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Google Businesses The Internet Entertainment Games

Google Lively To Be an Online Gaming Platform 123

Posted by Soulskill from the world-of-googlecraft dept.
GamesIndustry.biz recently interviewed Kevin Hanna, creative director for Google Lively, about the virtual environment's beginnings and the plans for its future. Earlier this month, he announced that Lively would open to developers, and now he says the long-term goal is for Lively to be "used as an online games platform." Hanna goes on to say: "I'd like for it to be invisible, where, when it makes sense to have 3D aspects of the web, that everyone will have already downloaded the plug-in, it's one of the first things you do when you install your machine, and you're able to just jump around and play in a creative space. I feel like a big chunk of the games industry out there has a corporate mentality where you're first to be second, and I've been there, where they say, 'Make sure you include this aspect, and this aspect, and this aspect, to ensure that we have an 80 per cent market share.' And it's sucking the life out of what should be the most creative and innovative medium out there."
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Google Lively To Be an Online Gaming Platform

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  • Wow. (Score:4, Funny)

    by nawcom ( 941663 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @01:04PM (#25207257) Homepage
    I wonder how many markets Google will get into. I can't wait until Google starts working on their female douche product line. hehe.

    • Re: (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward

      As opposed to male douche products? Wait, nevermind, I really don't want to know.

    • Re:Wow. (Score:5, Funny)

      by ivandavidoff ( 969036 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @01:09PM (#25207329)

      I can't wait until Google starts working on their female douche product line. hehe.

      That would lend a whole new meaning to "googling yourself".

      Or wait, maybe not.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by elrous0 ( 869638 ) *
      A douche that stays in perpetual beta?

    • I wonder how many markets Google will get into. I can't wait until Google starts working on their female douche product line. hehe.

      I definitely wouldn't want to use a beta version of that. I also think people are likely to read the instructions for such a product, and might get hung up when the EULA on the package says, "by opening this, you agree that whatever you use with this product can be used by google in any way it pleases." I also think they'll be puzzled when they learn that they have to set up a gmail account to use the product.

      I also realize it's a joke. I hate when I respond to jokes and people reply to my comment with "who

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Ilgaz ( 86384 )

      Google was after "hosts" for a while and when they got enough data they turned to "clients". I can easily predict slashdot front page in 5 years and it is not a pretty sight.

  • Acquisitions Leading Towards 3d (Score:5, Informative)

    by mfh ( 56 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @01:09PM (#25207325) Homepage Journal

    Valve denied it was being purchased by Google [outsurging.com], but it leads me to believe that the opposite may be true. Time will tell.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by gEvil (beta) ( 945888 )
      Valve denied it was being purchased by Google, but it leads me to believe that the opposite may be true.

      Valve's planning on buying Google?!? Folks, you heard it here first. Now go spread the word!

    • Re:Acquisitions Leading Towards 3d (Score:4, Funny)

      by gad_zuki! ( 70830 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @02:41PM (#25208537)

      >Valve denied it was being purchased by Google, but it leads me to believe that the opposite may be true.

      Whoa, I knew Steam was a high-margin money maker, but who knew Value would be buying Google soon?! Between Google's forever tracking cookie and Steam's DRM, it could lead to incredible heights of corporate douchebaggery!

    • I doubt it though.

      Iirc, Valve is one of the few studios that is funded on their own money, therefor I'd like to think they want to keep control to themselves.
      Seeing as all of their products (except maybe some expansion packs) have been doing great, and Steam being the most succesful platform for downloading games (not to mention gaming hub, IM-tool, a toolset for developers), I can't seem to think that they'd sell...

      Then again, money talks. And LOTS of money sortof shouts.

      Would be another Ex-Microsof

    • "but it leads me to believe that the opposite may be true. Time will tell."

      Many rumors on the net frequently become true, especially in regards to financial transactions. I've noticed quite a few rumors come true over the years, and while we should take things with a grain of salt, we should also analyze the situation for the likelyness of the statement itself.

