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81-456: Xbox Cloud Gaming is a cloud gaming service as part of Xbox offered by Microsoft Gaming . Initially released in beta testing in November 2019, the service later launched for subscribers of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate on September 15, 2020. Xbox Game Pass cloud gaming is provided to subscribers of Ultimate at no additional cost. Xbox Cloud Gaming operates by linking the device to a remote server in

162-508: A browser-based web application , which would not have its content restricted by the App Store limitations. The company later announced that it will use this approach to bring a browser-based version of the cloud gaming service to both personal computers and to iOS devices to be released sometime by the second quarter of 2021. An invite-only beta test of the browser version started on April 20, 2021. The full version for all Xbox Game Pass subscribers

243-503: A combination of hardware using its graphics processing units and software in May 2012, initially intending to partner with Gaikai for games on the service. Ubitus GameCloud was also introduced alongside Nvidia's Grid. GameCloud was designed as white-label service based on Nvidia's Grid that other providers could use to offer game streaming to their customers. Grid was formally introduced as part of its Nvidia Shield Android TV device during

324-497: A hotel, which can unlock rewards such as Wheelspins and the right to Fast Travel. The game features over 800 licensed vehicles. Due to licensing issues, vehicles from Alfa Romeo , Fiat (including Abarth marque) and Lancia were not present in the base game. Prior to the release of Forza Horizon 5 , the Stratos HF Stradale was shown in a video covering car audio but it was scrapped in the released game. On 17 July 2023, it

405-636: A perk of the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription, though also required users to be registered in the Xbox Insider program. It was officially released as part of the Xbox app for Windows on September 14, 2021, along with Remote Play support from Xbox consoles to a Windows computer. Microsoft introduced a Clarity Boost feature for Windows users through the Edge browser that provides client-side visual improvements to

486-453: A potential target of about three million users in 2010. French telco SFR launched G-cluster gaming service in 2010 for its end users and Orange followed suit in 2012 offering the gaming service for its customers. Both services have been commercially operational ever since offering cloud gaming for their customers on TV and mobile. In early 2003, another attempt was announced by American company Infinium Labs , which intended to revolutionize

567-516: A preview version. On May 5, 2020, Project xCloud came to Spain (Europe) in preview (Video on live). Microsoft released Xbox Cloud Gaming across 21 countries in North America and Europe, as well as in South Korea, on September 15, 2020, for select Android devices, with support for more than 150 games at launch. Xbox Cloud Gaming was released in its beta form for Windows users on August 9, 2021, as

648-623: A private server during this time to test games on a remote connection. The service entered its home testing phase in May 2019, when it could be used outside the lab environment. It entered public testing later in the year and was unveiled at E3 2019 . Microsoft said that its Xbox content library will make its service more appealing than competitors such as Stadia . The hardware at launch used Xbox One S -based blade servers , but began to transition to Xbox Series X -based servers in June 2021. Each server initially had four customized Xbox One S-based units for

729-450: A provider's dedicated hardware, and streamed as video to a player's device via client software. The client software handles the player's inputs, which are sent back to the server and executed in-game. Some cloud gaming services are based on access to a virtualized Windows environment, allowing users to download and install games and software as they normally would on a local computer. Cloud gaming can be advantageous as it eliminates

810-521: A richly saturated canvas of cities, sunsets, and scenery". While criticizing the car handling for making the game too easy, Rock Paper Shotgun enjoyed the new additions to the formula like the EventLab creator and Super7 events, "If you’ve played a Forza Horizon game before then you might feel a slight sense of deja vu, but you won’t care as the formula has been perfected at last". Eurogamer praised Horizon 5 's open world of Mexico, writing that "The map

891-439: A service regularly may also be limited by data caps enforced by some internet service providers . Further, the costs of cloud gaming shift from traditional distribution through retail outlets and digital storefronts to the data servers that run the cloud gaming services. Novel cost structures are required to cover these operating costs compared to traditional distribution. Cloud gaming requires significant infrastructure for

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972-477: A user's Steam and Epic Games Store library to run on the remote instance. This importing model was criticized by publishers including Activision Blizzard and Bethesda Softworks , as purchases were only intended for personal computers and not through cloud gaming. The publishers forced NVidia to pull these games from their service. In 2014, Dragon Quest X was brought to Nintendo 3DS in Japan using Ubitus for

