"Of course PS4 can do Cloud Computing", says President of Sony'

[The Evil Overlord]

I was told that cloud computing, or 'gaming' is a positive because if you have a low end machine, most of, if not all, of the processing has been done (positive)

I was also told that cloud gaming would actually have an increase in input lag and response lag, due to the amount of back/forth communication to said datacenter/server (negative)

 

Am I in the right neighbourhood with this??

[HawkMan]

 

Besides, 300k servers thing i s a gimmick. 300,000 servers is the entire Azure architecture. There are not 300,000 physical servers. Most are virtual servers on the same hardware. The whole Azure network does a ton of other things. Now one of them with be all the XB1 stuff.

 

 

 

Eh no, not even close. You need to read up on azure and MS server farms, and how many servers they fit in a single container in their container server farms. that statement is almost as ignorant as claiming they made and entire Cloud API and SDK in a couple of months. that's already being implemented in games. 

[BajiRav]

 

I think it comes down to a couple things. First and foremost was Microsoft's decision to only have 5GB of RAM available to devs probably happened before they realized the PS4 would have 7, and those 7 would be better-integrated with the GPU. The Xbox One boards for the console were probably already being fabricated and more importantly it would likely have fudged their cost projections to toss another couple of GBs in it.

 

So what could Microsoft do to combat the superior hardware of the PS4? This is where the "Cloud" comes in. By adding "cloud computing support"; which is more more of a software thing that they can develop in the meantime without changing the cost of their console and acts as a sales bulletpoint of the technologically illiterate.

 

Companies never want to release something less powerful than their competitors, so when they get the jump on you in specs you have to compensate somehow - more features or a lower price. Sometimes when you're up against a wall those "features" aren't substantial, like MS's Grand Magic Cloud Strategy.

 

The couldn't modify hardware in a short span so they just threw together an entire "Cloud plan" in that time? That sounds...odd?

besides Xbox Live doesn't use Azure yet. (as per MJF)

Besides

[threetonesun]

I was told that cloud computing, or 'gaming' is a positive because if you have a low end machine, most of, if not all, of the processing has been done (positive)

I was also told that cloud gaming would actually have an increase in input lag and response lag, due to the amount of back/forth communication to said datacenter/server (negative)

 

Am I in the right neighbourhood with this??

No, yes, and maybe. There have been services which put all of the processing on the "cloud", OnLive for example, which just pushed a video signal to the TV. That can induce delays, as you push a button, a message gets sent to the server, the server renders the scene, and the scene gets sent back to the TV. So yes, there's lag, on the other hand all you need is a relatively simple controller interface to play.

 

When you have a console or PC though, you can render 90% of the things locally, and then big calculations can get pushed to the cloud. As far as I know, no game has really done this to a noticeable extent. Sim City said they did, but it was proven false. In theory, Sim City could have offset some of the calculations to the cloud and gotten infrequent updates that meshed with the game state.

 

The real question is, what can you add to a game that can be computed remotely that won't break if the player doesn't have a connection? And what can you add to something that requires a quick response time that won't slow down the response?

[+Audioboxer Subscriber²]

Sure it can, the cloud is the cloud. It's nothing exclusive to any piece of hardware.

 

It's all about how much of MS' BS you're shoveling down your mouth about "omg 40x faster" that steams up your glasses from seeing what exactly the cloud is.

[Woelfel]

<p> You mean, like being a server, matchmaking, providing downloads, and other miscellaneous expected tasks? Those are the expected tasks for non-local hardware. Everything else local hardware does better, significantly better. Xbox One is just making bad publicity if it cannot push a single player game and requires online access to offload some tasks. And what exactly does this mean? A thousand x thousand battle will be offloaded to a server and if the user doesn't have a connection good enough to stream all that back? Or has bandwidth caps? Or the game support gets dropped? Or the closes server is 800ms away? There is nothing next gen admitting that your CPU is too weak to handle basic AI.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>EDIT: And Neowin fully messed up IE10 support.</p>

 

Weird, I'm using IE10. No, I'm not talking about that. There are number crunching calculations that can be done in the cloud that can't be done locally (Folding @ Home anyone...that's just an example though). The benefit that you won't see right now until developers get more time with the system is that with offloading that information to the cloud, you now free up resources to do more tasks locally. Local hardware have the benefit to give information back to the user (scene rendering, etc...) on a per frame basis.  We know there's a delay to connecting to the cloud, that's why (right now) it's beneficial to not develop "cloud" code on a per frame basis.

 

Using the "cloud" is almost (not exactly) like having more space on a disc in the sense that it is a resource that a developer can use that was not available before to do more in a game.

