Games for Windows are coming to Google Play
For years, Google has looked at Windows with indifference, but that seems to have changed: Google was planning more interoperability between Android and Windows, in addition to the explosive news that Google Play Games has come to Windows, first as a closed beta. They didn’t wait: There are already Windows games on Google Play.
The assault on Google’s Windows has already begun, and it is that the great redesign of Google Play active in a few countries includes a own games section for Windows which in some cases do not go through Google Play Games for Windows, but are downloaded as a lifetime EXE installer.
Boy, there’s a Windows in my Google Play
Android games will arrive on Windows through the door of Google Play Games, but it will not be the only access point. some games can be downloaded as EXE files, which install the game in the “traditional” way on the PC, with its installer and all.
When this happens we will see the button Download on Windows in the Google Play listing, which shares prominence with Install on Android, which is the back button. Lineage2M is a sample Windows game available on GooglePlay.
In games with a Windows version, two buttons appear: one to download for Windows and another for Android
The button Download on Windows Download the file Lineage2MNU_PURPLE_Installer.exe, which installs on Windows like any other application. Purple is a gaming-focused Android emulator that counts Lineage2M among its supported games. In other words, in the case of Lineage2M, it is a android emulator for windows.
Google calls these games “local games”, those which are installed in the normal way, but they won’t be the only ones available. In the redesign of Google Play that is active in South Korea, we can see that they will be separated from what Google calls “Google Play Games on PC” games.
These Google Play Games for PC games seem to work differently, probably being the same APK as for a mobile or a tablet, but it will work under the same emulated system in Windows. Typically, emulation was handled by the new Google Play Games app for Windows announced by Google, since Windows 11’s Android subsystem doesn’t include Google services, at least for now.
The details are still a little hazy, but one thing is clear: Google Play will stop being an Android app store, and it will become a universal application store, including at least games for Windows, coinciding with its redesign. Even without the redesign, there are already Windows games like Lineage2M that can be downloaded.
Through | @ArtemR
