Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice will be the first game to get full touch controls in Microsoft's streaming service, Project xCloud. First announced in October 2018, Project xCloud is currently in beta on an invitation-only basis. Its full release is expected in September 2020.
Video game streaming services are a controversial but increasingly common feature of the current video game marketplace. Perhaps the most notable of these services is Google Stadia, which launched late last year to poor reviews. Many players were thoroughly disappointed with Stadia's performance, as well as its relatively scant game library and a host of missing features that had been promised for launch. The idea of game streaming is exciting to many people, promising a world where gamers can play high-end AAA titles on systems without the power to run them on their own, but there's still a sizable gap between idea and execution.
Project xCloud is now trying to narrow that gap a bit with the help of Hellblade. In a recent Game Stack stream from Microsoft, Project xCloud Program Manager Arik Cohen announced that the dark fantasy action game would be the first of many games in the xCloud service to offer full support for touch controls, allowing it to be played on smartphones without the use of a controller. Cohen says that support for touch controls was the most requested feature by players who had participated in the xCloud preview, stating that people were most invested in the convenience of being able to experience acclaimed titles like Hellblade anywhere and at any time.
The stream also highlighted some of the features of Project xCloud's touchscreen support, which was made out to be very advanced. Developers talked about how games would offer different control schemes based on where the player is in the game. An example was given in Gears 5, where the control layout will disappear during cinematic cutscenes and change to a touch slider during certain vehicle segments. All of these features are also expected to show up in the touch controls for Hellblade. An exact window for when touch controls will be added to the game was not given, but it seems likely that it will be very soon.
Lack of touch screen optimization is far from the only thing holding game streaming back, though. The technical requirements to run the software are still very steep, and it requires fast internet speeds for the best experience. As the botched release of Google Stadia shows, this is a very difficult system to get right, and there's a lot that can go wrong and ruin the experience for fans. These touch controls seem like a promising addition to Project xCloud's service, but frankly, controlling Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice with the touchscreen of your phone isn't nearly as important as being able to play the game with decent performance. It remains to be seen if Project xCloud can deliver that experience.
Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice is available now on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC.
Source: Microsoft
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