OnLive Remote Gaming Service Launches In June 316
adeelarshad82 writes "After eight years of development, remote gaming service OnLive is scheduled to roll out on June 17 for Windows and Mac. The company also announced its service pricing: users will need to pay $14.95 per month, which will allow them access to the service. However, the company did not disclose the price to rent or purchase games. 'It is partnering in this launch with publishers including Electronic Arts, Ubisoft, 2K Games, THQ and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. The games will also include new releases like Mass Effect 2, Borderlands, Assassin’s Creed II, as well as a bunch of other titles. Perlman anticipates anywhere from a dozen to 25 titles to be available at launch time, and more after that, depending on how negotiations with other publishers proceed.'"
Well good luck to them (Score:5, Interesting)
I just don't see this succeeding, especially after seeing the leaked preview article. The problem is that on top of the cost of the service, you have to have a good net connection. While it uses like 1mbps for the stream, you need more like a 10mbps connection to keep the latency low. Remember that you don't just have to take ping time in to account with data transfer, but the time it takes to transfer all the data. Ok well good connections cost more money and thus aren't so much the domain of the budget user which is their target user. I mean I've got a connection with low ping times and plenty of bandwidth, however I won't be buying since I also have a video card.
Another problem is that because of the compression on the video stream, you are not going to get the highest quality video, no matter what the settings on the host computer are. Part of their selling point is that you get the max quality of new video cards on your current system. No, not really. Looking at the gameplay vids you get more like mid to lowish quality video. Fine, but that isn't nearly so expensive. $100 will get you a video card that will look as good or better than what was shown, and that is not nearly such a barrier for entry.
Yet another problem is that their service requires you to be near one of their data centers, so that pings are low. Fair enough, latency can kill this, but that means their potential user base is less than it would be otherwise. There will be users who want the service and can't have it because their ping is too high. Some may even be near a data center physically, but too far Internet wise.
Finally there's the ever present lag issue. While the test showed some kinds of games to be playable, the lag is there and was noticeable in relation to a native system.
I just don't see this as having a big enough market. If they truly could deliver a gaming experience the same as owning a $1500-2000 system over low bandwidth net connections, sure. However they can't. They can (almost) deliver the experience of owning a $500 system with a $100 graphics card added on over a moderate bandwidth net connection to some areas.
Broadband Cap? (Score:5, Interesting)
Has anyone heard how much this will eat into broadband cap?
and what internet speed is needed to play?
Their is one thing I know, I would not want to be stuck with a game that I cannot play till the start of a new month because I decided to watch a few youtube videos.
partner up? (Score:1, Interesting)
They should think about partnering up with the developers of Google Chrome OS. This seems like a match made in heaven.
Re:Monthly charges AND per game (Score:5, Interesting)
Lets say you've got $1000 bucks to spend. Internet connection we'll say is ~$30 a month. Thats for decent gaming speeds @ home. In scenario A, you grab a $200 computer and your total billing becomes $45 a month - so ~18 months of gaming.In the other scenario, 18 months of internet connectivity is $540. That leaves you $460 for a new Rig. Not a whole lot to deck out your machine.
Reversely, if you buy an 800$ machine, expecting it to last you 3 years, thats $800 + $540 so $1340 overall. If you buy a $200 machine, expecting to play for 3 years, thats $200 + 1620 so 1820 overall. Saving about 500 bucks. The only factors you as a user have to think about its how long you'll go between upgrades.
This OnLive System appears to work well for those who want to game during summer vacation but Buckle down during the school year - in other words: Short spurts of gaming.
Mayday! Mayday! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Monthly charges AND per game (Score:2, Interesting)
They are what Ubisoft, EA, Activision, et. al. want the gaming world to become. No hard distribution channels, no consoles, no PCs, no DRM to fight with.
