EA and Comcast join forces to stream games to cable subscribers

Electronic Arts is getting into the set-top streaming business this week by partnering with Comcast to deliver games to Comcast subscribers' X1 cable boxes.

The launch of this platform, officially branded "XFinity Games powered by EA", makes good on a report from Reuters over a year ago that EA and Comcast were working on a game streaming service.

EA's platform is currently in open beta and streaming out a catalog of just over 20 games, including EA titles like NBA Jam and M.U.L.E. along with some non-EA games like Tomorrow Corporation's Little Inferno.

"We have relationships with publishers across the industry," EA's Katrina Strafford told Polygon in response to queries about whether or not more non-EA games will be added to the service. "It's absolutely something we'll explore more as we get feedback from players."

The service is free for Comcast subscribers at the moment, and gamepads are neither required nor supported -- instead, X1 Games lets players employ select phones and tablets as controllers while playing these streaming games by visiting a specific web page on their device.