  • Though I'm not really sure it'll work, this actually might make a bit of sense - or at least more sense than simply creating a competitor to second life where you can't build objects.

    It's like an open version of ps 3's home.

    My goodness, imagine the hardware requirements for this thing... and without any foreseeable return on investment? I guess if anyone can do it, it would be Google.

    • My goodness, imagine the hardware requirements for this thing... and without any foreseeable return on investment? I guess if anyone can do it, it would be Google.

      Maybe Google should bail out the economy. Then no one will argue about the street view invading their privacy, because Google will own the land anyway...

    • Why doesn't Google just get on the OpenSIM bandwagon? They could push forward development of a system that already interacts with the 2nd Life grid (IBM and Linden Labs had the first 'Gridnauts' travel between grids at IBM and the 2nd Life test grid a month ago) -- and help establish the communications protocols and policies for handling avatars and intellectual property on the grid.

      No -- they have to create something uncompatible, in an effort to --- what?

      1. Create crippled 2nd Life competitor.
      2. Announce

      • Good points. I honestly was not aware of the tests between IBM and Linden, and only had a vague knowledge of OpenSIM.

        I don't know what the heck they're doing then. Google typically embraces openness, I'd be really surprised if they're reversing themselves on this project.

  • I just hope they do better than Shockwave 3D. If nothing else, it would be an improvement in that it's unlikely they'll charge for the creation tools as opposed to the overpriced Director MX.

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by morgan_greywolf ( 835522 )

      just hope they do better than Shockwave 3D.

      That's not very difficult. That's almost like saying you'd hope they'd do better than Microsoft Bob. Almost.

  • Lively (Score:3, Funny)

    by necro81 ( 917438 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @01:19PM (#25207455) Journal

    Well, of course online gaming is going to be lively. You wouldn't expect Google Bore (beta) to be a force here.

  • Yeah but does it run Linux?

    And the answer:

    Requires Windows Vista/XP with Internet Explorer or Firefox

    • Re:Yeah but... (Score:5, Funny)

      by genner ( 694963 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @01:53PM (#25207847)

      Yeah but does it run Linux?

      And the answer:

      Requires Windows Vista/XP with Internet Explorer or Firefox

      So....it doesn't run on Chrome?

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by paazin ( 719486 )

        Yeah but does it run Linux?

        And the answer:

        Requires Windows Vista/XP with Internet Explorer or Firefox

        So....it doesn't run on Chrome?

        Just shows how much faith google has in its own products ;)

      • No, it doesn't run on Chrome. It's not too surprising given the secrecy that surrounded Chrome even within Google. As for Lively, they have a lot of bugs to fix and that's their priority at the moment.
  • I don't remember how I stumbled across this, maybe even a link somewhere on /., but I think Metaplace [metaplace.com] seems like it's going to be quite similar. From what I've seen of their news when checking back from time to time, they seem to be moving along and some people have built some pretty impressive stuff with the editors they give you.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by argent ( 18001 )

      Seems to be a closed alpha test that only runs on Windows.

      Just like Lively.

      I am SO excited.

  • Anyone else think of VRML (Score:5, Interesting)

    by elrous0 ( 869638 ) * on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @01:21PM (#25207485)

    "when it makes sense to have 3D aspects of the web, that everyone will have already downloaded the plug-in, it's one of the first things you do when you install your machine, and you're able to just jump around and play in a creative space"

    Everytime I hear someone propose something like this, I think of VRML [wikipedia.org] and the failed (and misguided) attempt to reskin the web into something it's not.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by PeanutButterBreath ( 1224570 )

      I think the key here is "when it makes sense", which is not very often IMO. Trying to turn the entire web into a 3D interactive environment is a lousy idea. On the other hand, being able to see 3D representations of certain objects (say products in an on-line store) does make sense. I *hope* that this is the kind of "sense" that is being considered here.

      • Or to communicate ideas or concepts that can only be shown in 3D. Think of the potential for building or assembly instructions, for instance.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by British ( 51765 )

      VRML was hyped when we only had dial-up modems. We have a wee bit more bandwidth now, and a bit more graphic processing power than last time.

