Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

OnLive To Launch In UK This Autumn

Posted by timothy on from the why-sail-across-the-atlantic dept.

arcticstoat writes "Cloud-based gaming platform OnLive has announced plans to launch in the UK this Autumn, with Onlive.co.uk opening for OnLive player tag registration on 7 June. OnLive runs games on remote servers and streams them back to subscribers, but until now it's only been available in some areas of the US."

9 of 67 comments (clear)

  1. This has to fail by Rik+Sweeney · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The only reason being that if it starts doing well it'll slowly become the new DRM.

    --
    Summation 2
    1. Re:This has to fail by Inda · · Score: 2

      How can it not fail?

      My packets take 50ms and five hops just leaving my ISP's network.

      How will everyone cope with the laaaaaaaaaaag?

      --
      This post contains benzene, nitrosamines, formaldehyde and hydrogen cyanide.
    2. Re:This has to fail by Stormthirst · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Do you mean this from a DRM point or a technical point?

      DRM: Well, apart from the fact that Blockbuster went bust, people still want to be able to rent movies. Not everyone wants a massive DVD/Blu-ray collection cluttering up their houses, and most people are turning away from $15 theatre tickets in favour of $8 per month for Netflix. The cost is incomparable. It is also conceivable that not everyone wants to pirate the stuff they want to watch.

      Technical: The difference is the lag time. Netflix can do a lot of buffering, but with games it's interactive - how do you buffer when you don't know what is coming up?

      Either way, your comparison isn't one.

    3. Re:This has to fail by icebraining · · Score: 2

      Yeah, but the casual gaming crowd that plays Farmville and similar doesn't need to render them on a GPU farm, any smartphone GPU is enough.

      --
      Dilbert RSS feed
  2. I would thoroughly dislike by Smirker · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I notice the difference between playing FPS games with wired and wireless mice. I would not react well to anything like this -- especially while I'm busy downloading my err.. creative commons.. music and movies.

    1. Re:I would thoroughly dislike by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Most people either don't know or care, would land in similar ping times as others, or just plain wouldn't use it (the tiny hardcore-gamer group that would hate it for other reasons). That leaves them with a considerable number of potential customers who'd like a Steam-esque experience on their TV, without the cost and various problems of a console. That's not to say I think they'll succeed, just that they might yet have a workable product.

    2. Re:I would thoroughly dislike by Lunix+Nutcase · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I notice the difference between playing FPS games with wired and wireless mice.

      No you don't. What you have is a case of confirmation bias. In a proper double-blind test you wouldn't notice the difference as the difference is well below a human's response threshold.

  3. Re:First! by RivenAleem · · Score: 4, Funny

    I would have been first but I stream /. using OnLive, which results in fractionally larger latency :(

  4. Beta around for a while by wjh31 · · Score: 2

    My attention was drawn a little while ago to the beta of this being around in the uk I downloaded it, and gave it a go and was pleased with the results, but wouldnt use it myself. Pro: The video quality was very good, and i had no latency issues, i tried out a racing game and an action game, both fast paced and i had no issue with input latency. It's clearly a fantastic way for those with lower end graphics cards to play games, You can also pay less than full price for games in exchange for access for a limited period, i.e rental for games you might only play through once. Con: You have to buy your games again to use within OnLive, which can then only be used in onlive. So you may have to pay again fro games you already own, and if you ever leave onlive youd have to buy again to regain access. Bandwidth. The video resolution was good but used every byte of my 10Mbps connection, rendering it unusable for anyone else, or if others used it i'd see a reduction in quality. Note the implications of 4.5+GB/hr for those with caps When my provider throttled me to 2.5Mbps, quality was noticably reduced (though latency was still good) and eventually onlive game up, stating i had insufficient speed. This is a fantastic concept, but as others have highlighted it effectively becomes another form of DRM, but allows gaming on non-gaming machines at good cost