OnLive, the "Console Destroyer"




Posted by Linko_16

http://pc.ign.com/articles/965/965535p1.html

The long and short of it is that you get a >$100 "Microconsole" which you use play games over the internet for a monthly subscription fee rather than buying multiple bulky, expensive consoles every five years. Or, at least, that's how they're selling it.

Although I'm somewhat attached the console ownership over all these years, I'm open to this new idea and a lot of people I've talked to about it are very excited, but I'm wary of the complications involved with this technology. Being able to trade in as many as three separate expensive consoles for just one little gadget under a hundred bucks is an attractive offer, but when you think about it in terms of, instead of playing games you have hard copies of on the machine you own and is sitting right next to you, you're playing on a computer hundreds of miles away that you connect to via internet and ultimately have no direct control over, it seems like there could easily be a lot of unnecessary problems.

Also, because the data for the game is processed on their servers as you're playing it, doesn't that mean that unless you have the most perfect connection speeds money can buy (and maybe not even then), this makes any game, even one you're playing by yourself, vulnerable to serious lag? Not that I'm an expert or anything, maybe with only one user input the data could be processed and downloaded at acceptable speeds, but if it is the case that you'd have to deal with even the smallest amount of lag, it would be wildly annoying to play anything but an RPG. Plus I've heard that you're going to have to live in close proximity to one of their server locations, and that there are not many.

Also, I'm not fooled by the talk of how cheap it is. It all depends on how much the subscription fee is, but over the course of an average console generation, it will surely add up to being at least quite close to the expense of your average console, if not more. Not necessarily a negative, since at worst that just makes it equal to a console in some way. It's definitely not a downer for X-Box Live subscribers, who already pay to game online, but I never thought such a thing should require a fee.

So the success of this kind of thing depends on A) How well it'll actually work (see above), B) How well developers accept it (it's no good if no one good decides to license their games for it, some may be committed to staying on console), C) How well customers accept it (remember the N-Gage?). It's certainly a different idea and may amount to being a fair improvement, but I don't think a decision on whether or not this is a preferable option to console ownership can possibly be made until more about OnLive and how it will work practically is known.

Either way, it's such interesting news that I'm really quite shocked no one has started a topic about it alre-


Quoting Speedfreak: Psst, VGC is dead.


Oh, right.




Posted by Ant

I'm skeptical about the whole thing, at best. Still a bit before it's time.




Posted by BLUNTMASTER X

i wanna own the physical games




Posted by Speedfreak

Won't work unless they've discovered Tachyons. It will be as laggy as hell and the video stream will look like full screen youtube.




Posted by Zeta

This probably wouldn't work unless you had ***ly PC specs or something, right?




Posted by S

It's a horrible idea. They'd need a flawless connection to their users, and that's not going to happen any time soon. This is just another unrealistic idea/hoax.




Posted by Speedfreak

[quote=S




Posted by BLUNTMASTER X

[quote=Speedfreak;937667]It won't work until we find something faster than the speed of light.i hope you're fakeposting right now




Posted by Poco


Quoting Speedfreak: It won't work until we find something faster than the speed of light.


he's right.



Posted by maian

I heard about this. Calling anything a "console destroyer" is a laughable concept. Maybe consoles in their current forms will evolve or die off to a new medium someday, but that's not any day soon. If anything, maybe PC games will go lower in demand, because from what I read about it, this essentially lets crappy computers play good games at a good speed. (Though I didn't read it very thoroughly, correct me if I'm horribly wrong)

Either way, I'll be console gaming regardless.




Posted by BLUNTMASTER X

here we go, another maian post where he thinks his opinion is important




Posted by BLUNTMASTER X

steve ballmer: bill!!! some lil faggot is gonna be console gaming regardless!
bill gates: fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck my plan is RUINED!




Posted by Speedfreak

Im really not joking, the kind of lag this would produce means that for it to work properly you'd need a signal with minimal latency. Considering online multiplayer games are laggy across large distances, even with optical cables, they'd need a method of communication faster than optical. Which means faster than the speed of light.

Which means this will be like playing a single player game with lag worse than multiplayer games.

It's simple physics, try reading.




Posted by S

The lag would be the time it takes for their computer to render the information, the time your connection takes to receive data in a consistent stream, and for your computer to display it. So it takes your computer's power out of the equation primarily besides rendering it on the screen, which means the delay is based on your computer's internet connection and the time it takes their computer to run the program. It'd add major delay but not incredibly worse than most multiplayers, that is as long as their computers are up to par. But this assumes that each player has a computer/system on their side specifically generating a game, or some ****ing super computer.




Posted by BLUNTMASTER X

[quote=Speedfreak;937803]Im really not joking, the kind of lag this would produce means that for it to work properly you'd need a signal with minimal latency. Considering online multiplayer games are laggy across large distances, even with optical cables, they'd need a method of communication faster than optical. Which means faster than the speed of light.

Which means this will be like playing a single player game with lag worse than multiplayer games.

It's simple physics, try reading.read solrok's post, we need better computers and ****, the speed of light is irrelevant




Posted by Speedfreak

[quote=S




Posted by BLUNTMASTER X

so what does this have to do with the speed of light wiseass




Posted by Speedfreak

That's the fastest possible speed we can send information down an optical cable. We would need the signal to go faster than that to reduce latency/lag.




Posted by

PS3 MOTHA****ER!!!!!!




Posted by Prince Shondronai

But...but it worked fine in demonstration at the show!




Posted by Vampiro V. Empire

Normally I'd say I want the physical copy like someone mentioned but I just realised I said the same thing about music albums and I pretty much don't give a **** about that anymore.

Though the actual idea of this thing doesn't appeal to me anyways.




Posted by Linko_16

Someone on ZP dug up an interview with the founder of OnLive. It's long and tedious, but he talks about all the technicalities. According to him, he didn't think it would ever work either.

http://www.zeldapower.com/forum/showpost.php?p=850662&postcount=1