Microsoft announces new Xbox division that will publish cloud-native games
Microsoft has announced a new Xbox Game Studios division. This will focus on publishing ‘cloud-native games’. Kim Swift will lead the division. She previously worked at Valve and later joined Google Stadia.
Microsoft says in a developer video that the cloud division will partner with studios to develop cloud-native games that “deliver experiences only possible with cloud technology.” Those titles should then come exclusively to the Xbox ecosystem, writes VGC. The division will become part of Xbox Game Studios Publishing and Microsoft will support involved developers in the development process, among other things.
Currently, Microsoft already offers cloud gaming through its Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription. Via Xbox Cloud Gaming, console games are run on servers and streamed to users’ consoles or PCs.
Kim Swift, the head of the new division, calls this “the low-hanging fruit of cloud content.” Swift previously worked at Valve on Portal and Left 4 Dead and until May last year at cloud gaming service Google Stadia. Last year it was already announced that Swift would start working at Xbox Game Studios and focus on cloud games.
With cloud-native games, certain parts of a game can be processed in the cloud, says Swift. For example, runtime calculations can be performed in the cloud. With this, things like graphic rendering, lighting, destruction, the behavior of NPCs, procedural generation and other game aspects would be controlled in real time via the cloud. According to Swift, the cloud can also be used during the development process, for example with QA bots based on machine learning that should simplify the testing of games.
Kim Swift says this will be a long-term project and cloud gaming is still in its infancy at the moment. She does say that the company is ready to partner with developers who want to create cloud games. Microsoft is not the only company working on cloud-native games, by the way. Ubisoft recently announced its Scalar platform, which serves a similar purpose.