1053-412: A viewer to join a player's session and temporarily take control of the game. Due to their dependency on high-quality streaming video, cloud gaming services typically require reliable, high-speed internet connections with low latency . Even with high-speed connections available, traffic congestion and other issues affecting network latency can affect the performance of cloud gaming, and the ability to use

1134-624: Is a racing video game set in an open world environment based in a fictional representation of Mexico. The game has the largest map in the entire Forza Horizon series, being 50% larger than its predecessor, Forza Horizon 4 , while also having the highest point in the Horizon series. The map was described by creative director Mike Brown as one of the most diverse Forza Horizon maps the team has built. The map contains an active caldera volcano , jungles and beaches, ancient Mayan temples , and towns and cities such as Guanajuato . Players can explore

1215-597: Is an absolute wonder, backed by a game engine which can deliver staggering views across the whole thing from the summit of the volcano that towers over it. The environments are rich and saturated with colour and atmosphere, from humid swamps to arid dunes, from deep, verdant canyons to pastel-striped barrios". Polygon liked the settings to tune difficulty and handling, but felt the game bombarded you with too many events and activities at once, "I feel constantly pinged with mentions and suggestions, from all directions, like two teenagers are blowing up my DMs". The Verge felt

1296-466: Is called "Piñata pop" where the Horizon Festival's cargo plane drops piñatas. The goal is to pop as many piñatas as they can with the help of other players. It also introduces the "EventLab", a toolset in which players can create custom games, races, and more depending on their personal preference. A new feature called "Forza Link" was introduced. According to Brown, it is an AI assistant that tracks

1377-488: Is latency, as the amount of delay between the user's inputs and when they take effect can affect gameplay — especially in fast-paced games dependent on precise inputs (such as first-person shooters and fighting games ). Attempts to reduce latency include the use of caching as the cached data can be "stored locally ... and can be retrieved when required." The provider's dedicated hardware can be upgraded over time in order to support higher resolutions and frame rates for

1458-466: Is only available in Forzavista). The game introduces a new weather system (local weather) in which players can visit one side of the map and can visibly see a storm. Because Mexico is such a vast nation with such a wide range of elevations, multiple climates would appear in the game at around the same time. The four seasons still exist but would affect the eleven unique biomes around the map. For example, in

1539-561: Is set in a fictionalised representation of Mexico . It was released on 9 November 2021 for Windows , Xbox One , and Xbox Series X/S . The game received critical acclaim and became a commercial success upon release; it launched to over ten million players in the first week, the biggest-ever launch for an Xbox Game Studios game. The game won IGN 's Game of the Year award and three jury-voted awards at The Game Awards 2021 , tying with Hazelight 's It Takes Two for most wins. Forza Horizon 5

1620-593: The Galaxy S20 Ultra . In March 2021, Microsoft released an update to the Android Xbox Cloud Gaming client that allows dual-screened devices like the Surface Duo to use the second screen to host the touch controls. Several notable games such as Minecraft Dungeons and New Super Lucky's Tale support the dedicated gamepad on the second screen. Some games such as Gears 5 support motion controls using

1701-565: The Game Developers Conference in 2019, Google officially announced its cloud gaming service Stadia , which officially launched on November 19 of that year. In May, Sony announced a partnership with Microsoft to co-develop cloud solutions between divisions, including gaming. Apple Inc. , which makes the iOS platform for iPhones and iPads , had looked to block cloud gaming apps on its service in mid-2020. They argued that cloud gaming services allowed developers to add games onto

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1782-423: The dry season , dust storms will appear, while tropical storms occur throughout the fall storm season. Another detail is in the jungle, in which the environment would now react to the weather; an example of this is leaves flying everywhere. Forza Horizon 5 also introduces a brand new Horizon Arcade. This consists of a series of mini-multiplayer games strewn across the map. One of these mini-multiplayer games

1863-411: The 2013 International Consumer Electronics Show . Grid/GeForce Now launched with services provided by several cloud gaming partners including Agawi, Cloudunion, Cyber Cloud, G-cluster, Playcast, and Ubitus. The Grid service was first launched in North America in November 2014 where a limited number of games were made available, and then later expanded to computers in 2017, including support for importing

