Xbox Streaming Device is Still “Years Away” According to Phil Spencer

Microsoft says the Xbox streaming device unveiled last year is still years away from becoming a reality. According to Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer, the Xbox game streaming system is now “years away.” Spencer spoke about the Xbox game streaming gadget, Keystone, that we recently noticed on his shelf yesterday at The Wall Street Journal’s Tech Live conference.

Keystone was the codename of something we were incubating internally, which was … a streaming console, so there’s no local gameplay, low-cost, plug it into a TV, and you’d be able to stream Xbox games,” said Spencer. “In the late spring, we pivoted to working with Samsung. We put an app on Samsung TVs that let you play Xbox games, and I still have the prototype; it sits on the shelf behind my computer.”

Microsoft initially declared last year that it intended to market an Xbox streaming device, even though Keystone was only a prototype. But it won’t happen any time soon now.

Will we do a streaming device at some point? I suspect we will, but I think it’s years away.”

Microsoft’s decision to abandon a dedicated Xbox streaming device is unknown, but it may have something to do with size. Keystone resembles a miniature Xbox Series S, but users are accustomed to dongle-like gadgets that hang out of HDMI ports, like the Chromecast. Even though Microsoft was careful to refer to Keystone as a “streaming device” rather than a stick, many people still thought it was a streaming stick.

Microsoft’s Project Keystone is anticipated to be a gadget that can be linked to a television and used to access the company’s Xbox Cloud Gaming service. Furthermore, it might be capable of supporting Netflix and other entertainment providers. Before Xbox Cloud Gaming was entirely ready for TVs, Microsoft still had some work to perform on the platform itself. Even though the business got an Xbox TV app on Samsung TVs, it only supports streaming games at a resolution of 1080p at a maximum frame rate of 60.

Future Xbox game streaming consoles will be created to work in conjunction with Xbox Game Pass. The actual time frame for the release of the streaming console is yet unknown, and by the looks of Phil’s interview, we can judge that it is still years after.

Source: The Verge