Moving Video Games to the Clouds

I suppose this was inevitable with cloud applications being all the rage these days.  I guess I'd have to see it in action before really making a judgment, but right now I'd be pretty apprehensive to a system like this.  It sounds great as a concept, but what kind of reliability does it have over a standard console like the 360 (RRoD issues aside)?  If my internet cxn goes down, I can't play anything.  Or worse -- I lose all of my progress.  Also I couldn't bring it to a friend's house for gaming action if he/she didn't have a 5mbps internet connection.  And what happens when the connection degrades during peak hours on some ISPs?  Also, what happens to my games during peak play hours where the cloud servers are under heavy load?

And then there's the other issue that the PS3 and the 360 are these amazing multi-function boxes.  They play video games, sure, but they also play DVDs or BluRay and stream Hi-Def multimedia content from a PC.

So, I don't know about this.  I like the concept, but I'm not sure it could work out in practice.  I'm guessing that subscription charges would actually exceed the cost of a stand-alone console in order to keep the number of users down and the load on the servers low.  But that is contrary to what this article is saying about being cheaper than buying new hardware every 5 or 6 years.

This is inevitable for the future of On Line Multiplayer Gaming. Low latency is critical for any High resolution high speed gaming.
Most all the concerns/issues people have with the concept can be addresses simply by placing these robust Game Servers on a local Service Providers data center or Cloud and require them to provide both the Server itself,maintenance of same, as well as a Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) tool that will assign these games broadband links a precidence over the SP networks.
These remote servers will also be connected back to OnLive central Cloud to allow Worldwide Gaming (with precednece as well).
OnLive could develop and deploy a Grid approach here tying these remote servers into their main Cloud.
OnLive's investment would be nominal if anything at each SP site other then remote updates and Level #1 Tech support.
A Revenue share arrangement would also be appropriate.

Jim A.
SP

The raw processing requirements don't change because you’re processing the data remotely. We are already seeing super computers being replaced with GPU arrays. Does anyone have a video card that runs the latest games at the highest settings smoothly. Does your card run hot when gaming? In other words do you have a lot of free GPU cycles when playing Crisis? Why would a server farm handle this any differently? In fact the server farm would require greater resources and/or processing power to handle the communications and process distribution for multiple customer streams. You would have to maintain a certain amount of overhead as not to over subscribe the resources because this will have a cascading effect. It would seem the answer is to make the game engines run more efficiently using more pre rendered content. Does my grass need to sway. Make it look like grass but focus the GPU power on particle effects and quality.

So each time a game hits the market we can expect the software company will have a huge capital investment to get it running live. All of the innovation in GPU hardware will be driven by a handful of gaming companies. Since the consumers won't be buying high end cards anymore the smaller startup gaming companies will never have the capital to launch a hit title like the makers of the original UREAL.

Gamers expect performance. We buy the best routers. We rarely use a wireless mouse. We take pride in building and tweaking the ultimate gaming rig even when it isn’t anywhere close. The hardware industry produces more than just video cards. We have cpu coolers, high end cases, memory, CPUs, and hard drives, and motherboards.

We are already at risk of loosing PC gaming to a dumb down console market. Now we are at risk of loosing the dumb down consoles as well. People really need to reject the idea of huge companies controlling your content by taking control of the hardware.

This article was thrown out there like spilling a cup of milk and walking away and expecting someone else to clean up the mess. Broadband providers are no where close to supporting this kind of load on the networks. The server model provides no performance or cost to cycle benefit. The business model is based on providing a benefit to the customer that the customer will have to pay for a gaming experience based on a system that could be best described as communist.