1944-655: The 2018 teaser, but this was doubled to eight per server in a 2U enclosure for the service's launch in 2019. Compared to the standard Xbox One S, power consumption has been reduced by 30% through processor-specific power tuning. Video output is set for 120 Hz to reduce latency. Trials of the service began in October 2019, and as of November 2019, the service hosts 50 games, with support in testing for Apple Inc. 's iOS mobile devices, and for Sony Interactive Entertainment 's DualShock controllers. On February 12, 2020, Project xCloud launched on Apple’s mobile operating system in

2025-718: The Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. In September 2021, Microsoft expanded the service to Australia, Brazil, Japan, and Mexico. In June 2022, the service was expanded further to include Argentina and New Zealand. The Xbox Series X/S's backward compatibility allows xCloud to retain

2106-601: The Galaxy , and the Kingdom Hearts franchise, using Ubitus. A proposed method to improve game streaming's scalability is adaptive graphics processing unit (GPU) resource scheduling. Most cloud gaming providers are using dedicated GPUs to each person playing a game. This leads to the best performance but can waste resources. With better GPU resource scheduling algorithms, if the game does not fully utilize that GPU it can be used to help run someone else’s game simultaneously. In

2187-505: The Microsoft Store. Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice was the first game to support full touch controls . Touch controls have since been added to another 186 games. Microsoft introduced cloud play support for selected original Xbox and Xbox 360 titles using its backward compatibility program starting in March 2021 with 16 titles available. Players are able to use cloud-based saved games from

2268-550: The Series 5 update introduced a stunt park located in the stadium on the map. This game is the first in the franchise to introduce new map changes, aside from seasons. On 1 March 2022, American and British Sign language interpreter videos in a picture-in-picture format for cinematics were added. The Series 13 update, released on 11 October 2022, celebrated the tenth anniversary of the Forza Horizon series, adding new content to

2349-409: The United States in 2019. In May 2018, Electronic Arts acquired cloud gaming assets and talent from GameFly for an undisclosed amount. EA subsequently announced "Project Atlas", a project to explore the integration of artificial intelligence , machine learning , and Frostbite engine technology to create a "unified" platform to "remotely process and stream blockbuster, multiplayer HD games with

2430-624: The Xbox app for smart TVs. The service was also added to Meta Quest VR headsets in December 2023 via a beta version of the Xbox Cloud Gaming app. In June 2024, it was announced that Microsoft had partnered with Amazon to bring Xbox Cloud Gaming to Fire TV devices through the Xbox TV app. Cloud gaming Cloud gaming platforms operate in a similar manner to remote desktops and video on demand services; games are stored and executed remotely on

2511-478: The browser sometime in early 2021. Amazon introduced its own cloud gaming service Luna in September 2020. Games on the service will be offered via a channel-style subscription service, with Amazon's own games and those from Ubisoft available at the service's launch. Nintendo currently has games on Nintendo Switch that primarily run on cloud gaming such as Control , Hitman 3 , Marvel's Guardians of

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2592-505: The cars slow to a stop. Microphones with flat frequency responses were selected, and padded to prevent damage and clipping from loud exhausts. Cockpit noise was recorded with both stereo and ambisonic microphones mounted centrally in the car. The team, with assistance from audio outsourcing companies, recorded 320 engines for the game, some samples usable for multiple cars that share engines. Additional recording included ambient environments and collisions. All sounds were recorded just for

2673-579: The cloud. The ideas for the cloud service came within Microsoft around 2016, around the same time that Kareem Choudhry developed the Xbox 360 backwards compatibility for the Xbox One . As his team developed this solution, Choudhry also had the idea if they could provide these games without having need of a console, and got Spencer's go-ahead to start a small team to determine the feasibility of cloud gaming. The technology

2754-509: The cloud. We’re committed to putting gamers at the center of everything we do, and providing a great experience is core to that mission." Microsoft had considered the possibility of making each game its own application as to satisfy Apple's requirements, according to The Verge based on emails uncovered during the Epic Games v. Apple trial. Microsoft suggested in October 2020 that to work around Apple's restriction, it may bring xCloud to iOS as

2835-478: The current statuses of players, helping them to link with other players online and play together. Forza Link can also link players' GPS systems if they accept the invitation from another player. Accolades, new to the Forza Horizon series, allow players to collect points and prizes for completing certain tasks. Some vehicles can only be unlocked through the completion of the Accolades. There are over 1,800 accolades for

