Xbox LIVE Comes to Windows 8

While Xbox LIVE was originally conceived as an online service for the Xbox video game consoles, Microsoft ported it to Windows, poorly, as Games for Windows – LIVE in 2006. Games for Windows – LIVE is pretty lackluster, only offering a subset of the capabilities you get with Xbox LIVE on the 360. But it still exists and Microsoft has pledged to continue supporting it in Windows 8, even though it supports only those games that run via the legacy Windows desktop. We won’t examine it in more detail here because nothing has changed.

In the years since creating this weird offshoot of Xbox LIVE, Microsoft also created the Windows Phone platform, which debuted in 2010. One of the major features of that platform was an integrated version of Xbox LIVE.

Unlike Games for Windows – LIVE, Xbox LIVE for Windows Phone wasn’t a horrible compromise, and it provided access to great Xbox LIVE games, with achievements and other Xbox LIVE features. Xbox LIVE on Windows Phone was so successful, in fact, that Microsoft decided to bring it to Windows 8 as well.

Windows 8 also includes apps for Xbox entertainment services, including Xbox Music and Xbox Video.

So what’s the difference between Xbox LIVE (for Windows 8) and Games for Windows – LIVE? It’s two‑fold. First, Xbox LIVE works with Metro‑style games on Windows 8, not desktop‑based games. Second, Microsoft has created new Xbox LIVE user experiences for Windows 8 that mirror those it created first for Windows Phone. These experiences take the form of two apps, for now, called Xbox Games and Xbox Companion.

NOTE

Like so many Metro‑style apps in Windows 8, Xbox Games and Xbox Companion are connected apps, meaning that they require you to sign in with a Microsoft account. As always, it’s easiest if you simply sign in to your Windows 8 PC or device using a Microsoft account. But if you are using a local account type, you can sign in to a Microsoft account the first time you run either of these apps.