You go, buy a box, pay a monthly fee for the service and for the games. They retain 100% control and can fuck with you at will, since you have no recourse. Now you can hack the game. Now you can get a killer deal on the predecessor to the latest HOT SEQUEL and find out it probably sucks (or is awesome, but who cares about -good games-). And best of all, your copy of $GAME can go inactive (like we all expect Assassins Creed II to) right before its sequel hits! They hate having informed consumers who can control how and when they play.
I suspect that rentals will be allowed on the publisher's schedule, preceded by many months of full retail (or maybe slightly discounted, to lure you in) prices on the games. No discounts, no control. So you might say my view on OnLive is that of complete and total pessimism, and I hope it goes down in flames.
Re:Monthly charges AND per game (Score:3, Interesting)
Does your friend also have a time machine? Because the first quad core was released Nov 2006, [wikipedia.org] the 2.667ghz Core 2 Extreme QX6700, and it cost $999 just for the processor. [wikipedia.org]. In terms of benchmarks, it's about half the performance [cpubenchmark.net] of a modern $230 i7-930 [microcenter.com].
Quad didn't become popular until the Q6600 was released April 2007 for $266. [wikipedia.org]
Re:What a steal! (Score:3, Interesting)
it would be the same as netflix if netflix charged you on a per-movie basis in addition to the monthly fee. this alone will make onlive fail. I have lost *ALL* interest in onlive do to the pricing model, especially now that steam is heading for the mac.
Can I HomeBrew this? (Score:5, Interesting)
If these companies are achieving moderate detail over the internet, how can I accomplish this on my LAN?
Wow (Score:1, Interesting)
Lots of comments, and not a single person that's tried it.
Guess what. I've tried it for some time now.
Yes, I'm posting as Anon because of the NDA. I've got to watch this carefully...but...here's my take...
What I can say is, every one of you that is saying "but I want a gaming rig" will continue to have a gaming rig. What you're not seeing is the ultra-small, ultra-cheap box that you can buy to replace your overpriced Xbox360/PS3. It's not about playing it on your computer. That's secondary. It's about playing it as a console. A console that you will never upgrade, will never overheat and have a RRoD, never have the console vendor screw you every 18 months with a cheaper version of the same hardware that you paid a fortune for, and the hardware inside never goes obsolete. And a console that is affordable. Think $49 for a game console, which just barely gets you a 8-year-old design, a PS2. Not $299. Parents are willing to pay less to have happy kids, and that's the market. Not college teens, or older people with incomes - kids. Think this through. The whole "play it as a streaming movie on your computer" thing is secondary. That's just a bonus. None of you are looking at the segment of Mac users that can't play PC games. Now they can.
Upgrades? Why upgrade at all? That's their problem. No more figuring out video cards. No more e-peen waving about overpriced, overbuilt systems. No more hassle. All of those upgrade issues go away - it's up to them to upgrade their systems to make it work. Nevermind that the video card is probably a rendering engine ASIC attached to another ASIC that spits out a stream of compressed video. Get those made as a single custom ASIC for a few bucks a chip and suddenly, memory and CPU are all you have to worry about. Intel is already doing "lookie-me" with their 40+ core CPU. Guess who'll probably line up to be the first customer there, eh? Looks like that hardware is getting *cheaper*, not more expensive; the primary cost of a new system is approaching the point where the video card is overtaking even the CPU in some cases. If the video card is fixed, never-changing, then what does that mean? And if you control the ability to make it do "new" things, then does it really matter?
The problem they face is not the hardware, it's the software. I can't say any more than that, other than their license fees must be outrageous. Yet if they can pull off subscriptions for just $15, that tells me that they've got an ace up their sleeve. And every time I look at it, it comes back to speculating as to how they are approaching their hardware.
Yes, the model has flaws - they really should do $25/month pricing and all-you-can-eat gaming (where it's a universal rent service, you pay a flat rent and get any game, so long as you pay rent), instead of $15 basic service followed by rent/buy online. I don't disagree. But don't go saying that it's 100% flawed. Look at it in terms of hassle vs. money, and think like a value buyer, one that lacks your technical background. And suddenly, it makes alot more sense. There are lots of gamers that buy gaming rigs without knowning shinola about how to build a computer. And there are those who know exactly what they are doing. The former are their target market; the later are competition.
