Xbox games will release on Steam

@Ant_17: "Microsoft is now a 3rd party publisher with a console.

UWP?"

In response to the OP, "yes and no"..

"Yes", in the sense that Steam is a store-front other than Microsoft's own Microsoft Store on PC.. But considering the fact that growth in PC gaming only serves to help the Microsoft PC division, the motivation here is fairly clear:

Go to current PC gamers where they currently are..

Microsoft clearly wants to grow the footprint of "Xbox" on PC and the overwhelmingly majority of PC gamers purchase their content from Steam.. It's just a realistic reaction to a realistic situation.. The Microsoft Store may come into relevance in the years to come but Microsoft wants to make serious strides into the PC market NOW.. and right now, that's Steam..

"No" because, at least judging from how they are handling the Halo: Master Chief Collection on Steam, an Xbox Live account is REQUIRED to play these Xbox games.. So even though the game is being purchased via Steam, that's still another monthly active user for Xbox Live (which is clearly the metric Microsoft is concentrating on moving forward)..

Its a win, win, win.. More sales for Xbox games due to a presence on Steam, resulting in more active Xbox Live users, also resulting in further growth for Xbox in PC gaming (which benefits Microsoft as a whole)..

As long as these games require an Xbox Live account, they are technically still part of the "Xbox" ecosystem.. Regardless of whatever store-front you prefer.. It's actually a rather genius move in this upcoming "battle of the ecosystems"..

As far as UWP, the new Game Core in Win10 seems to be the evolution of that vision (In terms of gaming anyway) .. There's obviously a place for lightweight touch friendly apps so that's where UWP and PWA will continue to serve their purpose on the wider scale..

@Pedro: "I had issues when the system was released but I have yet to encounter any of these problems with the Windows Store since then."

Same here.. I seriously think many of these "Windows Store is garbage" comments are hyperbole from people who don't actually use the Windows Store..

I've downloaded and played plenty of games from there ever since Xbox Play Anywhere was released.. No issues at all..

*disclaimer/clarification* I'm not a "PC gamer" by any means other the idea that I sometimes play video games on my PC.. So far I've been able to purchase, download, and play video games from the Microsoft Store onto my PC without any issues.. Which is why I don't get the general "Windows Store is complete garbage" narrative..

Windows gaming PCs are still Microsoft's ecosystem. Being friendly with Valve may placate Valve from moving from Windows platform.

Microsoft may have other motives to keep Valve within Microsoft's sphere of influence.

Haha, if Sony did this you and others would laugh. In fact, with the Quantic Dream games coming to Epic Store, they are already laughing and saying "Sony is losing their ground!"

But when MS does it, people go "MS being more PC friendly". It's like listening to Fox News soundbites, in video game form!

Kinda different scenarios. MS has been moving to a unified software space for a while. It's clearly their mandate to utilize their console, as well as software (Windows) space to release broad-spectrum. As for Quantic Dream moving over... That's simply not Sony's move. QD clearly have the rights to proceed with a PC release.

All that being said, PSNow has been moving away from solely PS hardware and onto PC, but at a much lesser scale than what MS has done. We do have the odd individuals here touting the win because of that, but also ignoring that Sony also wins with regards to subscriptions.

Checks and balances.

Xbox is coming to switch already. Hopefully hear about it at E3.
https://au.ign.com/articles/2019/02/04/what-does-xbox-live-on-switch-mobile-actually-mean

I already responded to @Pedro's same comment. The Windows Store is certainly not broken beyond all measure. In fact, over the last couple of years it's gotten a lot better. Unfortunately, it still lags as a storefront (even behind Epic.) I'm not saying that the WS is meant to match other storefronts anywhere close, but it is meant to provide apps/game software for Windows users.

My largest issues, were:

• The store could not continue downloads from a pause.
• The store would stall download and any attempt to refresh meant downloading from the beginning.
• The store would legitimately forget I owned a game. This could be due to a license renewel of some kind, i'm not sure. Mine was Halo Wars... It said I could download on Xbox, but discontinued my PC license. This could be legitimate, but more communication would be necessary.

All that being said... The storefront is way better on the back-end nowadays. My only latest issue is playing FH4 on my PC, but no sounb in-gameplay... Only in cutscenes. That's obviously a game matter, but I booted it yesterday and it's annoying me still lol.

Wow. That is news.

Fair enough. But I wouldn't mind playing Grabbed by the Ghoulies again. Even though that is the most suggestive title ever. Lol

Why? When you buy on MS store, you get the game for Windows and Xbox, this will not be the case on Steam.