You’ve always thought of an Xbox console as, well, a console. But Microsoft said Thursday that as it pushes Xbox gaming into the cloud, you’ll see something entirely new: smart TVs with the ability to play Xbox games, and new Xbox streaming hardware, too.
Microsoft isn’t saying which TV makers it’s working with, or when these devices will launch. Nor is it saying what the streaming hardware will be called, when it will launch, what will be inside it, or whether the company will even open up its streaming hardware to third-party manufacturers. What it’s doing, though, represents the natural intersection of the Xbox and the cloud at Microsoft, especially the cloud gaming portion of its subscription service, Xbox Game Pass.
