Microsoft Announces Mouse, Keyboard Support For Xbox One Through Razer Partnership

Mouse and keyboard support for Xbox One consoles has been rumored for some time, but now Microsoft has confirmed that this is indeed happening. The company announced that it is teaming up with Razer to make this happen and that select testers will be able to try it out in the coming weeks.

“At Xbox, we’re committed to bringing gamers more choice in what they play, who they play with and how they play. We’re also equally committed to providing developers with the best platform to create and deliver the best gaming experience on Xbox,” Microsoft said in its latest Xbox Wire post. “Today we’re announcing a new way to play games on Xbox: we’re enabling mouse and keyboard support on Xbox One for select Xbox Insiders in the coming weeks.”

Microsoft has confirmed that “Warframe” will be one of the very first titles to have mouse and keyboard support on the Xbox One. If Microsoft decides to roll out the feature to all Xbox One gamers, it doesn’t mean that all games will support it. The company has made it clear that mouse and keyboard support for games will be added on a title-by-title basis and is entirely up to game developers.

“We’ve been working closely with studios of all sizes to ensure mouse and keyboard experiences on console are fun, fair and correctly balanced, and look forward to introducing more games with support for mouse and keyboard input in the future. Tune into the November 10 edition of Inside Xbox for more details about additional titles supporting mouse and keyboard, and to learn more about our partnership with Razer,” Microsoft said.

Delivering a fair experience will likely play a huge role in how mouse and keyboard support will be implemented on the Xbox One. Mouse and keyboard players typically have a movement advantage over players using controllers, especially in first-person shooters, as pointed out by The Verge. This might be one of the reasons why Microsoft is testing this out first with Insiders before making the feature available to everyone else.

Microsoft said that “most wired and wireless” mice and keyboards will be able to work on the Xbox One console. However, the company decided to partner with Razer to bring the best experience possible. Razer already has a reputation when it comes to offering gaming peripherals for PCs, so it makes sense that Microsoft would partner with the company.

Microsoft also teased that it will share more “soon” about its partnership with Razer, which might indicate that the companies might be working on new mice and keyboards that are specifically made for Xbox One consoles. Xbox One owners should keep an eye out for announcements from Microsoft and Razer.