Microsoft Liberates Xbox: iOS & Android Live Apps Coming

Microsoft plans on bringing more of the Xbox experience to rival smartphone operating systems, including Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android.

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Microsoft’s Windows Phone offered its few customers the ability to play games against one another using their Xbox Live account. However, the company decided to discriminate against rival operating systems and used the feature to make its Windows Phone offering attractive. Although of benefit to Windows Phone, the move handicapped Microsoft’s Xbox.

In December 2011, the company reconsidered their motives and released an Xbox Live and Kinectimals that extended the gaming experience beyond the living-room bound console, to Apple’s iOS smartphones. These iPhone applications proved successful, so much so that Microsoft is now planning to share some Xbox love with Android too. A Microsoft spokesperson shared the news in a statement:

“While the Xbox Live experiences and games always work best on the Windows platform, we understand that some Xbox fans may be using other types of devices. To satisfy that need, we are working to extend a few of our Xbox experiences and titles to other platforms.”

So far, Microsoft hasn’t revealed when the Xbox Live app will be available on Android or iOS, but there’s comfort in knowing the experience is coming and you don’t need a Windows Phone to share it.