Cross-Console Multiplayer Is Now (Theoretically) Real

I'll echo the sentiments of others and say this will be awesome for Rocket League, Destiny, The Division and other games. Hopefully this could lead to more games coming to Xbox One like FFXIV. I could see Rocket League and Minecraft being the front runners for this initiative as they are both super popular and one is owned by Microsoft.

Great news but it's an odd celebratory announcement considering MS has always been the roadblock in cross-platfrom play, proof will be in the pudding.

The XB1 does need some sort of saving apart from losing significant market share to the PS4 the 360 will start tracking above the XB1 this year, it's why MS has been scaling back Xbox and porting its niche first party titles to PC.

It's a lot more likely now that's for sure.

Nothing but good news, as long they aren't trying to charge for online access for PC games.

Investors care about the stock price, and any one of them worth their salt considers the whole picture. I'm not suggesting the Xbox One is the reason MS stock is up (MS is a huge company); but it's sure as hell not hurting MS overall (or their investors) as you implied. Also, companies have published good news and obfuscated bad news since the beginning of time. Do you honestly expect MS to highlight that they've sold fewer consoles than their biggest competitor? Conversely, do you expect Sony to highlight that they're lacking in exclusives? It's not "dodgy" to avoid publicizing shortcomings; it's just business common sense.

I love this. Microsoft is just saying "Fuck it! Play our shit on Xbox or PC or whatever! Also, the Xbox is going to be more like steam machine."

Very excited to see what the future holds. I wouldn't rule out seeing Halo on a PS4 at some point now that the dam has broken.

This is the start of the "one box future" that people have been predicting for years. Except it might be many boxes that play everything (kind of like a PC I guess).

"Rocket League: Bringing us all...together"

Just like real soccer, Rocket League brings all nations together.

Except America.

The idea of possibly playing games against my friends that would never buy an Xbox is exciting.

Really cool idea. If this gets adopted wholesale though, I think there are certain genres where cross play does heavily favor PC (first-person shooters come to mind right away). Halo and CoD kids should start saving their money now, or prepare for years of punishment online.

This is sort of crazy.

I like this potential a lot. But then it feels like a matter of time where we'll just have PC's and a single console.

I really hope this works out. It feels like Sony has been pretty positive on cross-platform play so far - at least with PC. A world where we can all play together would be great; the only slight downside I could see would be that either games wouldn't be able to have cross-platform invites or that they'd have to build in their own in-game system (such as the Fighter ID in Street Fighter V). I remain hopeful, however.

Jeff's rant on this week's podcast about how desperate of a move this is to please the two existing Xbox owners is going to be something else. /s

Cross Play SMITE PLS when it come to PS4

@dprotp: Yep and this sort of limitation pretty much kill any excitement I have for a feature like this.

Shadowrun! My main man Austin.

I remember when cross-platform was a thing in 2000 with Quake 3 Arena for the Dreamcast when they allowed PC players to play against Dreamcast players. Of course, unfair advantages were brought up though playing field was levelled with the Dreamcast mouse and keyboard .

Man, that console. Waaay ahead of its time.

I'm actually surprised PC and Xbox took this long to do cross multiplayer stuff. I don't see PS4 and Xbox ever mixing, but I could be wrong I guess. Would be nice to play with people I know who own an Xbox.

Rocket League is truly the saviour of gaming.

Watch the shareholders shoot this one down when they get told that this means they'd have to drop hardware prices to be competitive against other companies rather than rely on the time old model of software exclusivity. Thus, lowering profit margins & dividends for everybody.

Though unlikely, ideally it'd be somewhat reminiscent of the Atari ST vs Amiga era in that the same games are released for both (unlike the SNES/Genesis era) & it's personal preference based on hardware & interface which version you ended going for.

Finally, as well as FFXIV, Street Fighter V is also already doing this with PC/PS4 crossplay. New initiative from Microsoft? Eh no~

Am I the only one wondering if we will ever get to have cross platform from the previous generation to the new? I have been wanting to play the same xbox one compatible games with my xbox 360 friends but I'm thinking this is never going to happen.... Thoughts?

I think this could potentially turn into one of the best things that's happened to gaming in a long time.

The KB+M vs. Controller performance divide is obviously an issue for some games and genres. I wonder if it's possible to develop an input verification layer as a mechanism for enforcing controller-only lobbies/playlists? (in addition to separate KB+M-only or mixed playlists) You probably couldn't actually keep people from using KB+M in "controller only" lobbies, but you might be able to force them to need to act enough like a controller to avoid detection that it drastically reduced their advantage (in which case nobody would bother to do it).

I'm going to pick KB+M in any shooter where I have the choice, but I understand that some people just like playing w/ a controller better. It would be nice to have a place where you knew you weren't getting destroyed because of your controller preferences, and then people on both platforms could play in controller only lobbies (or even KB+M lobbies, if that comes to consoles, which seems likely at this point).

I wonder if this has anything to do with that NX rumor regarding being able to work with Playstation.

