Microsoft employees: We’re working on the next-gen Xbox

Multiple current and former Microsoft employees have disclosed details about their work on the company’s unannounced next-generation Xbox on their online CVs.

Rishi Jain, a system validation engineer at Microsoft, Parag Garg, a former program manager, Avi Bar-Zeev, former principal architect, and Maxwell Churchill, Microsoft’s ex-visual designer, each list their work on the next-gen Xbox on their LinkedIn profiles, with Churchill’s profile hinting at a 2013 release for the unannounced console.

Churchill, who worked at Microsoft between March 2011 and March 2012, states that he contributed to the “Visual design, UI, UX, IA and illustration for Xbox 2013”, alongside work on “Windows Phone 7, Xbox Mobile, and Zune Marketplace”.

Churchill’s personal websites also refer to his work on the “XBOX CONSOLE” alongside the words “Coming soon”, and what appears to be concept work for a Kinect-compatible title called ‘Shooting Stars’.

Meanwhile, Jain’s profile says that he’s been “working on the next gen XboX” since taking his post in November 2012, while Garg states that he was “responsible for the original engagement and interaction with the silicon provider for the Next Gen XBOX Console, including prototype bring up,” during his time at the firm between October 2010 and March 2011.

Garg was also the “team lead responsible for OS Development, and Product Investigations for Next Gen XBOX”.

Bar-Zeev’s profile, however, appears to be the most interesting. As principal architect at Microsoft, Bar-Zeev states that he “developed novel product concepts for forward-looking groups at Microsoft, including MSR’s Startup Business Group, Bing Mobile’s Prototyping team, and Xbox Incubations (originators of Kinect)”.

Part of his work, Bar-Zeev states, was related to “‘Next Gen’ XBox HW/SW architecture and experiences” and, although it may not be related directly to the console, developing a software platform for a “real-time 3D [user-generated content]-stitched world” called “Read/Write World”, and hardware and software-based “Holographic Telepresence”.

The latter could be in reference to Microsoft’s rumoured Project Fortaleza, the virtual-reality glasses-based technology exposed in an alleged leaked document detailing Microsoft’s next-gen console plans.

As an aside, Bar-Zeev was also the original developer of Google Earth.

Microsoft has yet to reveal its next-gen Xbox, but is expected to host an event next month where it’ll announce the console.

The console’s reference on multiple Microsoft employees’ CVs follows a series of blunders made by other Microsoft staff and third-party developers working on the console.

Earlier this month, VideoGamer.com revealed that two Ubisoft staff members had listed Watch Dogs and Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag for release on the unannounced “X720”, days after “Next Xbox” was listed on the CV of Microsoft’s software engineer Eusebius Lai.

Microsoft told VideoGamer.com that it does “not comment on rumors or speculation” when contacted about the console’s appearance on employee CVs. “We are always thinking about what is next for our platform, but we don’t have anything further to share at this time.”

Source: LinkedIn