What you need to know
- A newly discovered Microsoft patent has given us a closer look at the canceled Xbox Keystone streaming console.
- The device is designed to sit under a TV and stream games through Xbox Game Pass.
- Keystone was canceled after Microsoft was unable to reasonably evaluate it.
In 2021, Microsoft announced that it was working on a dedicated streaming device for Xbox Game Pass. That device was later revealed to be codenamed Keystone, which took the form of a streaming box that would fit under your TV, cost a fraction of the price of a regular Xbox, and enable the ability to play Xbox games over the cloud .
Unfortunately, it appears that Microsoft has since abandoned plans to ship the Xbox Keystone due to an inability to lower the price to a level where it made sense for customers. Xbox CEO Phil Spencer has said that the device should have cost around $99 or $129, but the company was unable to achieve that.
That means we never got a chance to see what the Xbox Keystone looked like. The closest we ever got was in a photo posted by Phil Spencer, which happened to include a front view of the Xbox Keystone on a shelf. That’s as much as we’ve ever seen from the console, that is so far.
Thanks to a patent discovered by Windows Central, we can finally take a closer look at the box that Microsoft had created from the inside. First, the patent reveals that the console took the shape of an equal square with a circle shape on top, similar to the black circular vent on an Xbox Series S. The front of the box had the Xbox power button and a USB-A port.
Around the rear there were three additional ports; HDMI, ethernet and power. The right side of the console appeared to have an Xbox controller pairing button, and the bottom had a circular “Greetings from Seattle” plaque on which the console was placed, similar to the Xbox Series X.
This patent was filed in June 2022, which was around the time the first details of the Xbox Keystone were being revealed. Sadly, the Xbox Keystone in this specific form is unlikely to see the light of day, but at least we now know what it would look like.
We still don’t know much about what was powering things under the hood, including what kind of operating system or firmware it was running. Was it an Xbox OS completely with local game support removed? Or was it running something lighter with an Xbox Game Pass app on top? We currently don’t know, and likely never will.
Keystone is gone, but Microsoft isn’t retiring from the cloud
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Microsoft has given up on its Xbox Keystone console, at least for now, but that doesn’t mean they’ve given up on the cloud.
The biggest barriers to the cloud now revolve around the business model. Using cloud game servers 24/7 is incredibly expensive, and the $15/month Xbox Game Pass Ultimate doesn’t cover the costs on its own. At least in theory, in-game purchases and direct game purchases would help improve the business model to some extent, but gatekeepers like Apple and Google work hard to prevent this business model from evolving. Microsoft is known to be working on a mobile game store for Android and iOS of its own, but I have absolutely no idea how they’re going to get people to download it. It won’t appear on Android and iOS by default like cloud gaming, and audiences across mobile expect ease of access as their north star.
A keyboard like Keystone would help reduce that, but as my colleague Zac Bowden pointed out above, Microsoft wasn’t able to lower the price. People would expect a device that can only play streaming games to cost around $99, and that was the target for Keystone, but the demand for components (boosted by the AI gold rush) has kept computing component prices down irregularly high.
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Instead of a dedicated device, Microsoft told me in LA for the Xbox Games Showcase 2024 that they are seeing huge growth with TV apps, such as those included by default in the Samsung TV Gaming Center. I’ve heard that Microsoft has been experimenting with offering cloud gaming for PC as well through Xbox Cloud Gaming, which would boost the catalog. Microsoft is also known to be working on allowing players to bring their existing game libraries to the cloud and purchase cloud games to own, pending discussions with third-party publishers and license holders.
Cloud may be incremental today, but it’s important for Microsoft to keep its foot in the door in this space. One day, cloud gaming may be indistinguishable from local playback, and platforms like NVIDIA GeForce Now are proving that the technology is fully and completely viable. Xbox Cloud Gaming has some way to go on the technology side, but there’s no reason to think they won’t be able to in the future.