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Xbox games may soon be streamed to PC

By Robin Valentine

Xbox games may soon be streamed to PC

Fri 12 Sep 2014 12:05pm GMT / 8:05am EDT / 5:05am PDT
Technology

Tech blog claims Microsoft is working on technology to make Xbox 360 and Xbox One games playable in a browser

Microsoft

microsoft.com

Microsoft may be developing a streaming service that would allow games from both of their most recent consoles to be played on a PC with minimal lag, claims technology news site Neowin.

Such a service would likely build upon Outatime, a research project within the company made public last month, which used FPS Doom 3 and RPG Fable III to test a method of disguising network latency for "mobile cloud gaming".

It would enable Microsoft to compete directly with PlayStation Now, the Sony streaming service currently in Open Beta in the US and Canada.

The report claims that the service has progressed beyond the concept stage and is currently in testing, with highly positive reactions so far from users.

Microsoft are yet to comment either confirming or denying the story.

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12 Comments

James Boulton Tools & Tech Coder, Slightly Mad Studios

145 183 1.3
Or you could play with less lag using an Xbox 360 emulator on your PC?

Posted:A year ago

#1

Adam Acuo Investment Banking

11 13 1.2
This would be a very interesting development - particularly if they make XBone games available on the system. Granted it might cannibalize sales of the Xbox One - but I would guess that it would likely more than make up for it in total market reach particularly if the competition viz the PS4 turns a little more sour for Microsoft. They're preoccupation with the Xbox and the living room left the PC market completely open for Valve and Steam and now Valve is pushing to become the living room machine while cutting MSFT out of the picture with SteamOS and Big Picture Mode. This makes so much sense that I'd be surprised if Microsoft actually did it.

Posted:A year ago

#2

Steve Wetz Reviewer/Assistant Editor, Gamer's Glance

213 529 2.5
Considering consoles are almost exclusively sold at either cost or a loss, allowing their games to be played in a browser makes a surprising amount of business sense. And I only say surprising because of the missteps which have occurred of late. Here's hoping some onerous system (*cough* GFWL *cough*) doesn't make this distasteful to consumers.

Posted:A year ago

#3

Steven Hodgson Programmer, Code in Progress Ltd

105 152 1.4
I can understand for 360, but I doubt X1 unless you already own one, like the vita remote with the PS4

Posted:A year ago

#4

Greg Wilcox Creator, Destroy All Fanboys!

2,585 1,634 0.6
Heh. I still wonder how things would be now had Sony not sued bleem! out of existence, bought the company and added support for PS1 games on Vaio computers way back in the late 90's early 2000's. They'd have been ahead of the curve on a few fronts, behind the 8-ball on others, but doing something we're seeing now in this post. Well, it's an interesting time for sure. Although I have to wonder how well it's going to work with a few millions of people trying to stream content at the same time or during busy periods where certain games may clog up the works... Eh, whatever. We shall see...

Posted:A year ago

#5

Eyal Teler Programmer

118 159 1.3
What I'd love to see is streaming from the Xbox directly to a PC, not a cloud service. That would allow playing without hogging the TV, which is frankly the only way I'd get to play it.

Posted:A year ago

#6

Paul Johnson Managing Director / Lead code monkey, Rubicon Development

1,219 2,667 2.2
can != will;

Posted:A year ago

#7

Alfonso Sexto Lead Tester, Ubisoft Germany

1,148 1,270 1.1
@Christian:
Not to mention the system requirements that emulating a 360 would demand to play in par with the console.

Posted:A year ago

#8

James Boulton Tools & Tech Coder, Slightly Mad Studios

145 183 1.3
There is no 360 emulator on the PC and for the forseeable future, there will be no 360 emulator on the PC.
A 10 second Google search would prove otherwise. Framerate isnt exactly awesome though, which suggests it's probably not fake. :)

Posted:A year ago

#9

Darren Adams Managing Director, ChaosTrend

510 1,209 2.4
Streaming games is 100% a bad thing for consumers and companies keep pushing it because they gain full control over the games. They see it as a way to end piracy, but in reality it will be a way to fuck over the customer.

Edited 1 times. Last edit by Darren Adams on 15th September 2014 10:44am

Posted:A year ago

#10

Tom Keresztes Programmer

742 400 0.5
There is no 360 emulator on the PC and for the forseeable future, there will be no 360 emulator on the PC.
This what they said about the possibility of an Amiga emulator in 1995.

Posted:A year ago

#11

Barrie Tingle Live Producer, Maxis

472 348 0.7
@Adam Acuo
I'm guessing the system would require the game to be on the console in question which would then stream it to the PC similar to how the nVidia SHIELD goes from PC to SHIELD device.

Posted:A year ago

#12

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