      • The newest (better) platform is 3DMLW. Supports widely spread 3D model files, is scriptable etc. Also a linux version is coming soon (some talk about this in the forum - searching for testers). A alpha version of a editor is also available.
    • I'm reminded of Java 3D as well. Unlike Java 2D, the classes to support a 3D plug-in never made it into the base JRE. It was basically impossible to convince users to download the 3D extensions at any sort of large scale, so mass deployment of Java 3D applets became impractical. The JRE itself had deployment problems as well, which led to the failure of Java applets to catch on in general.

  • The Matrix (Score:3)

    by megamerican ( 1073936 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @01:38PM (#25207693)

    Does anyone else think that this sounds like the beginning of the creation of The Matrix?

  • Snow Crash? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Xelios ( 822510 )
    I would love to see a 3D sandbox where freelance programmers could just be given the tools to create whatever they want and share it in a virtual world. Anyone could download a client application and navigate this virtual world like Google Earth.

    Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson portrayed a world like this. Destinations could be anything from lavish corporate offices where company execs conduct virtual meetings, to virtual clubs (which would really be nothing more than spiffy looking chat rooms), to games,

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by lilomar ( 1072448 )

      Dude, what you are describing...
      SecondLife [secondlife.com]

    • Re:Snow Crash? (Score:5, Informative)

      by Goaway ( 82658 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @01:48PM (#25207781) Homepage

      You know, that's what Second Life is. Been around for years now.

      And it's horrible.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      The problem is 'policing' the content introduced to the system. In an open ended world like this it'd be trivial for someone to upload some malicious code. There'd have to be some sort of submission system where all code is reviewed before it's introduced to the system, but even that wouldn't be fool proof and it'd probably be pretty expensive.

      Unless that system was peer to peer. [opencroquet.org] Then everybody manages their own environment and it's no more dangerous than the web now.

      • There actually is the IBM/OpenSIM/LindenLabs initiative to standardize movement between sims running on other systems. The first 'Gridnaut' transported between systems about a month ago - and there are numerous external OpenSim grids being run, and hundreds of single OpenSim sims accessible from the SecondLife test grid.

        So -- the basic architecture for what you describe is already in place in an early form. They are now in the process of working out how to handle moving user intellectual property/content

    • The problem is 'policing' the content introduced to the system. In an open ended world like this it'd be trivial for someone to upload some malicious code. There'd have to be some sort of submission system where all code is reviewed before it's introduced to the system, but even that wouldn't be fool proof and it'd probably be pretty expensive.

      That aside, the possibilities would be endless.

      That'd never scale. Imagine if there was a similar requirement on publishing HTML to the web. Instead, everyone's wel

    • The problem is 'policing' the content introduced to the system. In an open ended world like this it'd be trivial for someone to upload some malicious code. There'd have to be some sort of submission system where all code is reviewed before it's introduced to the system, but even that wouldn't be fool proof and it'd probably be pretty expensive.

      That would never scale, and it would be absurdly restrictive if it did.

      When are people going to realize that the Internet is successful because of its openness, not in spite of it?

      Take a close look at Second Life, and consider two things: First, I believe they limited the damage of "malicious code" the same way a web browser does, by sandboxing it. And second, it's actually pretty slow and horrible, I would guess mostly because of the fact that it's still based on a bigass-central-server model. Granted, the

  • 'Make sure you include this aspect, and this aspect, and this aspect, to ensure that we have an 80 per cent market share.'

    Like making it only work for Windows? Yeah, that pretty much sucks the life out of it for me.

    • Re:Linux Support? (Score:4, Funny)

      by not already in use ( 972294 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @02:05PM (#25208027)
      That's the great thing about Linux -- Choice! Like, the choice to use an operating system with a marginal market share not likely to get commercial support!

      • The other one I like is the choice not to use it -- which is pretty cool. I wish I could say the same about Windows in the work place.

