Xbox’s Mobile Store may be just around the corner


An Xbox store for mobile games, including Microsoft-owned titles like Candy Crush and Minecraft, will apparently launch soon.

Earlier this year, Microsoft revealed it would launch an Xbox Store for mobile games, bringing competition to the leading mobile game distributors – Apple’s App Store and Google’s Google Play.

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Now, a new dedicated webpage spotted by an X user shows that the company is preparing for the launch.

In May, Xbox president Sarah Bond revealed at the Bloomberg Technology Summit that the company will launch the store in July with games from its own studios, such as Candy Crush Saga and Minecraft. Later, the store will open for third-party games.

The company is launching its platform via the web rather than a dedicated mobile app store like App Store and Google Play.

Bond said that the company wanted to launch the platform “across all devices, all countries no matter what independent of the policies of [...] closed ecosystem stores”, referring to restrictions imposed by Apple’s App Store and Google Play.

The executive hinted that Xbox will eventually launch its store on Apple’s App Store and Google Play, at least in the EU, after changes implemented by the European Union’s Digital Markets Act required it to open up to alternative stores and payment methods.

Microsoft first announced that it would open a store for Mobile games in 2022 when it bought Activision Blizzard, which owns titles like Call of Duty and World of Warcraft.

The mobile store will enable Microsoft to leverage these titles to attract gamers directly to its platform. This may help the company increase its market share in the mobile gaming industry, which is estimated to be $102 billion this year.

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