Google is preparing to officially bring Android games to Windows PCs sometime next year.
The company dropped the news in a brief video during Thursday’s The Game Awards event. “Get ready to play your favorite mobile games on your PC,” Google teased in the clip.
The company plans on bringing the games to Windows PCs via a new Google Play Games app for Microsoft’s operating system, according to The Verge. The same app can also cloud sync your gameplay session across devices. So you’ll be able to play your games on an Android smartphone, and then continue where you left off when you switch to a Windows PC.
“This Google built product brings the best of Google Play Games to more laptops and desktops, and we are thrilled to expand our platform for players to enjoy their favorite Android games even more,” the company’s product director Greg Hartrell told The Verge.
The big question is how Google plans on porting the games to the Windows OS. A company spokesperson told PCMag: “We’ll have more to share on implementation in the new year, but what we can say is this is a new experience that will enable players to download and play their favorite Google Play Games on their desktop. It will not involve game streaming. Google will distribute the application and games themselves.”
Users can already use emulators for Windows to run Android games over the OS. However, the upcoming Google Play Games app is poised to offer an even better experience, especially with the cloud syncing capability.
The news also arrives as Microsoft is preparing to bring Android app support to Windows 11. However, the company is doing so, without the Google Play Store. Instead, Microsoft is partnering with Amazon’s mobile app store to deliver the Android apps.
To run the Android software, Microsoft is adding a new component in Windows 11 called “Windows Subsystem for Android,” which is designed to essentially load the Android OS over a Hyper-V virtual machine. Windows 11 Insiders can currently test the feature.
