All the buzz at the recent Game Developers Conference in San Francisco was about OnLive.
The news on everybody’s minds is OnLive
, a games service which is roughly comparable to a streaming movie service like Netflix On Demand or what have you. The hardware is to be free, and it will support any USB- or Bluetooth-compatible controllers.
Sounds and looks great.
But some question the ability of the Internet and OnLive’s servers ability to deliver those games minus lag and skipped frames.
After the demo, we spoke with a more technically-orientated booth guy, who said that between 3 and 4Mbit/s is what they’re aiming for with their 720p60 stream, and when I asked about tension with ISPs, he hinted cryptically that they had that under control. I just hope Comcast and the like haven’t “overbooked” their cable and fiber the way airlines do flights.
If the doubters are right and it just doesn’t seem to cut it for hardcore gamers, I’m sure real time story would work fine. Story unravels quickly, but much slower than bullets crisscrossing the screen. If the lag makes game play poor it might be just the right pace for real time story story. OnLive might want to look into it!
