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As a gamer who has been playing since the days of the Super Nintendo, it’s always been the dream to take console quality games on the go. I remember back in the day wanting to take games like Paper Mario portably, alongside titles like Halo and Sly Cooper. But during those days, portable gaming devices were limited by technology. We certainly saw a leap with the Game Boy Advance, which was on par with the SNES in terms of game quality, and Sony’s PSP and Vita hardware, while not functionally equivalent, felt like matched pairs to the PS2 and PS3 respectively. Yet all of those still had compromises in terms of graphical fidelity and while Nintendo’s Switch console is a great little machine, it’s still bogged down by hardware limitations. With xCloud, it’s really more of a matter of the limitations of internet speeds and data requirements. Over the past few days, I’ve been toying around with xCloud more since I got a Razor Kishi controller for my phone and having what is essentially a portable Xbox that can play games like Fallout New Vegas, Banjo Kazooie, and Forza Horizon 4 is incredible. Playing these games over the internet while maintaining consistent frame rates and input accuracy is just astonishing. However, those are when the service is experiencing its best days. On its worst, controls can feel unresponsive and even loading a game can be a pain to deal with. Of course, xCloud is still in beta, so what’s currently being seen and played is still early technology that will evolve over time. Unfortunately, data limitations and the requirement to always be online with no option for download play will always be the main issues with cloud gaming, and that is something that can’t be fixed. It’s more of a limitation with how games are made and played than it is an issue with streaming, but that’s probably why streaming won’t reach the mainstream for right now. The internet is continuously growing and when 5G becomes the standard, cellular companies will further increase resources to increase data speeds on cell phones. However, as of right now, Microsoft seems to be in no rush since they are so far ahead of everyone else with cloud streaming. Not to mention, they aren’t treating xCloud as a separate platform to rent or buy games you may already own elsewhere, be it consoles or PC, since it’s tied into the existing Xbox Game Pass Ultimate tier. This means if you are a subscriber to that tier, you already have access to a large library of games that rotate in and out of that service. I suspect Microsoft will introduce a $6.99 per month tier of Game Pass down the road that just gives you access to xCloud, and for what it’s worth, would be a good deal, especially with Microsoft adding more to Game Pass to continually increase its value. I don’t think cloud gaming will ever overtake the traditional model of gaming on individual hardware. It certainly could, but considering the faults and failures of other platforms that have the resources to make it a success, internet and data logistics involved, and the debate over whether you own these games will forever make it a contentious topic in the gaming community. Yet, more companies will pop up to try and make streaming the future of gaming and lead the market so it is currently unavoidable that one corporation will crack the code and manage to make game streaming a success. However, in the here and now, Microsoft’s xCloud has completely changed my mind on game streaming. Having these games available on the go with just the pocket device of the user’s choice running acceptably might be enough for some people to get onboard with it. While it remains to be seen if this generation will adopt game streaming at all since kids are likely more interested in games on their tablets and phones than the traditional console, we’ve seen Xbox Game Pass have the “YouTube Effect”, where people are discussing the coolest new releases and if such a title is part of Game Pass, it offers an incredible value of getting the game for “free”. Not everyone is going to have the disposable income to plop down $300-$500 on a brand-new console, so giving more people access to games via the cloud generates more players and more active users for Game Pass. It still remains to be seen if that’ll happen or it’ll fizzle out. However, as of right now, I’m enjoying xCloud and see the potential of the hardware and future of the platform. Microsoft’s strategy is solid; they just need to follow through with it which like everything Microsoft has ever done will take years before it reaches its peak form.
