I had always assumed that things like the MOGA controller were primarily used by people to play downloaded ROMs in emulators, not to play actual games from the Android store.
I guess so, but you’re still dealing with a game whose graphics are designed around a full size screen. Are they able to flex some of that design around displaying on a phone? I mean, Outer Worlds just released a patch because some of the lettering was too small for some TVs, I can’t imagine trying to read that on a phone. I’ve never tried streaming to a phone, maybe that’s a solved problem, but it would be a tough one for me, with my eyesight.
Or you could play if you’re travelling, or on a train, or wherever else when you’re not at home. Obviously this will work with a laptop later as well, giving you more options. Maybe this isn’t suitable for you, but for me this will be ace, especially being able to play games I already own or already get through Game Pass This makes it a million times more attractive for me than Google’s Stadia where I would have to buy the games all over again, and with a low online population and in most scenarios with no crossaves.
I seem to be in the preview but seem not to have a bluetooth controller. Oops.
I finally bought batteries for my XB1 controller that I use for my PC. (I just wire it to the PC with a USB cord normally). So with batteries, it becomes a Bluetooth controller that I can use with my phone, so I could use it with Project xCloud while my son watches his Youtube videos on the Xbox.
First impression: Uh oh. As soon as I logged in on the phone for Project xCloud, it logged me out of my account on my Xbox, so my son was left babbling about not being able to watch his songs. D’oh.
I switched him over to the AppleTV’s Youtube app instead, and got back to my device. I propped my phone up on the kitchen counter against the Xbox One controller that is paired with the Xbox One (as opposed to the one in my hands that’s paired with the phone), and played a couple of games. I continued my game of Brothers: A tale of two sons. It continued right where I left off on my Xbox months ago, with the two brothers crossing some gaps with the help of a friendly giant. I then quit out. Oh wait. There’s no way to quit out? Well, not with the controller, I had to go back on my phone to quit out of the game.
And then I started Forza 7. Now, understand that I don’t own Forza 7. And it’s not a Game Pass game either. I did have a save game I continued from the last time they had a free play weekend. I did a long 8 lap race. It’s not perfect by any means. Sometimes the connection hitched a little and I ended up not taking a turn properly. Luckily Forza 7 lets you rewind time as much as you like, so that actually made it perfect as a streaming game.
So overall not bad. But they need to not have me log out of my Xbox when I stream on my phone. GFWL used to do that with PC/Xbox and it was a pain in the ass. They got rid of it and let you log into both at once with the new system. They need to do the same with Project xCloud and your Xbox login on your actual console.
I gave them that feedback through the app, hopefully they’ll listen.
This controller looks neat.
I have purchased one of the 8BitDo SN30 Pro+ controllers recently. They aren’t quite as fancy as the xCloud one, but they’re much better than I expected. They provide some nice software for configuring the controllers too.
I have the SNES-styled version of this controller, and it’s nice.
It’s still just phones and tablets.
Oh wow. This is a hugely aggressive move!
Like I’ve said many times before, Microsoft is not fucking around with Game Pass.
I’m sure the app will work just fine sideloaded on Android TV devices at launch, and they’ll add support to other platforms soon enough.
I thought they had already strongly hinted they were going to do this.
Not that I’d seen. Many, including me, speculated that they might bundle it for a reduced price, but giving it away for free-- that’s huge. I really didn’t think they would go so far.
This just destroys Stadia, Shadow, GFN, PSNow, etc. It resets consumer expectations, as of today we expect game streaming to be free. Anything less is a loser.
Don’t have a gigantic existing cloud to absorb the load like Microsoft? Too bad, so sad, remember to turn off the lights when you leave the building. You’re dead.
Free, for the low cost of $15/mo.
Yep. They mentioned it in a post at the end of April. The news today should be because they’ve finally set a date.
There was never the slightest shadow of a doubt that Game Pass would work with Xcloud. That was obvious. Including Xcloud with Game Pass for free, that wasn’t hinted.
It’s still 5$ more expensive than PSNow if you only want streaming. It’s going to be all about the exclusives (and here I agree Microsoft seems to be hitting harder, putting first party stuff in the service at launch).
I think it depends on where xCloud ends up on the devices front. If it stays mobile only, I think there’s still room for competitors that play on PCs.
And I guess we’ll see about TVs. I’m not sure how excited Microsoft will be to undercut their hardware sales, but maybe they’re thinking longer term towards a console-less future.
It appears this can’t stream games you own outside of game pass, and won’t even do all game pass games. They’re saying 100 games at launch. And it’s 720p on an Xbox One S.
This seems like kind of a shit deal. A more expensive and slower ps now, with a smaller game selection to boot. The whole reason the xcloud approach was interesting when Spencer pitched it in last year’s E3 interview with giant bomb was they seemed to be completely decoupling game ownership / console ownership / access to streaming. And they’ve pivoted hard from that.
If Microsoft makes such a major misstep they deserve to lose. I mean, MS has made mistakes before, but I’ve never seen them go so gung-ho before, and I would be shocked if they kept Xcloud on mobile only.
Of course it will go beyond mobile, they’re just not talking about that yet.