[ctrl_alt_delete]

 

I think it comes down to a couple things. First and foremost was Microsoft's decision to only have 5GB of RAM available to devs probably happened before they realized the PS4 would have 7, and those 7 would be better-integrated with the GPU. The Xbox One boards for the console were probably already being fabricated and more importantly it would likely have fudged their cost projections to toss another couple of GBs in it.

 

So what could Microsoft do to combat the superior hardware of the PS4? This is where the "Cloud" comes in. By adding "cloud computing support"; which is more more of a software thing that they can develop in the meantime without changing the cost of their console and acts as a sales bulletpoint of the technologically illiterate.

 

Companies never want to release something less powerful than their competitors, so when they get the jump on you in specs you have to compensate somehow - more features or a lower price. Sometimes when you're up against a wall those "features" aren't substantial, like MS's Grand Magic Cloud Strategy.

 

 

I think you're trying to start another rumor because I don't see how that actually makes sense to you.

and marketing bullet point? I guess abs and power steering are also marketing bullet points too, right? because a car doesn't need those to steer or to stop, right?

what I realize is that when it comes to things people don't understand or that doesn't come from their favorite company they will always push it aside as if it means nothing until their favorite company releases something similar.

 

anyways, in the coming game releases we'll see how developers utilize the online server power given to them at no cost. until then you can downplay it as much as you want. I'm the one who's going to benefit, not you.

[n_K]

LOL at someone saying using the cloud for dedicated game servers, you might be off your head on crack.

MS doesn't bother with dedicated game servers for xbox, YOU are the game host or someone you are playing with is, it's much much cheaper for MS that way and it's been like that for many years now.

[Packet1009]

dumb question here - i don't own an xbox - so i dont know (and hence asking)

 

are there no dedicated game servers on the xbox / console platform?

is one system always the host?

[ctrl_alt_delete]

LOL at someone saying using the cloud for dedicated game servers, you might be off your head on crack.

MS doesn't bother with dedicated game servers for xbox, YOU are the game host or someone you are playing with is, it's much much cheaper for MS that way and it's been like that for many years now.

 

interesting because Microsoft has already stated that the cloud will be hosting the games and not individual machines (like is for x360, ps3 and ps4) so anyone can jump in and out of matches easily.

they talked a lot about "persistent worlds" which are hosted on their servers. we'll see what type of games that are released for both systems over time and how different the multi platforms are  if anything.

dumb question here - i don't own an xbox - so i dont know (and hence asking)

 

are there no dedicated game servers on the xbox / console platform?

is one system always the host?

 

as far as I know, an xbox360 is always the host in multiplayer games, that's why when the host leaves the match either ends or the system tries to find another host which works yes, but there's always a delay of sometimes 30seconds or more (sometimes you're just about to kill someone then the host leaves)

[MindTrickz]

I think you're trying to start another rumor because I don't see how that actually makes sense to you.

and marketing bullet point? I guess abs and power steering are also marketing bullet points too, right? because a car doesn't need those to steer or to stop, right?

what I realize is that when it comes to things people don't understand or that doesn't come from their favorite company they will always push it aside as if it means nothing until their favorite company releases something similar.

 

anyways, in the coming game releases we'll see how developers utilize the online server power given to them at no cost. until then you can downplay it as much as you want. I'm the one who's going to benefit, not you.

 

I'm going to ignore the first part of your post. False equivalence and all. As for the second part, you have consider limitations of Cloud computing. For example, any instructions that would others wise heavily rely on the CPU and GPU will not be sent off to the cloud. The reason for that CPU and GPU use the fastest possible IO a long with the RAM to deliver instructions in real time. Even assuming Microsoft's servers deliver instantaneous processing, the internet is incredibly slow in terms of real-time computing, and for that reason it will be slower than CPU and GPU; and will not be able to deliver real-time.

 

Even Microsoft admit this; Matt Booty

"Reactions to animations in a shooter, reactions to hits and shots in a racing game, reactions to collisions" wouldn't be possible on the cloud. There are some things in a video game world, though, that don't necessarily need to be updated every frame or don't change that much in reaction to what's going on."

 

Here is the reason why:

 

This means that whatever cloud computing power is available, consoles will have available to them an average of 1MB/s a second of processed data. If we compare that to the sort of bandwidth consoles are used to, the DDR3 of Xbox One is rated at around 68,000MB/s, and even that wasn't enough for the console and had to be augmented with the ESRAM.

