Xbox is the definition of not giving up in the console war. That my competition has more games? I buy exclusives by the bucketload. That despite everything the public prefers it? I ask if it’s possible to sneak Gamepass. And, why not, I try to make the leap to mobiles. And in those is Phil Spencer, who has already announced that it will take much less than we think to see its app store hand in hand with Google Play and the App Store. Earthquakes are coming.
I app-posed it all
The Xbox Mobile Platform (which may change its name, of course) was leaked in October, as part of the documentation needed to buy Activision Blizzard. What we didn’t imagine was that its launch would be imminent. And it makes sense: Activision Blizzard bought in 2015 King, the developer of ‘Candy Crush’, which if it only appears in Microsoft’s app store already has halfway done. Like starting a race a hundred meters ahead.
Obviously, Xbox knows that it will not be easy to resist in this market, so they are betting everything on a single word: decision. Allowing users to move on their own on their own phone and decide whether they want to stay with what has already been imposed or bet on new ways to get their games and applications.
Microsoft’s long-term plan is to be relevant not only on the computer and TV screen, but also on the mobile screen. The more options, the more likely it is to be a success, after all. The word is that before the end of 2024 we will have a new partner in an office that is becoming more and more crowded.
It’s worth noting that to enter like a dinosaur in a porcelain store they will have to wait on Apple devices, because as of today you can’t install alternative stores to the official one (on Android you can, of course). But they will have to change and allow it to fall under the Digital Markets Act. Does that mean Apple fans are going to end up downloading the Xbox app store? Frankly, few things crazier and more impossible I can think of.