      • Although Linux isn't the current most widely accepted platform for gaming :

        - It is an emergent platform in the netbook form-factor. And although you wouldn't play Crysis on an Eee PC, if they plan to make Lively a casual and common plugin it better has to run on the small machine everyone will lug around in their purse/lab coat pocket/etc...

        - Also running Linux and also running lots of other OSes none of which are Windows XP are the PDAs and smartphone. Currently the form factor is a tad too small. But on t

        • Yes, a million different things run on linux. Of course, how many things rely solely on the linux kernel? We're not talking drivers here, we're talking full apps that rely on a number of libraries, none of which are standard across the various platforms that use the linux kernel.

          • We're not talking drivers here, we're talking full apps that rely on a number of libraries, none of which are standard across the various platforms that use the linux kernel.

            You can get close enough.

            Anything capable of playing games -- or at least, playing games on Linux (PS3 is right out) -- is going to have something resembling OpenGL, maybe MiniGL.

            Some locked-down set top boxes aside, if we're watching movies, it's going to be through xvideo. Sound will go through ALSA, and OpenAL will probably be on most of these platforms.

            So, the standard combination of SDL + OpenGL + OpenAL + X11 is pretty solid across all desktop-like platforms, with the exception of embedded devices, wh

            • none of which are standard across the various platforms that use the linux kernel.

              So, the standard combination of SDL + OpenGL + OpenAL + X11 is pretty solid across all desktop-like platforms, with the exception of embedded devices, which still probably have MiniGL.

              BTW: The name you are looking for isn't MiniGL [wikipedia.org] (= a partial implementation of a non-standarized subset of OpenGL functions. Back in the day when Voodoo 1&2 didn't have yet full OpenGL drivers) but OpenGL/ES [wikipedia.org] (the "embed" version of openGL - a precise standard, geared toward embed systems, that also removes the window manager out of the equation OpenGL/ES draws directly to the frame buffer whereas OpenGL draw to the X11 windows manager).
              Beside the frame buffer difference and some technical details which d

      • the choice to use an operating system with a marginal market share not likely to get commercial support!

        You mean like the support I just got from Dell for my shiny new Ubuntu laptop?

  • I thought it said online gambling platform.

  • If you're a traffic based site gaming is a natural. Surprised they didn't do this earlier. Too obvious?

  • First REAL attempt at a Metaverse? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Cornflake917 ( 515940 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @01:57PM (#25207913) Homepage

    Second-life's attempt to be the world's Metaverse turned out to be just a huge advertising/hacking cluster fuck. Not saying that that Lively won't be a advertising/hacking cluster fuck but at least it sounds it would be more open to programmers, which will allow for more diverse possibilities, so there could be just as much good stuff as bad.

    • I'd like a second life where I could create a 50 megaton virtual H-bomb.

      Nuke them from orbit, it's the only way to be sure.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Fozzyuw ( 950608 )

      Actually, Metaplace [metaplace.com] is already far ahead of Google on this one. Just running the system, though, makes Firefox use about as much memory usage as World of Warcraft.

      However, the system is pretty cool. I've been beta testing for while now. But a flash based virtual world embedded in a browser simply cannot compare to a stand-alone app.

    • Second-life's attempt to be the world's Metaverse turned out to be just a huge advertising/hacking cluster fuck. Not saying that that Lively won't be a advertising/hacking cluster fuck but at least it sounds it would be more open to programmers, which will allow for more diverse possibilities, so there could be just as much good stuff as bad.

      Oh yes, we can always rely on Google to save us from advertising. Kinda funny, since Google is an advertising company.

    • Not saying that that Lively won't be a advertising/hacking cluster fuck but at least it sounds it would be more open to programmers

      Second Life: in-world creation of in-world content (no special tools needed for building and scripting), open source client, active cooperation with competing open source server platform, runs on Windows 2000, Mac, Linux, in-world scripting based on Mono, ...

