First Android 17 leak teases a big win for gamers

If you’re a gamer, Android 17 might excite you. Since One UI 9 will most likely be based on this update, your Galaxy smartphone and tablet will likely benefit from these gaming improvements. The codename for the upcoming Android version has also been revealed.

A report from Android Authority reveals that Android 17's internal dessert codename is ‘Cinnamon Bun.' This information was spotted in the latest Android Canary release. Moreover, the publication was also able to spot traces of support for native controller remapping in the same code release.

Currently, Android natively supports some popular gamepads and gaming controllers, such as the Xbox Wireless Controller and the PlayStation DualSense Wireless Controller. If you want to use other gaming controllers that aren't popular, you won't be able to remap its buttons on your Galaxy (or any other Android) phone or tablet. In Android 17, a permission named android.permission.CONTROLLER_REMAPPING was spotted.

The report also talks about references to a dedicated section in the Settings app where you might be able to remap the controls of a paired gaming controller. It could do this using a feature called Virtual Gamepad. The operating system might register a virtual input using a standard hardware identifier.

The Virtual Gamepad supports the following buttons:

Actual gamepad key presses are converted into virtual key presses which are then remapped. This enables button remapping in games lacking remapping support and allows mapping of on-screen touch controls for games without controller support.

Looking at this information, it appears that Android 17 will bring a major improvement to game controller support. And if you are someone who likes playing games on your Galaxy phone or tablet using a gamepad, you will see better performance with unsupported gamepads.