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Xbox Series X will be able to play Steam games. Mountains of salt required ITT

DaMonsta

Member
This rumor is spread with every Xbox release and every time it’s wrong. I think Phil Spencer even spike on how wrong it is and how it’s not in line with their strategy at all around the release of X1
 
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Bryank75

Banned
Well, I remember someone from the xbox community saying it would run the same OS as One X and One S....

So that wouldn't make much sense.
It would also just be a subsidation of PC gaming.
 

jshackles

Gentlemen, we can rebuild it. We have the capability to make the world's first enhanced store. Steam will be that store. Better than it was before.
I honestly believe if it were true (which it isn't) it would still draw zip zero zilch more people there.

Anyone remember Steam boxes? Everybody THOUGHT they wanted one... Until they didn't...
Which is what makes my hunch about game streaming is probably how this will go down, if at all. Steam Machines were a pretty big failure but this would probably be more like Steam Link which actually was a half-decent piece of hardware that sold relatively well and properly filled the niche. The only reason that the Steam Link didn't take off like a rocket is because it required a dedicated gaming machine to be powered on, connected to the network, and running Steam. Playing games on your PC then streaming them to your living room is a novel goal, but it also left the PCs mostly useless as well as noisy.

Now that we know Valve is making an XCloud-like service for Steam, that will allow you to stream games to your device without having a dedicated PC in your house doing the heavy lifting, it'd make perfect sense to have a client that runs on Xbox, PS5, etc as you've already got a network-attached device with a dedicated controller. It would probably (and ideally) also run on Android/iOS/AndroidTV/Roku/FireStick as well and likely wouldn't be an "Xbox Exclusive" feature. It'd be like how all these devices already work with Netflix out of the box.
 

Pantz

Gold Member
There was a rumor early last year I think that Microsoft's acquisition team paid a visit to Valve.
 

MoreJRPG

Suffers from extreme PDS
That would be a great move for them honestly. Considering they've effectively merged the ecosystem into one, PC and Console. It makes sense for them to get Steam compatibility on the device. Who wouldn't want to play TF2 in their living room?
 

Vawn

Banned
The entire point of Microsoft having the Xbox machine in the first place is to keep other stores out and earn revenue from every game sold.

This isn't happening. Not the full Stram store.

Now they could have you log in to a Steam account for various games. That isn't anything new. You could do that on PS3 to play Portal 2.
 
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jshackles

Gentlemen, we can rebuild it. We have the capability to make the world's first enhanced store. Steam will be that store. Better than it was before.
This makes no business sense for Microsoft.
We don't know the behind-the-scenes business deals Microsoft may or may not have with Valve though. Valve's cut is 30% which gives them quite a bit of wiggle room to potentially share.

Maybe Microsoft gets 15-20% (instead of their usual 30%) for every game purchased on Steam through the SeX UI? Valve still ends up with a bigger cut than Epic, and has a potentially massive number of new customers to market to.

Without knowing the particulars, we can't really say for certain whether it makes business sense or not.
 

Vol5

Member
It sounds wild and would be absolutely huge. Imagine Death Stranding, on Steam, playable on an XBOX.... :cool: My worry would be running windows on it - although perhaps they have a W10 core mode for Series X layered with big picture? Would all games have to have a specific patch to run on XSX?

Too good to be true perhaps.
 

DrAspirino

Banned
If they did something like this, I expect they would start not with Steam or EGS but with Game Pass on PC. I think they did most of the work on the OS side this gen with Xbox One, it wouldn't even be a stretch.
Technically it is possible. If you see Windows roadmap, the unification of the system was their goal years ago (I would even say a decade). Xbox One shipped with a very customized version of Windows 8 and later on they released an update that runs Windows 10 core + custom UI + hypervisor.

Now that I think of it, if every game on Xbox (and even the shell itself) runs on their own virtual machine handled by the hypervisor, it wouldn't be crazy to offer a "Windows environment" running Windows 10 S on a virtual machine with limited hardware access. That way, if a user really wants or needs to use Windows, it would be able to, but not in a way to put in danger the xbox games bussiness model.
 

DrAspirino

Banned
By the way, searching on the internet, here's an article on Windows Central about the Windows Core OS strategy. It adds weight to the rumor and it would explain the origin of it.

With Windows Core OS, Microsoft is building a universal base for Windows that can be used across all these different devices. Instead of having to develop a new version of Windows 10 for every new device type that comes along, Microsoft can simply use Windows Core OS to start. They would then pull in features and functions it has already built for it, and create it as an OS for that device type. All that would be created with less overhead and fewer resources used.

Windows Core OS strips Windows down to the bare minimum. It doesn't have legacy Win32 program support, or feature any legacy shell interfaces, and sticks to UWP as a core for the operating system as it's lighter and already universal. From there, Microsoft can build out Windows Core OS with different components and features that it can then apply to devices where necessary.

The shared component idea extends to the UI as well, thanks to a universal shell Microsoft has been building called Composable Shell, also known as CShell for short. CShell is the other half of this universal idea for Windows Core OS, and allows Microsoft to build shell experiences that can be shared across devices, and even bundled up together where it makes sense. For example, any shell-facing feature like an Action Center, Start menu, or taskbar, can then be used across all CShell-powered devices without having to rewrite them to fit on different devices every single time.