The PS4 memory system allocates around 20,000MB/s for the CPU of its total 176,000MB/s. The cloud can provide one twenty-thousandth of the data to the CPU that the PS4's system memory can. You may have an internet connection that's much better than 8mbps of course, but even superfast fibre-optic broadband at 50mbps equates to an anaemic 6MB/s. This represents a significant bottleneck to what can be processed on the cloud, and that's before upload speed is even considered. Upload speed is a small fraction of download speed, and this will greatly reduce how much information a job can send to the cloud to process. Taking the Forza crash example, if the console has to upload both the car collision mesh and scenery mesh to the cloud for it to calculate whether they have collided or not, that's going to take several seconds.

 

Here is the extensive Digital Foundry report.

 

 

So all this talk about the cloud making the Xbox One 3x times more powerful is just nonsense.

[ctrl_alt_delete]

I'm going to ignore the first part of your post. False equivalence and all. As for the second part, you have consider limitations of Cloud computing. For example, any instructions that would others wise heavily rely on the CPU and GPU will not be sent off to the cloud. The reason for that CPU and GPU use the fastest possible IO a long with the RAM to deliver instructions in real time. Even assuming Microsoft's servers deliver instantaneous processing, the internet is incredibly slow in terms of real-time computing, and for that reason it will be slower than CPU and GPU; and will not be able to deliver real-time.

 

Even Microsoft admit this; Matt Booty

"Reactions to animations in a shooter, reactions to hits and shots in a racing game, reactions to collisions" wouldn't be possible on the cloud. There are some things in a video game world, though, that don't necessarily need to be updated every frame or don't change that much in reaction to what's going on."

 

Here is the reason why:

 

 

Here is the extensive Digital Foundry report.

 

 

So all this talk about the cloud making the Xbox One 3x times more powerful is just nonsense.

 

things that doesn't need to be updated in every frame. like say a very big map with everything interactive? where other players can be interacting with other parts of the map and none of that calculation is done on your box, you can see fights in the distance, buildings getting blown up and none of that calc is done on your box. 

more realistic clouds, smoke, explosions, lighting.

how about running through dense smoke without having any lag?

 

anyways, we'll see what will be done when games start getting released and devs find new ways of using it.

[slapfacemcdougal]

I think you're trying to start another rumor because I don't see how that actually makes sense to you.

and marketing bullet point? I guess abs and power steering are also marketing bullet points too, right? because a car doesn't need those to steer or to stop, right?

what I realize is that when it comes to things people don't understand or that doesn't come from their favorite company they will always push it aside as if it means nothing until their favorite company releases something similar.

anyways, in the coming game releases we'll see how developers utilize the online server power given to them at no cost. until then you can downplay it as much as you want. I'm the one who's going to benefit, not you.

Not to argue or anything but... You don't need anti-lock brakes to stop a car not do you need power steering. You can do just fine with non abs brakes and "Armstrong" steering.

[WinMunkee]

Cloud computing can and may offer coop in games like Dead Rising where hundreds of AI can be computed server side rather than console side never needing to hit the console. So all the console has to do is process packets rather than the AI itself. So that is one advantage. In order for Sony to do something like this, they are going to need the datacenters and the proper software to make this happen. The question is, do they? Also, I'm sure they will be using the Microsoft Azure platform to accomplish it.

[cammy]

PS3 did a form of cloud computing years ago, remember Folding @ home? also looking at the Xbox One Architecture Panel back in May shows they were overhyping it more than they should have.

 

 

Was that a Freudian slip from major nelson? Did he say xbox lies? haha, because you know he's a renowned liar.

[LaP]

LOL at someone saying using the cloud for dedicated game servers, you might be off your head on crack.

MS doesn't bother with dedicated game servers for xbox, YOU are the game host or someone you are playing with is, it's much much cheaper for MS that way and it's been like that for many years now.

 

Anyway if you are using the cloud as a dedicated server then it's not the cloud it's a frecking dedicated server. Nothing new PC games had dedicated servers for ages

[ctrl_alt_delete]

Not to argue or anything but... You don't need anti-lock brakes to stop a car not do you need power steering. You can do just fine with non abs brakes and "Armstrong" steering.

 

I know that, the first car I drove didn't have abs or power steering (LADA).sure they're not needed, but they add great benefits to the driving experience

[BajiRav]

 

It's all about how much of MS' BS you're shoveling down your mouth about "omg 40x faster" that steams up your glasses from seeing what exactly the cloud is.

So if MS is all bullshitting us*, why does Sony feel the need to say yes we can ###### too?

 

*I am sure they are to a certain extent though not as cynical as you are.

[FlintyV]

LOL at someone saying using the cloud for dedicated game servers, you might be off your head on crack.

MS doesn't bother with dedicated game servers for xbox, YOU are the game host or someone you are playing with is, it's much much cheaper for MS that way and it's been like that for many years now.

 

 

Err, they've already said games will now be hosted on Xbox Cloud...They're no longer P2P and are dedicated.

