbox One X enhancements. But we're also seeing fantastic engagement with Xbox One console exclusives like Sea of Thieves, the fastest-selling Microsoft Studios new IP of this console generation; and PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, whose new desert-themed map is now available to play on a dedicated test server ahead of its launch in Xbox Game Preview later in May.

"We also reached a couple milestones recently with players having enjoyed over 4 billion hours on games released through our ID@Xbox program and nearly 1 billion hours on games in our Xbox One Backward Compatibility library."

It also pointed out how well its Xbox Game Pass service was doing, especially since it introduced first-day releases to the program including Sea of Thieves and the upcoming State of Decay 2.

Its streaming Mixer service was also discussed, with more than 10 million active users in a month for the first time, which has only grown more as 2018 has gone on.

Finally, Microsoft teased about what lies ahead at E3 and promised its biggest showcase yet. "We're hard at work on exciting plans for E3, from what will be a great briefing filled with new games to the fan experience at the Microsoft Theater. This is our biggest E3 yet, and we look forward to a great week for gamers. Again, thank you to the amazing Xbox community."

We'll let you know what the company has to offer in just a few short weeks.