      Lively: no user-created in-world content, in-world or out, just promises, no developer API, no information about an API, j

      • "In-world creation of content" == "In world _ONLY_"

        SL, for something so mature, is in a very sad state as a platform goes.
        - No way to legitimately back-up created items (and the unsupported ways of backing up are so universally shunned you can't even mention using them for your own content)
        - Very poor offline tools for content creation. Using photoshop and in-world tools some very good designers have made some very awesome stuff. It's even more impressive when you realize that only the most

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by argent ( 18001 )

          "In-world creation of content" == "In world _ONLY_"

          There doesn't seem to be a middle ground. It's either in-world and interactive, or (as in things like There and Activeworlds and... well, everything but SL) external and batch.

          That's a big advantage SL has: an interactive environment is a much more productive one. It's like Smalltalk or Lisp or Forth or APL versus punched cards and COBOL, or Fortran. Or Enterprise Java Beans [scarydevil.com].

          It's almost unheard of that a programming language comes along that some crazy pers

          • LSLs horrendous nature has nothing to do with it being a "real time control system". It's just bad.

            The types of very-domain-specific languages you speak of are that way because of their efficiency. I don't think you or anyone else would accuse LSL of being efficient. Can you even design in your head right now a system which would work in such a way that removing (perhaps 200 total, across a sim) attachments which have set up a "listen" could reduce lag a non-trivial amount?

            LSL's basic structure isn't bad. I

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by argent ( 18001 )

              OK, you're talking about the SL server API being bad, not the LSL language being bad. Most people who rag on LSL just want to write C# instead of LSL. This is similar to the complaints people make about javascript... which would be quite a nice language, if the API exposed by the browser wasn't so funky and inconsistent.

              The server API is restricted, there are serious shortcomings, but that's got nothing to do with LSL... and given the API that google has proposed for Lively (google gadgets running inside wi

              • no, no, don't get me wrong. LSL, the language, sucks.
                I tried to make that clear in my post, but I guess I failed it.
                "Even ignoring the uselessness of the built-in functions it can't be seen as good." was meant to refer mostly to the API. Obviously it's a bit hard to separate what is part of the "API" and what is part of the basic language (at least when talking about list manipulation), but that's probably one of the problems with the language itself.

                The whole thing is bulky, clunky, and a horrible pain to

            • I compiled some of my scripts using the Mono compiler in SecondLife -- and it improved performance significantly. LLabs is making progress - albeit slower than some people want.

              Given the sheer amount of ground that Google has to make up -- I don't see how Lively will compete. If anything, I can see Google Lively taking away some of the chatterboxes away from SL - but is that really a bad thing? (improving the signal to noise ratio is win-win as far as I'm concerned)

          • That's a big advantage SL has: an interactive environment is a much more productive one.

            Only if the interactive environment is of superior quality to the static environment.

            It's like Smalltalk

            Indeed. One of the curious things about Smalltalk is the lack of source code.

            Maybe my ignorance is showing -- I gave up on Squeak when I couldn't make it run on 64-bit. I got interested later, and read up on the Smalltalk VM, which, as it turns out, makes all kinds of crazy assumptions and optimizations for 32-bit machines, with no thought given to true architecture independence.

            All that aside, though... Oh yeah, source cod

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by argent ( 18001 )

              Indeed. One of the curious things about Smalltalk is the lack of source code.

              The other interactive languages I listed after Smalltalk don't have that problem, and neither does LSL, so while that's an interesting side issue about Smalltalk (and one that I have sympathy with) it's kind of irrelevant to the point I was making.

              I could also add the UNIX command line versus Windows Scripting Host: the advantage of the interactive environment is not that it hides the source code.

            • You actually have to use an external graphics editor (gimp, photoshop, et al) to create image textures for texture mapping; you then upload them (either as a batch zip file, or individually). I've uploaded .jpg .png .gif .bmp formats without any issues and used them in world. So from that perspective, how is that any different than web 2.0?

              The LSL language is typed into 'note cards' (essentially SecondLife's text files) - and the note cards support syntax highlighting. To apply a script to an object, yo

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by argent ( 18001 )

                I would hazzard they would probably return to SL after seeing the cartoon-ish system that Lively is).

