Xbox Cloud Gaming now available to everyone on Xbox Game Pass Ultimate

Xbox Cloud Gaming is now open to everyone (pic: Microsoft)

Microsoft has confirmed that its cloud gaming system is now running on Xbox Series X hardware, as the service is upgraded once again.

The Xbox Cloud Gaming service has taken another major step towards being a finished product, as Microsoft announce that it is now available to all Xbox Game Pass Ultimate members in 22 different countries.

Previously you had to sign up to an invite-only version of the service but, according to a new Xbox Wire blog, now all you need is an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate account and a PC or mobile device.

The service now works via Chrome, Safari, and Microsoft Edge browsers and has been upgraded to use Xbox Series X at Microsoft’s data centres, which in turn has helped improved the quality of the experience.

Despite now using Xbox Series X tech the games will still only stream at a maximum resolution of 1080p, at 60fps, but then the service is still technically only a beta, and further hardware updates are promised in the future.

Over 100 games from the Xbox Game Pass library currently work with the service, which means you can play any first party Xbox title on the go with nothing but your phone or laptop.

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Microsoft clearly sees cloud gaming as the future of Xbox, something which will at some point in the future will make consoles unnecessary.

Given the quality of the service at the moment, and the vagaries of broadband connections – particularly in the US – that future is still some way off though and Microsoft has been at pains to emphasise that it has no plans to stop making consoles any time soon.

Once cloud gaming does become dominant though Microsoft has an obvious advantage, in that its data centres are amongst the fastest in the world – to the point where Sony has already signed up to use them.

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