Microsoft bins Android-to-Windows porting tool to focus on iOS

Microsoft has canned Project Astoria -- an upcoming "Windows Bridge" that would've let devs easily port Android games to the Windows Store -- to focus its attention on its iOS porting tool.

Last year Microsoft made its Windows Bridge for iOS, dubbed "Project Islandwood" open source, and has continued to update the tool ever since. The company also announced Project Astoria at the same time.

However, after receiving feedback from a number of developers, who allegedly claimed it was "unneccesary" and "confusing" to have two projects designed to bring code over from mobile operating systems, Microsoft has now scrapped Astoria. 

"We received a lot of feedback that having two Bridge technologies to bring code from mobile operating systems to Windows was unnecessary, and the choice between them could be confusing," read a Windows blog post.

"We have carefully considered this feedback and decided that we would focus our efforts on the Windows Bridge for iOS and make it the single Bridge option for bringing mobile code to all Windows 10 devices, including Xbox and PCs."

Microsoft is urging developers who were waiting on Astoria to take a look at its iOS Bridge, and its recently acquired C# porting tool, Xamarin.