Xbox Remote Play IOS Preview

October 21, 2020 at 3:46am
By Jason Stettner

I’ve done this type of article a few times now, with this being the latest look at the technology of Xbox Game Streaming. In the past I viewed it on Android devices, I’ve also seen xCloud (now Xbox Cloud Gaming) on both IOS and Android.

This has been through various test situations, and at E3 when it did debut a year or so back. Now the Game Streaming in general has been shifted to the name Xbox Remote Play which makes complete sense. It essentially allows you to mirror your Xbox console.

That’s whether it’s a Xbox Series X/S or Xbox One. It gives open access and presentation to your console experience, and it works well. I’ve included a video of showcasing it off when it was in beta testing, but I’ll dive into the just of the setup on IOS at this point.

At the start you’ll head over to the “my library” area. That will showcase what consoles are available, you’ll want to connect and be given a special pin to use for connecting. At that point you’ll be able to begin and it’ll start streaming.

It is suggested that you use a Bluetooth connection with this setup, but you can also be connected directly to your console too. Anyways, once it’s loaded you’ll see your dashboard alongside an overlay. This overlay has a Xbox Guide button and a three dot button that gives quick extra options. It’s very smooth, and perhaps familiar if you’ve tried their previous early access types of events.

For context network wise I had 68/16mb while doing this gameplay testing. I played on Halo: The Master Chief Collection, DayZ and Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1+2 in order to see a variety of options. Halo for the multiplayer in close proximity, DayZ for the open world multiplayer and Tony Hawk’s for single player.

It ran fairly smoothly across the games with minimal pixelization or fuzz to the imagery. I think they were on the right track with this one in beta, and it’s going to be a good option for local play.

Just connecting from another room, or even swapping the signal so that another individual could watch something else while you keep on playing. It did look good on the iPhone XS and it’s nice to have this first phase of the setup rolling.

I do expect the Xbox Cloud Gaming IOS release will someday happen, it’s just a matter of when and how they go about doing so. For now, Remote Play is impressive and fast to setup. I do believe that this is has its uses, and people will appreciate the option. It’s been very neat to see this part of gaming grow, and it’s wild to have full scale experiences on just a mobile device.

It’s wild when the devices themselves run the apps, but even crazier when you’re able to stream over what they could never handle. With that taking up no space, and being an instant connection. You can read about the naming change to Xbox Remote Play below, or check out the platform hub for further coverage.

Read about Xbox Remote Play Replacing Game Streaming
View our Xbox Hub