Xbox chief Phil Spencer has been dropping hints about an Xbox handheld<\/a> for months, but what about Windows handheld gaming PCs? Jason Ronald, Microsoft\u2019s VP of \u201cNext Generation,\u201d tells The Verge<\/em> that we should expect to see the Windows handheld gaming experience change within this calendar year. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n Ronald was a roundtable panelist this evening at an AMD and Lenovo event<\/a> titled \u201cThe Future of Gaming Handhelds,\u201d which was mostly a coming-out party for Lenovo\u2019s new Legion Go S<\/a>. But he did hint on stage that Microsoft plans to bring the Xbox experience to Windows PCs, rather than the other way around \u2014 and expanded on that considerably after we caught up with him later.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve been really innovating for a long time in the console space, and as we partner across the industry it\u2019s really about how do we bring those innovations that we\u2019ve incubated and developed in the console space and bring them to PC and bring them to the handheld gaming space,\u201d said Ronald. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n After we caught up with him after the event, he confirmed that Microsoft is looking at combining Xbox and Windows experiences together \u2014 and that we should see changes this very year, rather than needing to wait for an Xbox handheld that might still be years away.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cI would say it\u2019s bringing the best of Xbox and Windows together, because we have spent the last 20 years building a world-class operating system, but it\u2019s really locked to the console,\u201d says Ronald. \u201cWhat we\u2019re doing is we\u2019re really focused on how do we bring those experiences for both players and developers to the broader Windows ecosystem.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Right now, Windows sucks on handhelds, to put it rather bluntly, to the point that a community-created fork of Valve\u2019s SteamOS experience<\/a> can be a far better way to pick up and play games. Ronald is clearly aware of the issues. \u201cWe\u2019re focused on really simplifying that and making it much more like a console experience. Our goal is to put the player and their library at the center of the experience and not all the [Windows] work that you have to do today.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n