2916-561: The device's built in gyro and provide a dedicated control scheme when using the gamepad mode. In October 2023, Meta Platforms announced an Xbox Cloud Gaming app for Meta Quest 3 (based on Android source code) virtual reality headsets . While Microsoft had planned to release xCloud for iOS devices, the company halted iOS testing in August 2020, asserting that policies on the Apple App Store limited what functionality they could provide for

2997-529: The existing library of Xbox games while adding new games from the Xbox Series X/S. The Xbox Game Pass Library currently lists 382 cloud-enabled games. The list includes Halo: The Master Chief Collection , Forza Horizon 5 , The Outer Worlds , Yakuza Kiwami 2 , and Microsoft Flight Simulator . Microsoft has also announced plans to expand the list of cloud-enabled games to include select Xbox games that Xbox Game Pass Ultimate members have purchased from

3078-472: The film Barbie was added to the game as part of a collaboration with Xbox Game Studios and Mattel in advance of the film's release. The game's first expansion, Forza Horizon 5: Hot Wheels , a follow-up to a similar expansion for Forza Horizon 3 , was released on 19 July 2022. This announcement was accidentally leaked via a Steam listing three days before its official announcement. The game's second expansion, Forza Horizon 5: Rally Adventure ,

3159-426: The five games' initial drive sequences in the new Horizon Story "Horizon Origins"—with Horizon Bass Arena DJ and Horizon Mixtape host Scott Tyler (voiced by Ronan Summers), the only Forza Horizon series character to have appeared in every game so far, joining the player—the return of Midnight Battles from Forza Horizon 3 , and new achievements , accolades, and badges. Each of the previous four entries' title screens

3240-461: The future possibility of using such a concept to "[reduce] latency to the point where it's basically nonexistent", referring to this concept as "negative latency". Forza Horizon 5 Forza Horizon 5 is a 2021 racing video game developed by Playground Games and published by Xbox Game Studios . It is the fifth Forza Horizon title and twelfth main instalment in the Forza series . The game

3321-563: The game in celebration. This included a new radio station titled "Horizon Mixtape", featuring a total of fifteen music tracks from the previous four entries (six tracks available from the start, five unlockable tracks via accolades by completing each chapter of the Horizon Story "Horizon Origins", and four tracks unlockable via completing limited-time seasonal championships in the Festival Playlist) along with recreations of key moments of

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3402-461: The game in less than 24 hours after launch, the largest launch for an Xbox Game Studios game, while it also held three times more concurrent players than Forza Horizon 4 . On 18 November, the official Forza Horizon Twitter account announced that over ten million people have played the game during its first week of release, the largest number of players for a game's first week in the Xbox brand's history. Writing for Forbes , Erik Kain attributes

3483-553: The game's release on 9 November, over 1.2 million players had accessed the game by buying either the premium edition of the game or the premium add-ons bundle as an Xbox Game Pass subscriber, with Video Games Chronicle estimating gross revenue between $ 54 million and $ 118 million before release. The game also reached # 1 on the Steam weekly charts for the week of 1 to 7 November 2021. Phil Spencer , head of Xbox, announced on 9 November that more than 4.5 million people have played

3564-404: The game's success to its at-launch availability on Xbox Game Pass, cross-platform play between Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and PC, its cloud gaming support via Xbox Cloud Gaming , and the high quality of the game itself. On 9 January 2022, two months after its release, the game passed the 15 million player mark, breaking the record for the previous game in the series in less than a year since it

3645-670: The game's virtual environment to look similar to its real-life counterpart. An example of this is the rocks in the side of the caldera volcano where they can be viewed with such detail. Individual objects, such as the needles of cholla cacti , can also be displayed by the game (although this is only available for the Xbox Series consoles as of now). Playground Games took a new approach to car audio in Horizon 5 , switching implementation from looping to granular synthesis . To prepare audio recordings for this, they captured cars performing full acceleration sweeps from idle to redline and then let

3726-424: The game, with none sourced from existing libraries. The soundtrack can be output through Dolby Atmos . Forza Horizon 5 was announced during Microsoft and Bethesda 's showcase at E3 2021 . The game was released for Windows, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X and Series S on 9 November 2021. Forza Horizon 5 received "universal acclaim" according to review aggregator Metacritic . Game Informer appreciated

