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Google Play Games beta now on Windows desktops, if that’s your thing

    The Play Games available for Windows often walk you through your unusual keyboard/mouse controls, sometimes really stylish.
    enlarge / The Play Games available for Windows often walk you through your unusual keyboard/mouse controls, sometimes really stylish.

    AKPublish pty ltd / Kevin Purdy

    First, Microsoft and Amazon colluded to enable Android on Windows, and now Google is making its own claim. Starting today, some US Windows users can try a beta version of Google Play Games on their desktop.

    At the time of writing, just over 60 games were available to me on the Windows Play Games Store, from a US location. They’re all free downloads because they’re the kind of games that make money from in-app purchases. It’s a mix of games that resemble or sound like more familiar games, relaxed build/design games, gacha ace, then what? Genshin impact. The selection is likely to expand, but the nature of Android’s free-to-play environment isn’t going to change anytime soon.

    If one of these games already hits you, you can sync your progress, achievements, friends, and other Google Play stats between your phone and Windows.

    I don’t have a Play game in my recent roster, so I chose Zombeast: Zombie Shooter from the library and installed it for a test drive. The game is what it says on the label; you slog forward through linear walkways, occasionally moving left and right, and click to fire when your auto target lands on the right zombie or oddly placed gas can.

    Knowing I was playing on Windows, zombie loaded with a tutorial for the keyboard controls. Everything worked as expected and the game played responsively. But it’s shocking to play a shooter, even an on-rails shooter like this, on a PC and be so limited. You can’t look with the mouse, you can barely move in any direction other than forward, and you only use the primary button on the mouse. I played a few levels, was notified that I would get a free gold revolver upgrade that would otherwise cost $1.99, then jumped out.

    • Some of the games available in Google Play Games Windows beta.

    • More of the games available in Windows Google Play Games beta.

    • My chosen test game, Zombeast: Zombie Shooter. Look, at some point you can really become a “Zombeast” and clumsily cut at zombies with clawing hands.

    • You are not supposed to use the shotgun on the “fat” zombies as they just absorb it. But somehow a gun works better?

    • I really have the first level of . crushed zombie. My secret? Mouse clicks to shoot things.

    I wrote that Play Games was available to “some” users at the top because not just any system can access Google Play on Windows. You’ll need Windows 10 or 11, a solid-state drive with 10 GB of space, at least an Intel UHD Graphics 630 or equivalent graphics card, a processor with at least four cores, 8 GB of RAM, and a Windows administrator account. You also need to enable hardware virtualization in your BIOS settings and allow Google Play to enable specific Windows hypervisor settings.

    It’s an interesting timing for Google to launch a US beta of its Play Store for Windows. Microsoft recently launched a similar limited trial of Amazon Appstore apps that use the Android subsystem for Windows, built on top of the Subsystem for Linux. Amazon’s Appstore is not licensed by Google and does not have the same APIs that an Android device would provide, although Amazon and Microsoft can probably replicate some or even most of them. Meanwhile, Google offers this fully integrated and synced app, starting with only a limited number of games that have good desktop (perhaps Chromebook) support.

    Listing image by Google/Kevin Purdy