Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Microsoft Developing Low-Cost Xbox Streaming Dongle That Could Rival Apple TV
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
"Apple Arcarde will struggle to compete" lol... it won't even be able to... ?
Apple has always been so clumsy with gaming... very "boomer" like mentality. It's sad.
Apple has always been so clumsy with gaming... very "boomer" like mentality. It's sad.
I simply do not understand the appeal of cloud gaming, anything that involves precise timing...which is most games, is pretty useless. It's just a marketing bulletpoint to me
I suspect gamers fall into 2 categories: hardcore and casual. The hardcore gamers will spend $$$ on rigs and timing will matter; all teh casual gamer wants is some fun play and lags, unless severe, will not be an issue.
The only people who believe it is a rival are those from apple themselves who use “console quality graphics” whenever they talk about any game on their platforms.
I’d be happy with TV and Arcade, now that controller requirements are relaxed, if Apple would court developers like Sega, Konami and Capcom to bring more stuff like Super Monkey Ball, Contra/Castlevania Anniversary collections, and Ghosts ‘n Goblins Resurrection to the platform.
Check out how Roku makes money. 0% of profit comes from the hardware. That means they are selling the hardware at a loss because they can make their profits harvesting & selling your data, as well as via advertisements.
This is why Apple can’t compete at the low end. They don’t want to be in the data-selling business nor would a big Peacock button on their remote fit with their brand. The low end of the market is the most price sensitive, so attempting to capture profits on the sale of a dongle is essentially impossible.
One can already Airplay Xcloud from Ipad/Iphone to AppleTV using an xbox controller, so what is the benefit of a separate gamepass stick? Not necessary for Apple TV users.
I agree, as the Xcloud gaming is max FullHD so how does that look on a 4K TV? Blurred, not sharp, etc something like old times gameconsole PS3. Doubt Microsoft can do the 4k streaming cause the bitstreams would be huge.
I think it's more that Apple's definition of gaming is meant to cater to their billion-strong iPhone user base, and less for the small subset of users who own an Apple TV and have a spare PS5 controller lying around. I am not going to be playing candy crush on my 4k tv, and I am not going to be playing doom eternal while waiting for my bus either.
Price point will be the key to the success of this one. Looks like Microsoft is all in on cloud gaming.
The benefit is not having to buy $700 of Apple devices in order to play a service meant to replace a $300 Xbox.
It’s assumed that AAA games are of interest to Apple. They understand niche markets and focused all of their attention on them at one point. While this market has grow substantially, the market for casual games on Apple’s nearly Billion devices is is much larger.
This is why they haven’t cared as much about high end gaming. Doing so would put them at the mercy of the big game studios.
Apple looked at Microsoft winning with Xbox and didn’t care. They lost money for a decade to build their franchise while Apple has released product after product that has been an immediate success while maintaining their profit margins. Apple TV+ is really the answer for Apple and Arcade may follow suite with a captive gaming studio focused on VR/AR. I don’t think they are interested in any thing that depends on developers like Epic or Microsoft who have proven unreliable or trustworthy to base your investments on.
For perspective, after a decade of looses Xbox was successful and after another decade they finally beat Sony in gaming revenue last quarter with at total of 4.6 million in revenue.
While Apple's focus on Services with products like TV+ Fitness+ Arcade and Apple Music made a total of $19.5 billion in revenue — With only a few years on the market.
If this were to be a rival to Apple TV, apple would have to be serious about gaming, and not have an operating system that kneecaps todays games. Nobody thinks any Apple product now, or even in the foreseeable future can run say a Battlefield game, or even Fortnite without becoming a brick due to heat etc. Apple may be in the game business but it is the mobile games.
It's not most games only competitive online games.
I use Stadia regularly to play Fifa, Hitman, Control, Assassin's Creed games and they all run really well.
Apple's services like TV+, Arcade and Apple Music aren't really that successful and seem to have hit a dead end and even if they generate more revenue I doubt profit margins are good.
Microsoft's investment and tenacity in gaming has made them a huge influence in this area. They now own some of the most popular and successful gaming IP and they have a much better path to growth than Apple's TV+ or Arcade services.
Last edited:
I strongly believe that having Apple invested into high-end gaming would benefit everybody, including users of Apple products who doesn't care about gaming at all.
- They'd probably have to properly support Vulkan, which in turn would've posed more serious threat to Microsoft and DirectX
- Metal would surely have better performance
- Game Center would finally get a nice refresh, maybe even deserve a place in a Home Screen again
- Both iOS and macOS would have better memory management, highly optimised windows manager, and other components catered for better performance, which in turn would improve performance in pro applications, too