Xbox Live users might be a little confused the next time they log in, as some of the service’s planned changes have now almost-fully come into effect.
Xbox One gamers are now able to change their Xbox Live gamertags and you can change yours to any darn thing you like – even if it’s someone else’s name.
If you decide the make the change and you pick a gamertag that’s already in use, the system will automatically generate a random ID suffix of numbers and a hashtag symbol, but the name will be completely valid. This’ll save you the incredibly annoying “Sorry, that name’s been taken!” auto-message that has left many a gamer pulling their hair out after 500 attempts to find a name they like.
What’s especially interesting is that gamers might want to take advantage of the new mechanism solely thanks to its new appearance. If you get an automatically-added “#482” (for example) at the end of your username, it’ll show up in a smaller font with a different colour, making you stand out from your peers. Neat!
Sadly this won’t be in time for the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare release. According to Xbox, although updating your gamertag will take effect for you right away, it won’t show up for other players until 2020.
If you want to change your Xbox Live gamertag then you can change it once for free right here on the Microsoft website here.
As always, any sort of inflammatory, mean, racist, or rude words are still not going to be allowed by Microsoft, and the character limit is 12. But hey, at least you can say goodbye to Y0M0M6969. Now you can be Y0M0M6969#927!
Will you be changing your Xbox gamertag or are you pretty happy with your existing handle?
ICYMI, GameByte’s got a new podcast! We welcomed streamer and Xbox On host Leahviathan to the My First Time set. Check out the video below.
Featured Image Credit: Microsoft