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Microsoft aims for a unified experience
If you've heard of Games for Windows Live (GFWL), then you're probably familiar with some of its troubles. The difficulties some users had with fundamental things like logging in and updating the GFWL could produce some epic tales of woe. GFWL was deactivated last year, and with it went its online matchmaking system, meaning that games that used this service to create multiplayer sessions either no longer had multiplayer or had to plug into something else, such as SteamWorks. With the next big version of Windows coming out this year, Microsoft wants to give it another shot, and thankfully their using a different set of tools and also introducing some interesting new features. We sat down for a lecture on the subject, conducted by Microsoft engineers Vijay Gajjala and Brian Tyler.
First of all, the Xbox Live service on Windows 10 is running native desktop PC code, in a Windows 10 app, rather than being a port. Windows tablets and phones running Windows 10 all get their native apps, which in theory should mean smoother operation. Microsoft is also talking about single sign-on, so you can use one Microsoft account across all Win10 devices to log into XBL as well as logging into the device itself. When asked about this service's availability for earlier versions of Windows, and for Android or Max OSX devices, the company had no firm plans on the horizon. Don't hold your breath.
When you log into XBL on Windows 10, you get the complete XBL experience – your profile page, achievements, leaderboards, messages, activity feeds, game clips, privacy settings, basically everything that's exposed to an Xbox One user. There's a "Game DVR" where you can record gameplay and upload it to be viewed on other devices logged into XBL. (And in case you haven't heard, you can stream Xbox One games to your PC and play them there.)
As far as Microsoft is concerned, there is no difference between what Xbox One users can do and see, and what PC users can do and see when logged into XBL. Microsoft is also adding a Twitter-like feature where users can be followed, rather than requiring an accepted friend request to see another XBL player's activity. This can be disabled in your privacy settings, if you wish.
Windows 10 developers who want to use XBL now get access to a fancy telemetry system. In a nutshell, a dev can flag certain player activities like acquiring a specific weapon, loading a particular level, or completing a lap in a racing game, and have those events uploaded to a "stats engine" in Microsoft's cloud. This is used to handle achievements, but the data can also be aggregated and analyzed to better understand how people are playing the game. So you could answer questions like, "Is this boss fight too hard?" or "Is this secret room a little *too* secret?" This data feed is an optional service that developers can subscribe to or ignore.
Devs also get access to the Windows Dev Center, which is a desktop client where they can do things like add a challenge to the game (a limited-time achievement), or create a leaderboard for a specific activity, like number of bad guys killed or number of explosions caused. These things can be staged on a test server before being published live, to catch problems before they're published live.
In a separate but closely linked GDC session conducted by Ferdinand Schober, a software development engineer also at Microsoft, we gleaned some details about cross-platform multiplayer. Session data is stored in Microsoft's cloud, so it will be difficult to misplace. Like GFWL, Microsoft will handle matchmaking on its own servers, and developers can find-tune the player skill ranges to search for, and how long the matcher searches before expanding its searching area another notch. Like on the Xbox One, invites and joining in progress are also handled with a universal UI, rather than game-customized interfaces or notifications.
This stuff isn't available in the Windows 10 Technical Preview yet, but it's never too soon to familiarize yourself with Microsoft's next flagship operating system. Win10 will be free for Windows 7 and 8 users anyway, during the first 12 months of its availability (after which you pay a one-time fee like usual, not a subscription fee as some had feared). We're looking forward to getting our hands on it.
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If you've heard of Games for Windows Live (GFWL), then you're probably familiar with some of its troubles. The difficulties some users had with fundamental things like logging in and updating the GFWL could produce some epic tales of woe. GFWL was deactivated last year, and with it went its online matchmaking system, meaning that games that used this service to create multiplayer sessions either no longer had multiplayer or had to plug into something else, such as SteamWorks. With the next big version of Windows coming out this year, Microsoft wants to give it another shot, and thankfully their using a different set of tools and also introducing some interesting new features. We sat down for a lecture on the subject, conducted by Microsoft engineers Vijay Gajjala and Brian Tyler.
First of all, the Xbox Live service on Windows 10 is running native desktop PC code, in a Windows 10 app, rather than being a port. Windows tablets and phones running Windows 10 all get their native apps, which in theory should mean smoother operation. Microsoft is also talking about single sign-on, so you can use one Microsoft account across all Win10 devices to log into XBL as well as logging into the device itself. When asked about this service's availability for earlier versions of Windows, and for Android or Max OSX devices, the company had no firm plans on the horizon. Don't hold your breath.
When you log into XBL on Windows 10, you get the complete XBL experience – your profile page, achievements, leaderboards, messages, activity feeds, game clips, privacy settings, basically everything that's exposed to an Xbox One user. There's a "Game DVR" where you can record gameplay and upload it to be viewed on other devices logged into XBL. (And in case you haven't heard, you can stream Xbox One games to your PC and play them there.)
As far as Microsoft is concerned, there is no difference between what Xbox One users can do and see, and what PC users can do and see when logged into XBL. Microsoft is also adding a Twitter-like feature where users can be followed, rather than requiring an accepted friend request to see another XBL player's activity. This can be disabled in your privacy settings, if you wish.
Windows 10 developers who want to use XBL now get access to a fancy telemetry system. In a nutshell, a dev can flag certain player activities like acquiring a specific weapon, loading a particular level, or completing a lap in a racing game, and have those events uploaded to a "stats engine" in Microsoft's cloud. This is used to handle achievements, but the data can also be aggregated and analyzed to better understand how people are playing the game. So you could answer questions like, "Is this boss fight too hard?" or "Is this secret room a little *too* secret?" This data feed is an optional service that developers can subscribe to or ignore.
Devs also get access to the Windows Dev Center, which is a desktop client where they can do things like add a challenge to the game (a limited-time achievement), or create a leaderboard for a specific activity, like number of bad guys killed or number of explosions caused. These things can be staged on a test server before being published live, to catch problems before they're published live.
In a separate but closely linked GDC session conducted by Ferdinand Schober, a software development engineer also at Microsoft, we gleaned some details about cross-platform multiplayer. Session data is stored in Microsoft's cloud, so it will be difficult to misplace. Like GFWL, Microsoft will handle matchmaking on its own servers, and developers can find-tune the player skill ranges to search for, and how long the matcher searches before expanding its searching area another notch. Like on the Xbox One, invites and joining in progress are also handled with a universal UI, rather than game-customized interfaces or notifications.
This stuff isn't available in the Windows 10 Technical Preview yet, but it's never too soon to familiarize yourself with Microsoft's next flagship operating system. Win10 will be free for Windows 7 and 8 users anyway, during the first 12 months of its availability (after which you pay a one-time fee like usual, not a subscription fee as some had feared). We're looking forward to getting our hands on it.
More...