With the recent news that Windows 10 will be making its way to the Xbox One in 2015, one has to wonder what this combined with the arrival of DirectX 12 will bring to the system.
While the impact of DirectX 12 has been widely and hotly debated, the introduction of Windows 10 will be a good thing for players who game on PC as well as console as well as console players looking for more connection with their PC based friends.
Being able to stream games from an Xbox One to a PC is just one of the new options being touted as well as the ability to have cross-platform gaming become a reality. This has been tried a few times over the years so I will take this with a wait and see attitude but if it does work, and can be applied in a large scale down the road, then this is a potential game changer for the industry. Having a huge new field of options for online game matches is something to look forward to but I would love to know how the issue of keeping PC based players from dominating some games will be interesting. The controls and power of a PC system can for some games give a real advantage to some players.
That being said, this is just one more step to blurring the line between console and PC systems to some and to others, underscores the love/hate relationship Microsoft has had with the PC as a gaming platform.
Many have said that Microsoft has put their attention on Xbox gaming at the center of their business plans and as such have left PC gamers feeling like an afterthought as their needs have largely gone without being addressed.
However the upcoming DirectX 12 and Windows 10 releases seem to be a way that the gaming community can find some common ground with one another as well as see improved performance and features in their gaming system of choice.
What the long term future of the features will offer is still to be decided, but at least for now, Microsoft seems determined to ramp up their Xbox One system and have it play nice with their PC neighbors, which could be a win-win for all of us.
