Cloud Gaming - Evolution or Revolution?

The Game Developer’s Conference ’09 which is being held in San Francisco this week is a great place to see big press releases, product demos and other juicy bits of technology related news. As you would expect, games and the hardware that support them are the order of the day. However, every now and then a company arrives with a break-through product that has the potential to change the industry forever. One such product this year is Onlive.

Traditionally in the world of gaming, companies produce the software to play as well as the hardware to play it on. For PCs, however, it’s a different story and a far more frustrating and costly experience as ever-more processor hungry titles leave you in a constant upgrade race to ensure your gaming rig is up to the job.

The Onlive service is looking to break this model by removing the need for expensive kit whilst allowing you to play all the games you like. They do this by running a bank of powerful servers that store and drive the games, so instead of playing locally, you play remotely using their processing power. The system is PC / Mac friendly and can even display the action on your TV. It is, essentially, cloud computing for games.

This groundbreaking move has enormous potential. A system that lets you play all the latest titles from almost any computer could be enticing for many gamers who are reluctant to invest in expensive hardware, and there are also opportunities here for software developers. With no downloads necessary for end users, games can be designed with premium optimisation in mind. Where this leaves hardware manufacturers, however, only time will tell...

Using shared technology platforms in this way not only streamlines efficiency, it also harnesses the power of the target audience.
But the idea is not without challenges. Firstly, every gamer’s nightmare: network lag. A system that streams all the action remotely to your screen could be hamstrung by latency (assuming you have a decent broadband connection in the first place). Secondly, will it still work if a million players are online together? More controversially perhaps is the issue of media ownership. Details are sparse at the moment but it seems likely you will be able to pay for individual games or choose a monthly subscription, which means you won’t actually ‘own’ the games you pay for. This could be a hard sell for consumers who may insist on more permanent additions to their games library.

That said, in these tough economic times, a cheaper way to access high quality content could be just the right product at just the right time. Watch this space.