New Game Streaming Service Gives Access to Over 1400 Games

Xbox Game Pass is great, offering hundreds of modern games for as little as $10 a month, but what if you want to play something a little bit older? Or a lot? Sure, you could sign up for the Switch’s Nintendo Switch Online service, but that’s only a couple hundred games at most. Well, a new game streaming service has hit the market, and it offers well over 1400 games — with more to come.

The new streaming platform is called Antstream Arcade, and it’s actually not all that new. It first launched on mobile a few years back, but had a pretty understated reception all things considered. Now it’s getting new life on Xbox, and it looks to be the go-to place for classic games.

Antstream lets you stream over 1400 classic games, including games from Atari, Sega, Nintendo, and PlayStation platforms, as well as a bunch of classic arcade games. Among the big hits are Pac-Man, Bubble Bobble, and Metal Slug, but there’s also games like Mortal Kombat and so many more.

All of these games are officially licensed, as you’d expect to see, and the company has even got some new games for older systems on board. What makes the service so interesting, however, is that it has unique systems in place to mod the original games and provide new challenges.

For example, you might have to play as Pac-Man and avoid the dots at all costs, or chase after ghosts to get your fill. Or it might be something a little simpler, like defeating a certain enemy in Mortal Kombat or winning a race in any number of classic arcade racing games. There’s also leaderboards, high scores to chase, and tournaments, just to keep things interesting.

Steve Cottam, the CEO of Antstream, says that the service is all about keeping games preserved, playable, and accessible to all players.

“Despite living in an age of incredible technology, I found it wasn’t easy enough to access the games I loved growing up and I wanted to be able to easily share scores and compete against friends,” Cottam said, “We believe in the preservation and accessibility of all games, the great, the impossible and the forgotten or lesser known too, I’m very proud to bring the Antstream Arcade platform to the Xbox community.”

Antstream Arcade is available now on Xbox Series X|S and Xbox One. It’ll set you back $30 a year if you want to play, or $80 for a lifetime license, both of which include all future titles. Antstream says it has licensed over 3000 classic games, so the library is set to grow substantially in the future.