Mar 15, 2021 While there’s still time before iOS users will finally be able to join in on the fun, looks like M1 Mac users can already enjoy xCloud games using the Android emulator. For those who aren’t familiar, Microsoft’s xCloud is a cloud gaming service, which allows subscribers of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate to play more than 150 games on Android. Xbox Cloud Gaming is our technology that allows you to play over 100 console games on the devices you already have with Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and a compatible controller. As part of your Xbox Game Pass Ultimate membership, you can enjoy the console games you love, the people you want to play together with, on the devices you already have, all. Xcloud working well on Safari for Mac, they should support it officially. Today I was fed up with an issue on Google Chrome for Macs on Apple Silicon that prevents some buttons from working at all on the Xbox Series Controller (LS/RS, Share and Xbox). So I tried playing xcloud directly on Safari. Feb 15, 2021 xCloud articles on MacRumors.com. Microsoft has announced that following beta testing for a small group of users, it plans to launch its xCloud game streaming service on Apple devices via Safari.
Microsoft released a beta of their web-based xCloud game streaming service recently. It would seem that this version of the service will work with any web browser that supports WebRTC, so let’s see how that works.
I decided to plug an Xbox controller into the USB port of my Pinebook Pro running Manjaro Linux and the open-source Chromium web browser.
If you have an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription, you can try the new beta web-based streaming service at Xbox.com/Play as well. The system requirements say that you need a Windows 10 PC or an Apple iOS 14+ device, but… guess what… Linux works, too.
Of course, you’ll also want a high-speed 10Mbps+ internet connection for the streaming, and an Xbox controller plugged in via USB or paired via Bluetooth. Microsoft mainly built this version because Apple won’t let them make a game streaming app for the Apple App Store, so the web-based method is a workaround for that. The bonus is that this web-based version happens to work with a lot of other platforms too.
This Pinebook Pro has extremely low specs by the way. It’s a six-core, 1.4GHz, Pine64 ARM processor with only 4GB of RAM and 64GB eMMC storage. If that was running Windows 10, everything would be laggy!
See below for how Xbox Game Streaming actually works on this very inexpensive Linux laptop running Manjaro XFCE Linux.
As you’ll see, the simple games work quite well, while more action-oriented games are probably going to need a bit more processing power on the client-side. Outriders worked ok, but there was certainly some latency, and Halo 5 Guardians turned out to be practically unplayable.
News
2021-08-07 Apple Arcade Surpasses 200 Games via @__tosh
2021-06-27 Parallels Desktop 16: Birthday Sale (25% price discount) via @__tosh
2021-04-19 Microsoft xCloud Beta for iPhone and iPad to Launch This Week via @__tosh
2021-04-04 Apple adds more games to Apple Arcade including new titles like Fantasian as well as classics like Cut the Rope, Fruit Ninja, Solitaire, Threes and Monument Valley via @__tosh
2021-01-15 Apple begins blocking M1 Mac users from side loading iPhone and iPad applications via @__tosh
2021-01-14 Dolphin (Nintendo Wii/GameCube emulator): 30-50% speedup as well as improved stability from native M1 support on Apple Silicon Macs compared to Rosetta 2 via discord:plex123,goldmaster11
2021-01-14 Apple might stop sideloading of iOS games (and other apps) on Apple Silicon Macs in a future version of macOS Big Sur via discord:goldmaster11
2020-12-31 MoltenVK 1.1.1 brings Vulkan support to Apple Silicon Macs via @__tosh
2020-12-30 10 Best FPS Games on M1 Apple Silicon Mac via @Andytizer
2020-12-26 Parallels Advanced Gaming Setup Guide for M1 Apple Silicon and Windows 10 ARM via @Andytizer
2020-12-24 The Game 'Inside' is free today in the Epic Games Store via @__tosh
2020-12-22 Apple working on 2021 Apple TV with stronger focus in gaming via @markgurman
2020-12-22 Steam Winter Sale is on until January 5th 2021 via @Andytizer
2020-12-22 JoyMapperSilicon adds support for Nintendo Joy-Con and Nintendo Pro controllers to Apple Silicon Macs via @chenqibin99
2020-12-22 Experience Report: M1 MacBook Air vs Intel MacBook Pro 16' for gaming via @__tosh
2020-12-18 Great News for Game Compatibility: Fallout 2 runs well via Parallels on Windows for ARM via @Andytizer
2020-12-16 StepMania 5.3 is one of the first native games for Apple Silicon Macs with full support for controllers and pads via @TeamRizu
2020-12-14 Apple releases macOS Big Sur 11.1 adding support for CS:GO and full screen support for iPad games via @__tosh
2020-12-09 Xbox Cloud Gaming Coming to iOS in Spring 2021 via @__tosh
2020-12-08 Google Stadia arrives in eight new European countries via @__tosh
2020-12-05 EVE Online: CCP Games developing a native macOS client via @PeterBlanc11
2020-12-02 Baldur's Gate III: Patch 3 released, adds support for Rosetta 2 via @MrMacRight
Xcloud Mac M1 Plus
2020-12-02 Apple names Disco Elysium 'Mac Game of the Year 2020' via @__toshXcloud Mac M1 Driver
2020-12-02 Mac version of Metro: Exodus in the works according to 4A Games via @Andytizer