Imagine a gaming PC, which, when being used with a mouse and keyboard, uses an actual regular desktop interface with a taskbar and Start menu. When an Xbox controller is connected, however, it boots into a "Game Mode" that enables the same Xbox shell you can find on Xbox consoles, except it's all running on your PC and has all your PC games ready to go. That would be pretty cool. These ideas are all very possible with CShell and Windows Core OS.

So... since it's now confirmed that it's technically possible, the remaining question is: will it happen? I doubt it, but the rumor has some wheight.
 
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AlphabetSoup

Neo Member
This is huge I wasn't sold on the series X by any stretch and was planning on skipping Xbox for the first time ever but now my interest is peaked
 

NickFire

Member
If this turns out true, and if this allows people to play The Old Republic on their TV with a controller, that would be cool in my eyes.
 

Three

Member
you should really try to better yourself in 2020 stop doing crack
Why not? They already sell surface hardware at profit. If their business plan is to have gamepass everywhere (all hardware) and try and sell the series x as a gaming machine at a profit what would be insane about that? Not saying it's about to happen but what would be crazy about MS getting into the PC hardware market but marketed to gamers as the 'xbox' brand?
 

Jad-Just_A_Dale

Neo Member
I would have believed streaming or even a limited amount of cross-purchasing/library access. Kind of like with GOG, but you get to access other libraries games on Xbox if they're available. Just straight up native EGS & Steam? Why start such an unbelievable rumor? I mean if it's true I'll be happy to state that I was wrong, but good for me I'm not.
 

Spukc

always chasing the next thrill
Why not? They already sell surface hardware at profit. If their business plan is to have gamepass everywhere (all hardware) and try and sell the series x as a gaming machine at a profit what would be insane about that? Not saying it's about to happen but what would be crazy about MS getting into the PC hardware market but marketed to gamers as the 'xbox' brand?
Have you recently checked the price of the surface studio ?
 

quest

Not Banned from OT
Why not? They already sell surface hardware at profit. If their business plan is to have gamepass everywhere (all hardware) and try and sell the series x as a gaming machine at a profit what would be insane about that? Not saying it's about to happen but what would be crazy about MS getting into the PC hardware market but marketed to gamers as the 'xbox' brand?
That whole 5 dollars a month for PC gamepass is totally worth throwing away your console business and giving gabe all the profits. PC gamepass exists to inflate MAU nothing at 5 dollars a month it probably does not break even it's being subsidized by the console gamepass and gold.
 
Steam isn't coming to Xbox and it certainly wouldn't come to PlayStation and Nintendo either.

How would you even play something like the original X-COM games that run via DOSbox with anything other than a mouse and keyboard? Or Deus Ex: Invisible War, a game that has trouble running on any PC with multiple cores and momentarily takes you out of the game every time you change levels?

Compatibility issues aren't going to go away just because you're playing PC games on the Xbox Series X.
 
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I_D

Member
I could see maybe "Games for Windows" games becoming a cross-platform option; but even that's still pretty darn iffy.
Steam and other game stores is even less believable.


But damn if it wouldn't be fantastic. I'd buy an Xbox X in a heartbeat if I knew it could play all of my Steam games.
 
I think this rumour started a week ago somewhere and came to a halt right away. Surprised it's back.
Once people believed that Xbox is willing to lose money with Gamepass, the same people are now willing to believe Xbox is willing to lose ALL the money from consoles by losing software sales. Basically turning Xbox into a literal money pit for no reason, giving people subsidized PCs sold at near cost and want nothing back in return.
 

vkbest

Member
Even if this is a false rumor, this is because I said several times, Sony porting their games to PC would be a huge error.
 
And give steam that 30% cut to sell software on their designed platform.

How are they going to make money then?
They will add their own 30%! (Not sure how they would monitor the Steam and epic sales, but that could be arranged, if they make a client for the platform).

If the machine has a Windows 10 mode, I think that it would be a closed off version that only runs executables from the windows store, which makes the idea realistic (and a pretty good PR move, as it gives the machine a pretty good level of flexibility).
 

vkbest

Member
Once people believed that Xbox is willing to lose money with Gamepass, the same people are now willing to believe Xbox is willing to lose ALL the money from consoles by losing software sales. Basically turning Xbox into a literal money pit for no reason, giving people subsidized PCs sold at near cost and want nothing back in return.

I think this is hard to see, but why people would buy a game on Steam, when the same game you could buy on XBOX and play with better performance? This would be a good move from Microsoft to attract people who can't play some games you can't play on XBOX (Japanese games or even some Sony funded titles such as Death Stranding, Detroit, etc)
 

DESTROYA

Member
Even if this is a false rumor, this is because I said several times, Sony porting their games to PC would be a huge error.
Totally different having Sony port some games to PC than having a console access all PC games.
Why exactly would it be a huge error? You get sales from consoles and from PC.
 

vkbest

Member
Totally different having Sony port some games to PC than having a console access all PC games.
Why exactly would it be a huge error? You get sales from consoles and from PC.

Who would buy a PS5 if you can play XBOX games, PC games and Sony games (ported to PC) buying the next XBOX at same price?

The most money Sony is getting is from royalties on third party games on PSN and Physical games, Sony would lose huge amount of money.
 
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Three

Member
That whole 5 dollars a month for PC gamepass is totally worth throwing away your console business and giving gabe all the profits. PC gamepass exists to inflate MAU nothing at 5 dollars a month it probably does not break even it's being subsidized by the console gamepass and gold.
Gamepass regular price is $10 a month. Why would it be throwing away your console business?
 
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