Xbox’s whole deal these days is you can play games just about anywhere, and it has just branched out again with a new Xbox Game Pass feature.
PC subscribers to Xbox Game Pass can now stream games they own via Xbox Game Pass, even if they aren’t part of the service’s catalogue.
This service is in testing at the moment, so it’s limited to Xbox Insider subscribers who have an Ultimate tier subscription.
It’s no tiny roll-out, though, as subscribers from 28 countries can get involved, including those in the UK and US.
For those who don’t religiously keep up with Xbox news, Microsoft kicked off this “stream your own games” concept earlier this year, starting off on Xbox consoles.
This opened up to browser support, but now PC players can kick off a stream right from the Xbox app, making it feel less like a cludgy work-around.
The feature is mostly useful for quick try-outs, or sessions that don’t really justify spending potentially hundreds of gigabytes of bandwidth installing the game proper. Have you seen how big game installs are these days? The Call of Duty series has become infamous for its 200GB-plus whoppers.
PC streaming also brings another handy feature. You can play Xbox games over streaming that haven’t actually come to PC.
Granted, after rifling through the 250-plus selection of games that are currently supported by this streaming feature, none of these jumped out at us. But it’s one way to open up ways to play titles like Lost Odyssey or Gears of War 3, which haven’t come to PC.
"You can expect even more games including console-only games and Xbox Play Anywhere titles to be added to the collection over time," says Anu Reddy, Xbox Senior Product Manager.
This might also be taken as an indication of what the future holds for Microsoft’s Xbox line.
You may have noticed, but this current console generation hasn’t exactly goner well for the big green X. And we already know Microsoft’s next big move is a Steam Deck-a-like handheld made in partnership with Asus — which already makes Windows PC handhelds.
This kind of streaming support for Xbox titles is one way to shrug off backwards compatibility complaints if Microsoft’s next Xbox basically ends up being a Windows PC at heart.
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