No longer just for the Elite, button remapping is now available for the masses.
Microsoft is keeping its promise of making the highly-requested feature a standard for all Xbox One controllers.
As part of the much-longed for New Xbox One Experience update, Xbox One owners can actually save themselves the $150 it costs for an Xbox One Elite controller if all they wanted was the ability to remap the gamepad's buttons.
Yet still, "for those who want the ultimate degree of personalization, the Xbox Elite Wireless controller is the best choice for complete control," says Microsoft's Larry "Major Nelson" Hyrb.
In short, regular Xbox One controllers are capable of making use of the feature, but of course, Xbox One Elite controllers can do a few more extra tricks. For example, standard controllers can now swap button pairs so if a player wanted the function of pressing A to be B instead then B would be the new A. On the other hand, A and B buttons are the only ones that need to be assigned to an Elite controller leaving a player the freedom to remove specific controls completely or even map more than one function to the same button.
In addition, mapped buttons on a standard controller will only remain with the console with which the controller was mapped. If a player moves to a different Xbox One, then they will have to remap the buttons all over again with the new console. That isn't the case with Elite controllers. Remapped settings on an Elite controller are saved directly on the controller itself, so a player could bring their custom setting over to any friend's house and not have the hassle of remapping all over again.
To enable the new feature, players can simply launch the Xbox Accessories app or access the settings on their consoles through either "Kinect & Devices" and then to "Devices & Accessories", or "Ease of Access" and then "Button mapping."
Besides button mapping, other sought-after features included in last week's Xbox One update include an easier to navigate Dashboard, backward compatibility with more than 100 Xbox 360 games, and an overall faster machine.
Photo: Marco Verch | Flickr
