Xbox Live news: Live is back online

Xbox Live Official Website

Microsoft has restored Xbox Live, and Xbox gamers can now go back to using the cloud-based service by the gaming giant.

In a statement given to The Express, a spokesperson said that the error brought difficulty to matchmaking and achievement unlocking features on Xbox Live. "Some users may have experienced intermittent difficulty with matchmaking and unlocking achievements yesterday," a Microsoft spokesperson told The Express U.K. "This has been resolved and users are back to playing games with their friends online."

Xbox Support posted a tweet last Jan. 13 at around 12 p.m. stating that the company was "looking into some troubles with Xbox Live." The problems affected players owning an Xbox One, Xbox 360 and Windows, but have now been restored and is now working properly.

The error on Xbox Live lasted about four hours, rendering the service virtually unable to access social sharing and communication features such as the party chat.

Xbox Support Tweet

One Xbox user who expressed his disdain for the situation was US-based artist Snoop Dogg, when he posted a video on Instagram threatening to leave Xbox and switch to PlayStation. The artist said in the video, ""A message to Xbox One or Microsoft or whoever the f***. Y'all f*****' server is f*****' wack, man. Y'all going to make me switch to Playstation if y'all don't ever get this s*** fixed. Is it that difficult to play someone online?"

Xbox Live is an online gaming and social sharing platform created by Microsoft for the Xbox gaming consoles. The service allows services such as avatars, cloud gaming, live broadcasting, online multiplayer and many more.

The online service has been plagued with various problems, with users reporting issues with its features on a daily basis. According to Down Detector, 65 percent of Xbox Live issues reported involve the online gaming features, and 29 percent involve issues with logging in.