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The upcoming schedule for this year’s Game Developers Conference – taking place between the 18th and 22nd of March – has revealed how Microsoft will be discussing its plans to expand Xbox Live support to Android, iOS and the Nintendo Switch.

It wants cross-platform play to go beyond the insanely popular crafting-survival game Minecraft and support multiple other titles. The tech giant will be providing a first look at the SDK which enables developers to connect players across multiple platforms – including Switch – with “any game” available in the Microsoft Store on Windows computers. It would essentially allow Xbox Live achievements, social systems and multiplayer to be added to games on the above-mentioned devices.

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Below is the full outline of the panel:

Xbox Live is one of the largest, most engaged gaming communities on the planet with decades of experience providing managed game services to developers that save you time and unlock all of the social and engagement features that players love.

Now Xbox Live is about to get MUCH bigger. Xbox Live is expanding from 400M gaming devices and a reach to over 68M active players to over 2B devices with the release of our new cross-platform XDK.

Get a first look at the SDK to enable game developers to connect players between iOS, Android, and Switch in addition to Xbox and any game in the Microsoft Store on Windows PCs.

Takeaway

- Xbox Live players are highly engaged and active on Xbox and PC, but now they can take their gaming achievement history, their friends list, their clubs, and more with them to almost every screen.
- This will break down barriers for developers that want their communities to mingle more freely across platforms. Combined with PlayFab gaming services, this means less work for game developers and more time to focus on making games fun.

Intended Audience

- Game services engineers looking to save time & expand their customer base by letting Microsoft managed game services handle social, communication, and multiplayer interactions across billions of screens.
- Game producers looking to plan a multi-platform strategy that brings the most active, engaged players into a community where they can watch, buy, play, pause, and continue their games from one device to the next on top of the most reliable social and multiplayer network in the world.

Would you like to see Xbox Live support on other platforms? Tell us below.

[source windowscentral.com]