One can only hope that this is the first step in a long road, I mean it could be a short road but I feel like if this did happen it would probably start as just being in the same game as these people but not being able to say invite your friend on x1 to your squad while you're on a ps4. I think for most of us, this is what we want from this situation and I just don't see it starting this way. Maybe years down the line this happens I just don't see it happening the way I'd want it to.

Also as mentioned when Sony was on board with doing this they were in the position Microsoft is in now, it will be interesting to see if that has changed now that the positions have reversed and as someone else pointed out will they go along with it just to keep the "for the gamers" reputation they are trying to build

Either way it's interesting news that I look forward to seeing pan out

I thought that Shadowrun shooter was pretty fun and got more flak than it deserved. I know that's not what this story is about but that's all I have to say. XD

Keep in mind that strategy was in place twenty years ago, before Microsoft was forced into court over antitrust litigation. It's still a prevalent policy, under many names within many corporations, but twenty years is a long time. Apple's gone from bankrupt, to up-and-comer, to a standard of quality, to a standard of mediocrity, all within that timespan. And heck, I still have an Intel processor despite their $1.2B payout to AMD for unfair competition.

I just watched a video with Ryan talking about how he ruled Quake 3 on Dreamcast with the DC mouse and keyboard. I tried playing with the controller: that thing does not work...

To address the parity question, Phil Spencer has gone on record about supporting mouse and keyboard on Xbox One. If this all takes off, then maybe it'll prompt Sony to follow suit.

@mlarrabee: It's true that this was a while ago but MS has done little to convince me that they have changed. If this were a few months ago I would be more receptive of their message but the recent vague UWA statements and criticism of it by people who I consider to be quite knowledgeable have renewed my wariness.

I play Rocket League on a PC using a Stream Controller with my own custom control scheme, which has capabilities not available to a standard console controller. Which lobby would I be placed in?

@gnomeonfire: Do you think it makes Microsoft look desperate?

So, in this hypothetical perfect world, you wouldn't need to worry about where all of your friends are playing and could focus on the merits of the platform alone when making a purchasing decision? Sounds iffy.

@babychoochoo: FFIV is the best MMO I have ever played and I am totally all for more people being able to play it.

I'm also holding out hope that this means that The Division will one day be cross platform, as my brother couldn't get it on PC so he can't play with my friends and I.

There were a few years there, where Shadowrun on Xbox had amazing community. I would play it everyday, and with a lot of really cool people, that always talked and had fun on the mics. The game was so unique and so fun, that its a shame it got so much hate for having the Shadowrun name, because I loved it so much.

Forgive me if im wrong or misunderstand, but isnt that how it works already? that our characters are more stationed on Bungie's side rather than directly tied to the Gamertag or PS ID?

Given their whole grand ambitions with that series, id be shocked if they didn't pursue using this capability for the sequel

On the bright side, it increases the pool of potential matches for Xbox players, which is always a good thing. And there's always private matches!

all this talk of UWP and cross console play brings me back to the days of Games for Windows live and Shadowrun.. so now that we had the bad news of yesteryear returning.. then i want the good stuff back as well.... so someone need to call Jeff Green and bring back GFW-Radio podcast!

@jarno: A great question, I don't know! It's not even a problem that needs solving in most cases. But for a subset of games where it clearly has been, or would be, an issue, like competitive FPS, I just wonder if there's a software solution that could end the debate, and make everyone happy.

Didn't hurt that it had tons of aim assist on PC that basically made it unfair for KB/M users.

I love that this is actually news. I hope that the issues I have with UWP (namely, lack of end-user file access and modification, hardware restrictions and the like) are resolved in a way that's satisfactory to both PC power-users and Microsoft. This may not actually happen, but it'll have to for the Universal Windows Experience to actually take off.

i'm all for crazy shit, and Microsoft seems to be doing the craziest of shit lately.

This looks big on paper, but I don't know if it'll actually be a big deal except for a few notable titles from a handful of companies. I might care if Destiny ever comes to PC...by then it should be pretty content packed right?

This is good. Fresh aerially-untrained meat in Rocket League. This is very good.

I love how MS super refuses to plainly say, hey you might be able to cross play with PS4!

We don't know if that will be possible. Only PC/PS4 and PC/XBOX1 at the moment.

Your move Adam Boyes!

Humble brag.

It strikes me that the most important reason for this change is so that people can buy PC games on the Windows 10 store without orphaning themselves from the larger Steam multiplayer community. The Xbox One to PS4 benefit is, if anything, just a bonus of Microsoft's shifting strategic focus to Windows 10 over and above Xbox consoles.

HOWTO: Implement cross-platform multiplayer with XBOX Live:

1. Pay $100 000 one time setup fee
2. Pay $10 000 per month for server rentals
3. All multiplayer traffic for your game must go through MS servers
4. MS reserves the right to disable servers at any moment in time

I'm not saying that this is true, but MS has been known to add severe restrictions (eg Launch parity) to developers. A scheme like this could also provide MS with a way to make money of the PS4 success.

Hopefully it's just a simple "connect to this interface for XBL player data, do with it what you want after that" solution.

Whoa. I can't wait to see where in the world this is going to go.