OnLive gets June US launch date


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The OnLive cloud gaming service is set to launch in the US on 17th June. The service allows players to access PC games from 2K, EA, THQ, Ubisoft and Warner Bros. The games run on OnLive's beefy servers and players control them remotely through the OnLive client. OnLive will initially charge a subscription fee of $14.95 per month and special offers and longer subs deals are also planned.

I will surely being giving this a try.

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Wow. I'm not use to posting news on Neowin or I would of. I saw this earlier was VERY glad it got a date at GDC. I saw t on there facebook.

If you sign up right now and are one of the 25k people you will get 3 months free. Just need a card to verify age. I am definitely giving this a try. If it works I'll be recommending this to friends who like pc gaming but have a decent pc and nothing gaming capable.

Good posts Brian, keep it up (Y)

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I was so expecting this to be vaporware. So much so in fact that I'm a little stunned to see it coming out this year!

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Wow. I'm not use to posting news on Neowin or I would of. I saw this earlier was VERY glad it got a date at GDC. I saw t on there facebook.

If you sign up right now and are one of the 25k people you will get 3 months free. Just need a card to verify age. I am definitely giving this a try. If it works I'll be recommending this to friends who like pc gaming but have a decent pc and nothing gaming capable.

Good posts Brian, keep it up (Y)

Thanks man. I am just a sucker for new gaming news. I have also been looking forward to trying out OnLive for a long time. I don't have a problem with $15 a month depending how the service works.

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OnLive has announced that its cloud-based game streaming service will launch in the 48 contiguous US states on June 17, 2010. The service will initially be available to PC and Mac owners for a monthly service fee of $14.95. Each game purchase and rental will carry a charge on top of the base subscription.

Steve Perlman, CEO of OnLive, confirmed that the final version of the OnLive "experience" will be demoed at E3 2010, which kicks off just two days before the service goes live. As for the whereabouts of its "micro-console," Perlman could only say that it will launch at a later date to be announced in the coming months. He offered a quick look ahead at some planned upgrades to the service, the biggest of which is 1080p support at 60 frames-per-second "as the bandwidth becomes available."

OnLive is going to waive the first three months of its service fee for the first 25,000 people who register for the service. Those who want to get a leg-up on being a part of that group can pre-register on the company's site.

Source: Joystiq

The bolded part is very worrying. This service is charging $15/month to play a game at 1080p using cloud computing on top of the game's retail price. Essentially, it's the equivalent of renting a powerful gaming computer that can be built for $800 and also paying for a game. How is it better than what is available now?

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$15 a month is one of the main reasons I see this failing. I would rather put that $15 a month and put it towards a PS3 or X360 and have the same capabilities. :/

Also I read they will use 5 servers to start off with, to distribute games. It will crash day one. I called it.

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you called the servers failing. I call the whole thing failing :p

True, but if servers fail it will all fail.

I never saw this as taking off anyways.

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Meh.

I'm so not impressed by this.

That being said, if it were an MMO it could rock. I've died SO many times in PvP due to

lag issues; not necessarily internet ping, but system lag. If ALL processes are done by

the same "cloud" system, then any lag I receive would be equally received by everyone

else... thus, an even playing field.

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I am pumped about this. I am just curious as to the cost of the equipment, of it that is included in the rental.

And the answer to that question is "not very well"

Did you get to try it already?

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...

Did you get to try it already?

No, but there are a few simple facts that mean it's going to have a bit of latency behind it and be of low quality (you can't do two pass video encoding on high settings for example, you need to do 1 pass with low enough settings to be real time, but still enough quality to not be a blurry block mess)

And by running over the internet they're reliant on the speed it takes packets to move around, even servers in the same city will result in some latency (Due to some strange thing, I get the same latency talking to a server in my city or one in New Zealand)

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No, but there are a few simple facts that mean it's going to have a bit of latency behind it and be of low quality (you can't do two pass video encoding on high settings for example, you need to do 1 pass with low enough settings to be real time, but still enough quality to not be a blurry block mess)

And by running over the internet they're reliant on the speed it takes packets to move around, even servers in the same city will result in some latency (Due to some strange thing, I get the same latency talking to a server in my city or one in New Zealand)

Not sure you saw this, but this video demonstration from the team explains how they are doing it:

http://www.electroni...ming.gaming.ui/

Talks packets and video encoding and how they are addressing it. Pretty darn slick if you ask me.

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I am pumped about this.

:blink:.

WHY?!

$14.95 per month PLUS the cost of the games PLUS the rental fees.

So.

14.95 per month + 59.99 + rental fee on top of that, so like.. whatever they choose to charge for rentals.

It's stupid.

And then you have to deal with latency.

You're better off dealing with a dedicated console.

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And the answer to that question is "not very well"

I would agree but the guy behind it helped make the original Quicktime. He knows his stuff about bandwidth in videos and all that.

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I would agree but the guy behind it helped make the original Quicktime. He knows his stuff about bandwidth in videos and all that.

Yeah, but there are still limitations in place that are very hard to get around.

Assuming there's a 25ms latency between the client and the server (so 50ms round trip in total), you'd have to be able to render at 250fps and encode at 250fps to achieve 30fps on the client (4ms to render a frame and 4ms to encode that frame).

Rendering at 60fps gets you 16.6ms between frames, assuming they can encode a frame of video in the same time they take to render it you now have 33.3ms in total to render and encode a frame, add another 25ms to send it to the client and you've come up to 58.3ms in total. 58.3ms goes into 1000ms 17.14 times, which is around how many frames the client would be able to get from the server every second.

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:blink:.

WHY?!

$14.95 per month PLUS the cost of the games PLUS the rental fees.

So.

14.95 per month + 59.99 + rental fee on top of that, so like.. whatever they choose to charge for rentals.

It's stupid.

And then you have to deal with latency.

You're better off dealing with a dedicated console.

It's $14.95 a month plus the cost of the game OR the cost of renting the game. You don't pay to BUY and rent the game.

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14.95 per month + 59.99 + rental fee on top of that, so like.. whatever they choose to charge for rentals.

Who, besides Activision, charges 59.99 for a PC game? I'm sure, with monthly charges, purcahase fees will be less than steam/disc games. I would bope.

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have they said what the rental fee is yet? otherwise id hold back judgment yet personally. it might be really cheap to rent, and $15 is about equivelant to what i pay for my mobile phone contract. it isnt THAT much. it might be everything it promised.

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