3807-481: The games through portals to end users. By 2010, due to changes in the market, G-cluster changed their model to work through a large server manufacturer to provide their games to the network operators and directly to users. This refocusing was necessitated by the increased available of free-to-play games available for personal computers, drawing them away from G-cluster's service, so G-cluster opted to focus on Internet Protocol television (IPTV) users instead, which had

3888-435: The iOS store which the user must use before playing, though catalog apps as part of the service can list and link to these games. Microsoft responded negatively to this change, stating that "This remains a bad experience for customers. Gamers want to jump directly into a game from their curated catalog within one app just like they do with movies or songs, and not be forced to download over 100 apps to play individual games from

3969-412: The iOS system that bypassed the normal checks they perform on any app before it is added to the App Store, and thus violated their terms of service. However, in September 2020, Apple altered its rules that allowed cloud gaming apps to work on iOS, with restrictions that each game must be offered as an individual download on the iOS store which the user must use before playing, though catalog apps as part of

4050-524: The lowest possible latency, and also to unlock even more possibilities for dynamic social and cross-platform play." That month, Google and Microsoft also announced cloud gaming initiatives, with Google beginning to pilot "Project Stream" (including a closed beta featuring Assassin's Creed Odyssey running via a client in the Google Chrome web browser, and Microsoft announced the upcoming Project xCloud , leveraging Microsoft Azure technology. At

4131-404: The market of home entertainment with their Phantom video game console, a device that was envisioned to be capable of providing an on-demand video game delivery service via monthly online subscription. The Phantom was designed to run PC games, thus making it compatible with hundreds of titles from the start, and was to be sold at a much lower price than high-end PC gaming rigs. A functioning prototype

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4212-443: The members of Donut Media . In November 2022, after a money-making exploit was discovered in the game's Super7 mode, Playground Games disabled the game's auction house and later released a patch to fix the exploit. However, they announced that the auction house would remain closed for the time being to rebalance the game's economy. In June 2023, a 1956 Chevrolet Corvette and 2022 GMC Hummer EV pickup featuring details inspired by

4293-525: The more capable Xbox Series X hardware in 2021. The service is designed to work with phones, either with touchscreen controls or game controller over Bluetooth . Notable supported controller models include: Xbox Cloud Gaming works with any Android phone or tablet that has at least Android 6.0 and Bluetooth 4.0 . Examples of supported devices include the Samsung Galaxy Tab S5e , the OnePlus 8 and

4374-411: The need to purchase expensive computer hardware or install games directly onto a local game system. Cloud gaming can be made available on a wide range of computing devices, including mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets , digital media players , or proprietary thin client -like devices. Some services may offer additional features to take advantage of this model, including the ability for

4455-436: The open world freely, though they can also compete in multiplayer races and complete the campaign mode. Both the cars featured in the game and the player character can be extensively customised. Players are able to create custom liveries and tunes for cars, and perform engine swaps , drivetrain swaps, or install body kits on certain vehicles. The game is the first in the franchise to support ray tracing on cars (although this

4536-428: The original release of these titles if they have used that service as part of Xbox Live Gold . Some of the games also support official touch controls when played on mobile devices. The service received generally positive initial impressions from reviewers. Playing over a T-Mobile LTE connection with just 25 Mbps download speed caused no effect on image quality. Even while playing on a moving bus and train, there

4617-522: The past, “GPU virtualization was not used due to the inferior performance of the resource scheduling algorithm”. However new resource management algorithms have been developed that can allow up to 90% of the GPUs original power to be utilized even while being split among many users. Algorithms could be used to help predict a player's next inputs, which could overcome the impact of latency in cloud gaming applications. Stadia's head of engineering Majd Bakar foresaw

4698-401: The player to achieve. The Eliminator battle royale game mode introduced in Forza Horizon 4 returns, albeit with players starting in a 1963 Volkswagen Beetle rather than a 1965 Mini . The world is designed for the mode unlike the previous game, which received The Eliminator after launch. As in the previous game, players can buy in-game houses ranging from small beachside cabanas to even