                That already happened. When Lively started up, there were so many people they needed multiple overflow rooms for the "Google Room" and even for the "Second Life in Lively" room. The last couple of times I visited, there weren't enough *occipued* rooms in all of Lively to fill the first page of the room list.

                Lively has basically imploded, which is why they're trying to reposition it as a game platform... but

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by brkello ( 642429 )
        Yet, I have more faith in Google than LLs to deliver something that is worthwhile and enjoyable. LL just knows how to pump out marketing. As far as a platform goes...it is stale and very few people actually "play" it. It isn't the future, it is the past.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by argent ( 18001 )

          LL just knows how to pump out marketing.

          *boggle*

          Linden Labs has problems, yes, but they're almost the exact opposite of "they just know how to pump out marketing".

          Both Google and LL are companies with a very rich engineering culture, where products and changes to products often happen out because they're cool. Linden Labs, if anything, could do with more marketing and more business culture... and they seem to know this. Google's business *is* marketing, their revenue seems to be almost entirely from adverti

  • Google pwns you and yuor computer.
  • It is funny to say, but think about it. Google has a mass of information that covers the entire web, including personal data about you and me. If it wanted to, google could track its users of the new google phone. Heck i have google maps on my blackberry, so they could track me too.

  • Is Slashdot... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by diablovision ( 83618 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @02:38PM (#25208491)

    Is Slashdot now becoming the marketing arm of Google? I swear this is like the 90th article about some new whiz-bang software they developed. There are other companies writing software!

    • There are other companies writing software!

      Yeah... so? We talk about Vista all the time here.

    • There are other companies writing software!

      Eh, if they were relevant, they'd be owned by Google.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Ilgaz ( 86384 )

      If google pays slashdot for these, they make a huge mistake. Slashdot community except the ones makes thousands from Google adwords have some idea about their manners about privacy and they will post basic questions like "What about privacy and behavioural targeting?"

  • Out of all the 3d user interfaces I've used, this is probably the worst. There's no connection between you and your avatar at all, and even getting your avatar to walk along a straight line is frustrating... the normal motion is to have you avatar teleport from one piece of furniture to another while you pan around at a distance.

    If simple movement is so hard, how on earth do they expect people to use it for a gaming platform?

    • I don't see either how they could make a game out of the current version. Perhaps they'll revise the interface eventually, Lively uses the Gamebryo engine so it should be easy to implement more game-like functionalities.

      I like Lively though personally I use it primarily as a chatroom. It can also be an interesting place to test one's creativity, in spite of the limitations some people have come up with some cool ideas to make use of the various objects and shells (the rooms).

      By the way: [ Kevin Hanna's roo [lively.com]

      • I tried to find more about Gamebryo but when I got to Emergent.com it said:

        Server Error in '/' Application.
        Runtime Error
        Description: An application error occurred on the server. [...]

  • Google Lively To Be an Online Gaming Platform (Score:5, Funny)

    by melted ( 227442 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2008 @02:58PM (#25208759) Homepage

    Here's the translation from the corporate speak:

    "We've released it and no one bit. We have no idea what to do with it, so let us see if we can use other people's ideas for free."

  • I read about lively quite a time ago ... but tried it just now to see how it feels.

    And i must say ... it sucks ... big time!

    If they do really want to make anything fun of it ... it looks like starting from scratch would be a good idea.

    Why ?

    - Its slow (on a dual core system that runs cyrsis just fine)
    - Loading takes ages
    - Controll via point and click not well done
    - Camera controll annoying
    - Overall usability far away from google standards

  • Lively is a disconnected collection of small rooms. If the web were be like that we'd have fixed-length non-scrollable pages with almost no way to jump from one to another but the bookmarks/favorites menu. I hope that Google's not only opening the API but is also going to remove the constraints on the room size or let people connect rooms together to create a continuous environment like SL (the latter would be enough). If they don't it will never become a 3D WWW.

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