For those who don't know, the Fluent Design System is Microsoft's latest iteration of their design language, which focuses on motion, light, and translucency. The idea is to create a design language that can transcend platforms and paradigms, including things like virtual reality, holograms, and beyond.
On Xbox One, it represents yet another major overhaul of the dashboard, adding refreshed aspects to the Guide, adding translucent materials to interactive elements, and a new glow effect when selecting different items. It also brings about various other small design tweaks and changes, including a brand new Community section, and the ability to pin both games and people as new content blocks, which offer rich contextual information.
We've been hands on with the latest Xbox Alpha Ring build which brings us the earliest look at these new features.
Of course, this is the Alpha Ring, so expect bugs and other minor issues ⸺ but know that the design philosophy is sound. While I'm not a fan of the "suggested friend" boxes and the combination of ads and personal content on the top of the home screen, the new customizable content blocks should prove incredibly useful for keeping track of friends and staying up to date with games. They're a little like live tiles on steroids.
It's going to be interesting to see how the latest Xbox dashboard evolves in the coming weeks.
