Microsoft offered to bring exclusive Xbox games to iPhone

Microsoft offered to Bring exclusive Xbox games to iPhone, based on a bunch of private emails the edge It was revealed after Epic’s trial against Apple.

These games could have been played in plataforma Xbox Cloud Gaming (xCloud) from Microsoft, made up of servers with Xbox One and Xbox Series X processors, rather than relying on your phone’s local processing power.

If the deal closes, you could theoretically buy a copy of a game from the Apple App Store and play it like any other app, rather than having to pay for a monthly subscription to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate with a fixed catalog of games and then have to use a Microsoft App Store solution based on an interface web.

This is shown by emails between Laurie Wright, head of business development at Microsoft Xbox and several members of the Apple App Store teams Microsoft has been concerned about serving Xbox games based on individual apps from the App Store.

Microsoft stated that “The complexity of managing the creation of hundreds or thousands of applications”How they’ll have to update each of these apps to fix any bugs, and how all those app icons can clutter up iOS home screens, among other concerns.

We believe the issues described here will create frustration and confusion for customers, resulting in a lower experience on Apple devices compared to a similar experience on all other platforms.

In March of last year, Microsoft suggested that it could create those hundreds of individual apps to submit to the App Store, as long as it could make those apps look a little closer in a nutshell, and not include all the software needed to run games on . The cloud is in every application.

If we had one application of the streaming technology it would take about 150MB, but the other apps would only take about 30MB and it wouldn’t have to be updated when the streaming technology was updated. This means a better user experience

At that time, Microsoft . also introduced The idea of ​​bringing Xbox exclusive games to iOS, Assuming they’ll need it too Streaming technology bundle as a separate app to deliver the right experience.

It will be an incredibly exciting opportunity for iOS users to get access to exclusive AAA titles as well as Game Pass games.

Obviously none of this happened. Microsoft rejected Apple’s new App Store guidelines in September 2020 and announced the web version of xCloud a month later. It arrived last April.

Microsoft says it was Apple that rejected their proposals, as they insisted that every game be forced to include a full set of streaming software.

Our suggestion to fetch games by individual apps is designed to comply with the App Store policies. Rejected by Apple at our request that there be a single streaming technology application to support individual game applications, as described in the initial email.

Forcing every game to include our suite of streaming technologies turned out to be unrealistic from a support and engineering standpoint, and would create an incredibly negative customer experience.

At the end of last April, the director of games for the Apple App Store, Mark Grimm, indicated that this was not the only reason why the companies did not come to an agreement: it could also have something to do with money.

Microsoft didn’t want to include in-app purchases in every game, which Apple was supposed to allow Microsoft games to bypass App Store rules on purchases.

“Unfortunately, Microsoft has suggested a version of xCloud that does not meet the App Store review guidelines, specifically the requirement to use in-app purchase to unlock in-app features or add-ons.”Read a statement from Apple.

however, Microsoft denies that in-app purchases affected the final decision. “The reasons for disapproval are not related to in-app purchase capabilities; we currently offer Xbox Cloud games through a unique Xbox Game Pass app on the Google Play Store with no IAP enabled, for example, and we’ll do the same through the App Store if allowed.”