Microsoft’s mysterious Arcadia project might be a game-streaming service

These days, consoles need to be more than just simple game machines. They need to be future game machines. The tried and trusted method of inserting a physical disc may not be going anywhere soon due to consumers actually wanting to own something that can’t be taken away from them, but there’s a growing market in digital games as well. And that market may soon be making way for digital streaming games.

For a while now, Microsoft has been working on something that is only known as “Arcadia”. While I was hoping that it would be a massive hub for game of ye olden days past (A MAN CAN DREAM DAMMIT), those fantasies have been dashed. Because according to snoop site Zdnet, Arcadia will be Microsoft’s answer to streaming games, a competitor of sorts to PlayStation Now.

According to anonymous sources at Zdnet, Arcadia is “the technology being developed by a new streaming team in Microsoft’s Operating Systems Group”.

The Arcadia technology replaces the discontinued ‘Rio’ game-streaming technology which Microsoft demonstrated at the company’s annual meeting in September 2013.

Built using that magical Azure cloud that Microsoft enjoys bringing up at every event, Arcadia will potentially stream games and apps onto Windows, iOS and Xbox devices. Android apps could also possibly be included. As you can expect, the service won’t be a freebie, with some sort of monetisation in the works.

What we do know is that Microsoft has an upcoming event for its Windows 10 operating system, where the software giant has revealed that gaming is also on the cards as Xboss Phil Spencer will also be present. Arcadia sounds like an interesting idea. It’s also an idea that will be completely useless locally, much like PlayStation Now. At least the two have that much in common.

Last Updated: December 17, 2014