Microsoft confirmed this week that Xbox Live will be coming to its revamped Windows 8 operating system.
The company had few details about Xbox integration at this point. The full release of Windows 8 is likely at least a year away; the first developer preview was unveiled just last night. But Microsoft did post a screen shot (click left for full image) of what Xbox on Windows 8 might look like, and it should be familiar to current Xbox users.
"Bringing Xbox Live to Windows 8 is part of our vision to bring you all the entertainment you want, shared with the people you care about, made easy," Larry Hyrb, the director of programming for Xbox, wrote in a blog post.
At its BUILD conference this week, where Windows chief Stephen Sinofsky showed off a lengthy demo of the OS, "we are showing that it is easy for developers to create games for Windows 8 that take advantage of the power of Xbox Live," Hyrb wrote.
He promised more information about Xbox Live on Windows 8 in the "near future."
Those games, meanwhile, will likely end up in Windows 8's app store, now known as the Windows Store. It will allow developers to sell their apps anywhere Windows is sold worldwide, from games to productivity tools. Microsoft promised a particularly rich experience ("flicker-free action") for games on Windows 8, thanks to the underlying power of DirectX 11.
For more, see PCMag's hands on with the developer preview and the Samsung testing PC and the slideshow below. Also check out our unboxing of the preview PC.