Let's not count the chickens until they hatch. Maybe they will die. Maybe they will overturn game consoles as we know them today. Maybe it changes and mutates into something else. In the meantime, wait and see.
Re:What a steal! (Score:5, Interesting)
None of that income goes to the primary market. People do not buy more "new" games because they've sold more used games. The budget rationale of human beings is not so rational. In addition the ones who buy used games are looking for good deals and cheaper-than-retail prices. Since Gamestop can *always* undercut retail no matter what retail is priced at, game publishers lose a huge chunk of profit to Gamestop. Again, this is why publishers are willing to price extremely popular games like Bioshock at $5 on Steam, but not at retail.
Game publishers have agonized over their sales data and research for a very long time. It's a phenomenon that has been pushing more and more of them into participating into a service like Steam, despite it being run, controlled, and ultimately monetized by a competitor.
Re:What a steal! (Score:3, Interesting)
None of that income goes to the primary market.
The primary market already got its money on the first go-around. The primary market has no right to any income.
People do not buy more "new" games because they've sold more used games.
[Citation needed]
In addition the ones who buy used games are looking for good deals and cheaper-than-retail prices.
People always look for deals. What's your point?
Since Gamestop can *always* undercut retail no matter what retail is priced at, game publishers lose a huge chunk of profit to Gamestop.
You're missing numbers. There's a limit to how low Gamestop can go, as it has retail overhead. Furthermore, your "huge chunk of profit" is complete conjecture. Not to mention that it is complete conjecture over the price of an item YOU HAVE ALREADY BEEN PAID FOR.
Again, this is why publishers are willing to price extremely popular games like Bioshock at $5 on Steam, but not at retail
[Citation needed] You're also disregarding instant updates, lack of inventory, and a host of other factors.
Here's the part that you and everyone in your position (yes, I'm quite sure you're an executive or marketdroid for a publisher) is missing: you already got paid when the first person paid for your product. Everything after that IS NOT YOUR PRODUCT anymore. Got that? It ain't yours anymore. Stop trying to fuck the world because your business model sucks arse. If you can't afford to make a game for $30M, then for God's sake don't!
Re:Monthly charges AND per game (Score:4, Interesting)
You keep saying that and I'd really like to see where you get this information from, i.e. [citation needed].
Buying video games is clearly discretionary (purely entertainment), which means people are going to make such purchases from discretionary income. Selling things second-hand gives people more discretionary spending ability. It seems highly unlikely that at least some portion of this wouldn't go back into buying new games. After all, if they have games to sell, they must have bought them new at some point, right?
Gabe Newell seems to think that pricing isn't all that important. This is in regards to piracy, but it seems reasonable it would hold true for new games, as well: he's certainly not going to be discussing the second-hand market here. Video here [youtube.com] (statement at 5:25).
Also, there seems to be an element of circular logic here: games have to be sold at high retail price because many people aren't willing to pay that and instead buy it second-hand (at a lower price). Presumably this leads to publishers increasing the retail price to make up for the "losses" from the second-hand market, leading even more people to resort to the second-hand market. Nice self-fulfilling prophecy.
I don't think the cheap Steam sales demonstrate any kind of willingness on the part of publishers to lower their prices, given how new-release titles are still just as expensive on Steam (which, to the best of my knowledge, effectively prohibits re-sale). This only seems to happen for products that are effectively obsolete, and as a way to increase exposure for new products (e.g. Bioshock as you mentioned: what better way to get people interested in Bioshock 2 than to have them play Bioshock 1 just before its release?). This is more about the cost structure of digital distribution vs. retail distribution than anything else, i.e. it's actually feasible to sell a game for $5 and make money on it on Steam, whereas packaging and shipping a product and putting it on retail shelves for $5 just isn't going to happen. Retailers who have a large stock paid way more than $5 for it already and won't want to take a loss, and the margins on selling product at that price point would be too small for most publishers to want to bother with.