Microsoft Plans Mobile Games Store To Rival Apple and Google (ft.com) 29
Microsoft is preparing to launch a new app store for games on iPhones and Android smartphones as soon as next year if its $75bn acquisition of Activision Blizzard is cleared by regulators, according to the head of its Xbox business. From a report: New rules requiring Apple and Google to open up their mobile platforms to app stores owned and operated by other companies are expected to come into force from March 2024 under the EU's Digital Markets Act. "We want to be in a position to offer Xbox and content from both us and our third-party partners across any screen where somebody would want to play," said Phil Spencer, chief executive of Microsoft Gaming, in an interview ahead of this week's annual Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. "Today, we can't do that on mobile devices but we want to build towards a world that we think will be coming where those devices are opened up."
Microsoft is fighting with regulators in the US, Europe and UK, which have all raised concerns about the potential impact on competition from the owner of the Xbox console buying the developer of Call of Duty, one of the world's most popular games franchises. PlayStation maker Sony has been a vocal opponent of the deal. However, Spencer argues the deal can boost competition in what he called the "largest platform people play on" -- smartphones -- where Apple and Google currently operate what some antitrust authorities have called a "duopoly" over distribution of games and other apps. [...] While acknowledging it was hard to predict exactly when Microsoft will be able to launch its own store, Spencer said it would be "pretty trivial" for Microsoft to adapt its Xbox and Game Pass apps to sell games and subscriptions on mobile devices. Microsoft's current lack of mobile games was an "obvious hole in our capability" that it needed Activision Blizzard to fill, he added.
Microsoft is fighting with regulators in the US, Europe and UK, which have all raised concerns about the potential impact on competition from the owner of the Xbox console buying the developer of Call of Duty, one of the world's most popular games franchises. PlayStation maker Sony has been a vocal opponent of the deal. However, Spencer argues the deal can boost competition in what he called the "largest platform people play on" -- smartphones -- where Apple and Google currently operate what some antitrust authorities have called a "duopoly" over distribution of games and other apps. [...] While acknowledging it was hard to predict exactly when Microsoft will be able to launch its own store, Spencer said it would be "pretty trivial" for Microsoft to adapt its Xbox and Game Pass apps to sell games and subscriptions on mobile devices. Microsoft's current lack of mobile games was an "obvious hole in our capability" that it needed Activision Blizzard to fill, he added.
Re:It will be great for OSs to allow new app store (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: It will be great for OSs to allow new app stor (Score:2)
That is not what strawman means.
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Safety. Security.
If you use anything outside our wonderful walled gardens, you're at risk.
Safety. Security.
Think of your children being exposed to unsavory material outside our walled gardens.
Safety. Security.
Russian hackers are everywhere except our walled gardens. Do you want to end up like Ukraine?
Safety. Security. Think of the children and Ukrainians!
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This is 100% going to happen. Everyone is going to have their own special just-for-them app stores. They are all going to pop-up non-stop notifications telling you that their apps need updating and then when you update them they are going to install 4 other apps that you didn't want as well. It's going to be just like the old days of windows software where every time you tried to install something it "recommended" also installing 4 other applications (that were really just paid ad ware). It's going to be a
Re: It will be great for OSs to allow new app stor (Score:2)
install 4 other apps that you didn't want as well.
I don't know about iOS, but on Android this isn't possible. You'll know if you're installing additional apps. Either you're spreading FUD or on iOS apple can just install whatever apps they want whenever they want.
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You must be young (not that there is a problem with that). But in the old days of windows, yeah the installer would generally tell you that it was also installing other applications as well. Most users would just click "ok" and then be smashed with adware.
Re: It will be great for OSs to allow new app sto (Score:2)
I know exactly what you're talking about, and that literally can't be done in Android. While an app can download other apps, it can't even ask you to install them without you giving it permission to do so first by going into the phone's settings menu, and then once you do so, you still have to go through the entire install process just like you did with the first one, approve it's permission manifest, tap past the warnings, etc.
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Well, if the user installs their store, then they have already given it all the permissions it needs to start installing more apps. Then it's just a series of "Ok"s clicked by the user. Users almost always click the ok.
Re: It will be great for OSs to allow new app sto (Score:2)
No, it's not. There's no button for "just install these 10 apps". They all have to be done one at a time, and each one requires several approvals and tapping past several warnings.
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I just can't wait for everyone to start bitching about having to install a bunch of app stores and set up accounts for them just to download the apps when companies start making their own and only putting their apps on their own stores. Kind of like streaming today.
Lets start. Why in the fuck do I need yet another account for yet another shitty frontend for a file server? Not like this is going to improve the quality of the games on the platforms. Those are the trashiest of trash.
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Plans... (Score:2)
They are planning to make an app store. They may hope it will rival Apple and Google, but hopes are not plans.
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REQUIRING APPLE!!! (Score:1)
Plans? (Score:1)
I plan to ride a flying unicorn to Disneyland where I'm planning to replace the water in Splash Mountain with a river of chocolate.
You can plan anything you want, but you're still going to have a few core problems to deal with:
1. Nobody trusts you when it comes to security after 30 years of constant zero-days and botched patches that make the system worse.
2. Unless you actually have content that people give a damn about, nobody is downloading your xbox app store trash.
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I plan to ride a flying unicorn to Disneyland where I'm planning to replace the water in Splash Mountain with a river of chocolate.
Real talk, I need to be a part of this plan.
1. Nobody trusts you when it comes to security after 30 years of constant zero-days and botched patches that make the system worse.
I don't think Microsoft's uphill battle has much to do with its security track record. To their credit on this front, I'm hard pressed to recall a story of a malware app ending up in the MS store on Windows, which is more than can be said for either Google or Apple...though I'll certainly make room for the possibility of the user count having something to do with that.
2. Unless you actually have content that people give a damn about, nobody is downloading your xbox app store trash.
I'm actually thinking that this is the sort of thing that may well make some sense. An Xbox Live
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No malware in the microsoft store because nobody uses that store.
What about console games stores? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Fight with your wallet. Only buy games on physical media. Don't buy download only games. It's not like you pay less for the digital download, you just get less.
Yeah, you'll have to wait a little bit to play. That's a good thing. It builds character.
They already have one (Score:2)
The already have an app store, and it is pretty pathetic. It used to support Windows Mobile, which was nice in theory, but equally pathetic in reality. Lots of promises, little action.
Why should this one be different?
Microsoft's app store is shit (Score:2)
You cannot specify criteria to sort by.
You cannot specify criteria to filter by.
I wrote an app.
When I search for it BY NAME it comes in about 20th.
It sucks.
And the new store will, of course, also MSuck.