Dave Perry Shows Off Cloud Gaming Service "Gaikai" 79
jasoncart writes "Veteran gaming man Dave Perry has shown off his OnLive-rivalling, cloud gaming service called Gaikai in a new video that is drawing a lot of attention. As you can see from the video, Perry plays World of Warcraft, EVE Online, Mario Kart 64, Spore and more — all running on a bog-standard computer through the Gaikai website, itself running in a normal version of Firefox."
More details about the service are available at Perry's website. He spoke about Gaikai in an interview a few months ago, and he seems confident that this will work better than OnLive (which we've discussed in the past).
Notably missing from the video: (Score:3, Interesting)
- Why no mention of what connection he is on? Or for that matter, why no mention of where the server is located? (besides some vague "Oh, I've never been as far from a server as I am at the moment!")
- Where's the fullscreen? I can see how it would be quite hard to properly stream current screensizes (such as 1680x1050, or even 1280x1024)
Other than that, I noticed a few odd things, such as:
- When playing MarioKart 64, at the end he all of a sudden crashes into a wall, which he tells is because "he hasn't been playing the game for quite some time"; Seems quite odd, and looked more like it had to do with the actual command not properly coming through.
- Howcome he's allowed to have MK64 running on an emulator anyways? I thought it was illegal to do so (even if you have the game yourself); though I might be wrong on that.
Whereas I like the idea (but can't see myself using it in the next decades), I think the price has to be really low for people to actually use it. Though I can definitely see a use for it for some new sort of console (Phantom, anyone?
Still, I always wondered how this would scale if it got really popular: I can't imagine a computer being able to stream multiple high-graphics game for multiple clients.
This is cool and worrisome at the same time (Score:3, Interesting)
While some claim that bandwidth isn't up to snuff, and maintaining enough servers to support a massive number of gamers is not feasible, etc, etc, this will all change in a short amount of time. This type of service is on the cusp of being a reality, and it will change computing forever. If a video game can be supported through a remote terminal, then ANY application could be supported. Eventually more and more apps will be available only on the cloud, and hardware costs will go down, then you'll find that 20 years later only dumb terminals exist in the hands of the average consumer. As wireless connectivity matures even phones will all just be dumb terminals. You never need to upgrade your phone, unless you want a bigger screen or different input method. The applications you RENT will be unpiratable, because there is no publicly available platform to run them on, and you can use the same app across your desktop and phone, but with modified interfaces as the device would report it's capabilities to the cloud, and the cloud would change the interface appropriately.
How does linux fit into all of this? Will there be a new ideological movement in the future to keep processing power in the hands of consumers? How do you install linux on a dumb terminal?
LS
Re:Head in the cloud(s) (Score:3, Interesting)
Except they won't actually be able to do that at all. Workplaces will block these services. Libraries will block these services. And if you can afford to regularly stream HD video to a mobile device, you can probably afford a Playstation.
Except this isn't "try before you buy". It's "pay per play". Remember arcades? Well, this won't be "insert coin", it'll be "insert credit card". And you bet your life they'll take away the "buy" option as soon as they can.