4779-519: The potential for cloud gaming was now timely. OnLive was officially launched in June 2010, alongside sale of its OnLive microconsole . While OnLive had acquired some support from large publishers like Ubisoft , 2K Games and THQ , they found it difficult to get other publishers onboard as they were wary of the subscription price model. Simultaneous to OnLive, another startup Gaikai was announced by David Perry in 2010. Gaikai opted to approach streaming of game demos rather than full games, making

4860-419: The progression systems were less confusing overall compared to 3 , and praised how the player could choose what to do next, "You’re able to choose which specific types of events to unlock as you progress   ... I feel like if I stopped playing the game and came back to it weeks later, I’d have a much better sense of what I’d been doing". The game was selected as IGN ' s Game of the Year . Before

4941-656: The rendering and streams. The Quality of Experience (QoE) that measures the user's general level of satisfaction also needs to be brought into consideration during the development phase of cloud gaming. The first demonstrated approach of cloud gaming technology was by startup G-cluster (short for Game Cluster), which introduced its product at the 2000 E3 , and released around 2003. In their initial model around 2005, G-cluster provided PC games that ran on their servers, using video-on-demand service providers, set-top box manufacturers, and middleware software providers to help provide their service to network operators, and then offered

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5022-474: The research on a cloud gaming system in 2005 for Crysis , but according to their CEO Cevat Yerli, they halted development in 2007 to wait until the infrastructure and cable Internet providers were able to complete the task and the cost of bandwidth to decline. Entrepreneur Steve Perlman revealed OnLive at the March 2009 Game Developers Conference . Perlman stated that with improvements in data and video compression as well as capabilities of smartphones ,

5103-503: The service a form of online advertising for games. Gaikai gained far more publisher support, including Electronic Arts which OnLive had been trying to bring back to their service. Gaikai was acquired by Sony Computer Entertainment in July 2012 for $ 340 million , and by October 2012, was offering PlayStation games. Ultimately, the technology behind Gaikai was used as the foundation for PlayStation Now , first introduced in 2014. OnLive

5184-436: The service can list and link to these games. Both GeForce Now and Stadia announced plans in November 2020 to release iOS versions of their streaming services as progressive web applications that would be run through a Chrome or Safari browser on iOS devices, as allowed for by Apple, to support cloud gaming. Microsoft has also announced plans to use a similar approach to bring the xCloud game streaming technology to iOS via

5265-438: The service. Apple clarified that cloud streaming services like xCloud allow Microsoft to release games onto the iOS platform that bypass the normal checks that Apple performs for other apps, and thus refused to allow the app on the platform. However, in September 2020, Apple altered its rules that allowed xCloud and other cloud gaming apps to work on iOS, with restrictions that each game must be offered as an individual download on

5346-418: The services to work as intended, including data centers and server farms for running the games, and high-bandwidth internet connections with low latency for delivering the streams to users. The network infrastructure required to make cloud gaming feasible was, for many years, not available in most geographic areas, or unavailable to consumer markets. A major factor in the quality of a cloud gaming service

5427-480: The social interactions in the game, especially the score comparisons, "More times than I could count, I noticed my friend hit a higher top speed, causing me to turn around and try the challenge again". Ars Technica liked the visuals of the title, praising how it looked "next-gen", "I seriously cannot keep track of how many times FH5 made my eyes bulge. The game takes special care to emphasize massive vistas   ... with screen-bursting HDR effects doing wonders for

5508-407: The streamed content. Microsoft began rolling out testing of Xbox Cloud Gaming for Xbox One consoles on test channels in October 2021, allowing users on those consoles to play Xbox Series X/S games. The internet speed requirements for Xbox Cloud Gaming's service is as follows: Xbox Cloud Gaming is available in the following 28 countries, incl. Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada,

5589-497: The streaming technology. In 2017, the French startup Blade launched a service known as Shadow, where users are able to rent a remote Windows 10 instance on a datacenter, with allocated access to an Intel Xeon processor and Nvidia Quadro graphics. The service is geographically-limited based on proximity to one of its datacenters; it initially launched in France, but began expanding into

5670-503: The user, but this failed to be profitable. OnLive and OL2's intellectual property was acquired by Sony Computer Entertainment in April 2015, but then closed it down about a month later. As stated by The Verge , the acquisition of both Gaikai and OnLive's intellectual property gave Sony access to a range of patents covering cloud gaming. Nvidia first announced its cloud gaming service, Nvidia Grid (later rebranded as GeForce Now ), as

