Samsung has unveiled its brand new Smart TVs ahead of CES 2022 today, and one of the most interesting new features is a Gaming Hub that will provide customers access to cloud gaming services. Google Stadia, Nvidia GeForce Now, and Utomik are the first cloud gaming services to be supported, but the South Korean company teased that’s “just the beginning.”
“The Samsung Gaming Hub will empower players to discover and jump into the games they love faster through game streaming services,” Samsung said in the press release. The company described the three aforementioned services as “industry leaders,” though Microsoft’s Xbox Cloud Gaming is curiously absent.
Xbox head Phil Spencer previously announced that Microsoft was working on bringing Xbox Cloud Gaming to Smart TVs, and the software giant is also planning to release Xbox streaming sticks to bring Xbox games to any TVs. As of this writing, though, Xbox Cloud Gaming remains in beta and players are still limited to a 1080p/60FPS experience, while competitors including Google Stadia already support 4K streams.
As Microsoft’s Xbox Series X|S consoles still remain pretty hard to find, we hope to get some news about Xbox Cloud Gaming on Smart TVs later this year. It’s still early days for cloud gaming services, but Microsoft’s Xbox Cloud Gaming is already quite competitive with over 100 cloud-enabled games available with Xbox Game Pass Ultimate. Samsung is also the official TV partner for Xbox in the US and Canada, so it wouldn’t be surprising to see Xbox Cloud Gaming come first to Samsung’s 2022 Smart TVs later this year.