 

It's nice for Sony to say they can do it, but actually doing it is another thing entirely.

[MikeChipshop Member]

 

 

So all this talk about the cloud making the Xbox One 3x times more powerful is just nonsense.

 

So when you've managed to offload that random crap to cloud processing, what's your console going to do? That's right, it's going to dedicate its resources towards what's going on locally, thus giving it quite a power boost.

Not that i either expect you to agree or possibly even understand but in a few years when Sony are doing it to i imagine you'll be like "Sony is the best thing ever, like, wow".

 

People who are unable to understand that both consoles are bringing some real improvements to the act of console gaming, are blind little fanboys.

Err, they've already said games will now be hosted on Xbox Cloud...They're no longer P2P and are dedicated.

 

It's nice for Sony to say they can do it, but actually doing it is another thing entirely.

 

My guess is it'll be a a year at least before they're doing it and they'll be using Azure!

[Ambroos]

If developers are going to use cloud computations on the Xbox One they can do the exact same thing on the PS4. They/Sony can just rent servers (from Amazon or even Azure) or install them themselves and do it on those. It might be a little bit more work since it'll probably not have nice fancy API's and everything, but it's really nothing 'special' and it will hardly improve games. Anything that actually involves rendering can't really be offloaded since it needs to be completed fast in order to avoid stutter and glitches. AI, maybe (for large amounts of units for example), but games have managed to do that just fine locally on past consoles and on regular PC's, so I don't really buy it.

[Brandon Live Veteran]

http://www.shacknews.com/article/79760/sony-of-course-ps4-can-do-cloud-computing

 

 

But off course, we all know that "cloud computing" is a fancy buzzword that doesn't mean anything.

 

I think you misunderstand the phrase and its usage here. It absolutely means something. It means that Microsoft is offering a whole lot of cloud compute resources (i.e. datacenters full of machines and a very advanced platform (Azure) for making efficient use of them. Sony has no such cloud computing platform to offer, let alone resources. Their best bet is to make a deal with Amazon (or maybe VMware) to offer something competitive with what Microsoft has.

If developers are going to use cloud computations on the Xbox One they can do the exact same thing on the PS4. They/Sony can just rent servers (from Amazon or even Azure) or install them themselves and do it on those. It might be a little bit more work since it'll probably not have nice fancy API's and everything, but it's really nothing 'special' and it will hardly improve games. Anything that actually involves rendering can't really be offloaded since it needs to be completed fast in order to avoid stutter and glitches. AI, maybe (for large amounts of units for example), but games have managed to do that just fine locally on past consoles and on regular PC's, so I don't really buy it.

 

Having dedicated, geo-distributed servers for Halo won't improve multiplayer games?

 

I think you're misunderstanding what these cloud resources will be used for and what advantages they offer (geo-distribution makes a noticeable latency difference, and Azure offers datacenters around the world and a traffic routing system to easily take advantage of it).

[ctrl_alt_delete]

Was that a Freudian slip from major nelson? Did he say xbox lies? haha, because you know he's a renowned liar.

 

where was that said?

 

Boyd: "the normal playbook would be to put a very small dedicated operating system on more advanced hardware, and then go.....but doing that would be, you kno, building a shiny version of last gen."

4k, input and output.

turn 10 lead: "even your games won't be as static....you know, thing that actualy evolve over time, and games that evolve over time based on what we're seeing. so again, doing processing in the cloud gives us a window into how the world is moving. what are people doing? so we can be direct in design evolving worlds, if you'd emagine a giant epic world where my actions interact with yours. thats just one level, and that's very cool. but another one is taking the meta level where everybody is doing a lot of things and we see that movement and can re-put that into the game automatically. so the game actually evolves overtime."

boyd again: "but now, you know, when the game ships on that disc it's not static"

he also alluded to games working/communicating with apps that are on the system.

[n_K]

Err, they've already said games will now be hosted on Xbox Cloud...They're no longer P2P and are dedicated.

 

It's nice for Sony to say they can do it, but actually doing it is another thing entirely.

I'll believe that when I see it.

Activision making xbox COD multiplayer games run on dedicated servers, are you serious? The xbox 360 model of each player hosts is their way of printing money.

[Ambroos]

Having dedicated, geo-distributed servers for Halo won't improve multiplayer games?

 

I think you're misunderstanding what these cloud resources will be used for and what advantages they offer (geo-distribution makes a noticeable latency difference, and Azure offers datacenters around the world and a traffic routing system to easily take advantage of it).

It will, but dedicated servers on multiple locations isn't exactly a big challenge, Valve for example has servers in almost every country in Europe, and Amazon has multiple locations too. It's all probably not as easy but dedicated game servers aren't a new thing.