Google rolls out Game Dashboard to Play Services, finally making the jump to the Pixel 6a
Android 12brought Pixel users a snazzy newGame Dashboardthat offers some rudimentary gaming options like an FPS counter and live streaming capabilities for YouTubers. The dashboard was initially very much only meant for Pixel phones — Google even made it part of the system UI of these phones. This has changed just now, though. Google has started rolling out Game Dashboard as a part of Play Services to thePixel 6and finally thePixel 6a, too, which inexplicably launched without it. This also paves the way to bring the dashboard to more devices other than just Google’s own.
As spotted by Mishaal Rahman, Game Dashboard appears to roll out to Pixel phones as part ofGoogle Play Servicesversion 22.30 and higher, though only if they runAndroid 13, which is currently still in beta. We can confirm as much on a Pixel 6 of our own. To check if the dashboard’s switch to Play Services has been made for you, head to your system settings and see if you can find a new Game Dashboard section in the Google menu.
As for functionality, it doesn’t look like any changes have been made compared to the previous method. When you activate the dashboard, you will see it as a floating button whenever you play a game. It’s still filled with the usual, quite limited options. With the switch to Play Services, Google is paving the way both for simpler updates to the experience across all supported Android versions and also, of course, the possibility to bring Game Dashboard to come to other devices.
In fact, Google has confirmed to Android Police thatGame Dashboard is coming to the Pixel 6aonce it’s running Android 13, and with this, it has made good on this promise. The company has additionally said in its July 2022 changelog for Play Services that the Dashboard would make its way to “select devices” running Android 13, but it hasn’t specified anything beyond that. We will likely still have to wait until the Android 13 launch for more details, currently all but confirmed to happen some time in September.
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