In what’s the most surprising – and potentially the most exciting – news of 2019 so far, it seems that Microsoft has set its sights on existing portable gaming platform, most notably the Nintendo Switch.
The GDC 2019 scheduling website, describes Microsoft’s future plans for Xbox Live and its aims to bring cross-platform play to the forefront [via WindowsCentral].
The site explains: “Xbox Live is one of the largest, most engaged gaming communities on the planet with decades of experience providing managed game services to developers that save you time and unlock all of the social and engagement features that players love.
“Now Xbox Live is about to get MUCH bigger. Xbox Live is expanding from 400M gaming devices and a reach to over 68M active players to over 2B devices with the release of our new cross-platform XDK.
“Get a first look at the SDK to enable game developers to connect players between iOS, Android, and Switch in addition to Xbox and any game in the Microsoft Store on Windows PCs.”
Microsoft games such as Minecraft already have Xbox Live support across mobile devices, but it seems the plans are to expand the library of available titles, making more Xbox games available on the go.
The website goes on to add: “[cross-platform play] will break down barriers for developers that want their communities to mingle more freely across platforms. Combined with PlayFab gaming services, this means less work for game developers and more time to focus on making games fun.”
It’s an interesting move as Sony has been very strict when it comes to cross-platform play for its own games. Pretty much the only PlayStation game that supports it is Fortnite, which is a real shame.
Details of how Xbox Live will be integrated with Switch haven’t actually been revealed yet. It could be as big as including Game Pass titles, or be as simple as just allowing cross-play.
Best to just wait and see what they’ve been cooking up.
— Pixelpar (@pixelpar) February 4, 2019
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Featured Image Credit: Microsoft.