5751-400: Was added for Xbox Game Pass subscribers on June 28, 2021. Invite-only beta testing launched alongside the iOS beta test on April 20, 2021. Spencer has also stated that Microsoft is working to bring the service to smart TVs and streaming sticks , though a challenge here is assuring minimal latency between the television and the controller. Microsoft confirmed in May 2022 that a streaming device

5832-399: Was also recreated by Playground Games within the game world of Forza Horizon 5 , with each season (week) of Series 13 using a recreated title screen corresponding to a different game; Forza Horizon in summer, Forza Horizon 2 in autumn, Forza Horizon 3 in winter, and Forza Horizon 4 in spring. The Series 14 update, released on 10 November 2022, added a new Horizon Story featuring

5913-580: Was announced that the Italian brands would return to the Forza series in the Series 24 update of the game on 17 August 2023. Forza Horizon 5 has seen many content updates and bug fixes since its release. Monthly content updates include new cars, collectibles, horns, clothing, etc. These updates typically have a specific theme; for example, the Series 2 update in December 2021 was based around Christmas . Many updates also include series-specific map changes, for example,

5994-462: Was deemed successful enough at around the time of Xbox Game Pass 's introduction that Microsoft assembled a larger team to build up the cloud gaming platform. Microsoft teased the service at E3 2018 and formally announced Project xCloud several months later, in October 2018. They demonstrated the service in March 2019 with the racing game Forza Horizon 4 playing on an Android smartphone with an Xbox One controller . Xbox head Phil Spencer used

6075-499: Was developed by Playground Games . The goal for the team was to create a game whose scale was significantly larger than its predecessors. The team chose Mexico as the game's setting due to its diverse and varied landscape. The team partnered with Mexican artists to create the in-game murals, and Mexican musicians to create the in-game soundtracks. It also sent a team to visit Mexico to capture real-world light and sky data. The game utilised photogrammetry data extensively in order to make

6156-521: Was first presented at the E3 2004, running Unreal Tournament 2004 , and then again at QuakeCon , where it was shown to be capable of perfectly operating Quake 3 Arena on a dedicated server. After a couple years of setbacks, the company bankrupted in 2008, with the Phantom console never officially released to the market, becoming one of the most popular vaporware of recent times. Video game developer Crytek began

6237-527: Was in development under the codename Keystone . However, by November 2022, Spencer stated that they had ceased development of this device, as it was too costly compared to the Xbox Series S, and surpassed the $ 99-$ 129 price range they had envisioned. In July 2022, Xbox Cloud Gaming was launched on select Samsung Smart TVs and Smart Monitors via the Xbox app, with support for Bluetooth controllers. Microsoft said that other smart TV brands were being evaluated for

6318-465: Was never profitable, and after a possible acquisition by HP Inc. fell through, OnLive's assets were acquired by a newly formed entity named "OL2", which was capitalized by Gary Lauder of Lauder Partners in 2012 at $ 4.8 million , a fraction of OnLive's valuation from 2010. A mass layoff (2/3 of staff) was conducted to reduce operating costs. Under Lauder Partners, the new OL2 attempted to pivot its business model to allow streaming of games already owned by

6399-432: Was no noticeable loss of image quality. Reviewers also reported that starting up games on the phone feels faster because the games are running on more powerful remote servers rather than a hard drive on a console. Load times are also minimized and closer to a PC gaming experience. Xbox Cloud Gaming runs via Microsoft's 54 Azure cloud computing centers, hosted in 140 countries. Microsoft upgraded its server blades to

6480-504: Was released on 29 March 2023. It includes a new map, a variety of off-road vehicles such as trophy trucks and buggies , and a new career mode. A car pack expansion of the game titled Forza Horizon 5: Fast X – Car Pack was featured on 5 December 2023, featuring the vehicles from the 2023 film Fast X , the tenth installment of the Fast & Furious franchise and the second of the series since Forza Horizon 2 in 2015. Forza Horizon 5

6561-588: Was released on June 28, 2021. Microsoft also announced plans to bring cloud gaming to the Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S consoles later in 2021, which would also allow Xbox One users to play games that are only able to run on the Series X/S consoles. The feature was made available on November 17, 2021. Alongside the iOS browser-based version, browser-based Xbox Cloud Gaming through supported browsers in Windows 10 computers

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