Here's how to get in on the cloud gaming action, and what you need to know about it. With many games easily passing 50GB, that can save a lot of downloading time and storage space. Making cloud gaming harder to pull off than video streaming is the added complication of sending controller input (pressing buttons and moving analog sticks) up to the cloud, the game actions playing out on that remote server, then beaming the resulting video output back to your screen.īut just as few people still download full movies or hoard DVDs, eventually game discs will disappear (they're already on the way out) and even full game downloads may be replaced by streaming. The content lives on a remote server somewhere and is beamed to your screen in real time. Why would you want to stream an Xbox game to your Xbox? First, Xbox One owners could play newer Xbox Series X|S games without getting a hard-to-find new console, and cloud streaming also means you don't have to set aside 40GB or more for each game to download and store locally.Ĭloud gaming, or game streaming, is similar to watching a Netflix movie. Following months of limited beta testing, Xbox Cloud Gaming arrived earlier this summer to all Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscribers, though still in beta.Īfter this hands-on was originally published, Microsoft also announced that Xbox Cloud gaming was coming to Xbox Series X and Series S consoles, as well as the last-gen Xbox One. It is, however, one step closer now that many Xbox Game Pass games can be streamed to iPhones, iPads and Windows PCs. Cloud gaming may be the future, but the future isn't quite here yet.

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