Yesterday, Google unveiled its Stadia game streaming platform. Instead of relying on a traditional console, the company claims that it uses the power of the cloud to achieve unbelievable visuals and expansive worlds. While a lot of questions remain to be answered like pricing and input lag, it seems like Microsoft's Vice President of Gaming Phil Spencer saw this as confirmation of where the industry was headed.
According to a report by Thurrott, Spencer sent an email discussing Stadia and what it means for Project xCloud to employees after its announcement. Project xCloud is Microsoft's game streaming platform which should enter public trials this year. You can read a condensed version of the email below.
We just wrapped up watching the Google announcement of Stadia as team here at GDC. Their announcement is validation of the path we embarked on two years ago.Today we saw a big... competitor enter the gaming market, and frame the necessary ingredients for success as content, community, and cloud. There were no big surprises in their announcement although I was impressed by their leveraging of YouTube, the use of Google Assistant, and the new Wi-Fi controller.But I want to get back to us, there has been really good work to get us to the position where we are poised to compete for two billion gamers across the planet. Google went big today and we have a couple of months until E3 when we will go big.We have to stay agile and continue to build with our customer at the center. We have the content, community, cloud team, and strategy, and as I've been saying for a while, it's all about execution. This is even more true today.
Game streaming definitely seems like it's the future of the industry, but Stadia still suffers from video artifacts and high input lag according to a report by Digital Foundry. Hopefully Project xCloud will be able to address these concerns at E3 2019.
Spencer promised that Microsoft will "go big" for the event, but it's unclear what this means. Unlike Google, Project xCloud needs to talk about everything from power, bandwidth requirements, picture quality, artifacts, and more to appease customers. What are some of the questions you want answered? Let us know.
The all-inclusive Anthem Xbox One package
Anthem's Xbox One S 1 TB bundle packs everything you need to get started in the game.
