
OnLive willl give you a free console if you buy a game - zoowar
http://venturebeat.com/2011/02/25/onlive-willl-give-you-a-free-console-if-you-buy-a-game/
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6ren
I used to think this was a stupid idea, because of latency; and the only
reason it got funding was because it would be _fantastic_ for publishers (if
it worked): no pirating, can charge by the hour, most people don't play their
console 24/7, so it's a better utilization of resources (you can even time-
zone it, albeit with worse latency), etc.

But just today I recognized it as a profound disruption: a service that isn't
very good, with a cheaper business model, that targets non-consumption.

When the network does become good enough - and it's only getting faster -
these guys will have encountered and solved all the myriad other technical
problems (like iron man and altitude freeze). And they will also have solved
all the problems with the business model (suppliers, charging, customer
issues). It will be hard to catch them.

And... turns out people are saying the latency isn't actually as off-putting
as you'd think, for FPS etc. I've heard a bigger problem is with mouse-
pointers - the latency between the mouse moving and the pointer moving is
apparently much more perceptible.

So, I say congratulations to these guys. Make a crap product for cheap; let
everyone laugh at you; make it better. They are the visionary entrepreneurs,
who actually change everything. No derision means no revolution.

~~~
GeorgeTirebiter
OnLive was founded by Steve Perlman - one of the 3 co-founders of WebTV. Steve
is the consummate Silicon Valley serial entrepreneur - brilliant geek,
business guy, product visionary, cheerleader -- all rolled into one with a
nice-guy personality to boot.

OnLive does some spectacularly clever things to perform so well; and it will
continue to deliver better and better experiences without you needing to
upgrade your video card or computer.

I can't say more (disclosure: I'm under NDA), but OnLive is <i>definitely</i>
the Real Deal.

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jhuckestein
This reminds me of the transition to SaaS. (Gaas??)

Soon game devs can develop their games for idealized virtual environments
which is much easier than developing for a video game console (or more than
one console). If a dev needs features that a console doesn't provide, they can
just 'host' it on a different data center.

The slow release cycle of consoles that Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony are
basing their businesses on is about to be obsoleted and replaced with frequent
software updates.

From here, it's only a small step to conceiving a world in which it is
incredibly easy to build multiplayer games, too. If the whole simulation lives
on the server and nowhere else, then you don't need any network code.

The OnLive team must be incredibly excited!

~~~
windsurfer
As a counter-point:

Soon game devs can develop their games for idealized hardware environments
which is much easier than developing for the myriad of centralized mainframes.
If a dev needs features that a mainframe couldn't provide, they can build the
hardware that's needed.

The high cost of servers and bandwidth that Onlive are basing their businesses
on is about to be obsoleted and replaced with dedicated rendering hardware for
the consumer.

From here, it's only a small step to conceiving a world in which it is
incredibly easy to build graphically intensive games, too. If the whole
simulation lives on the one piece of hardware and nowhere else, then you don't
need any network code or fancy servers or massive bandwidth.

I'm excited for the future console wars!

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lazyronin
I tried out OnLive over the Christmas break and it was great. Played Mafia 2
on a 4 year old MacBook and it ran perfectly.

But I can't use the service because over 2 days I had used 40GB of my 65GB
bandwidth (thanks Rogers). Although it's an extreme example, 3GB/hr is still
too much for my capped internet service.

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T-R
Is my understanding of this correct - that they're maintaining state and
performing rendering on the server for every connection to the service, and
then sending each frame over the network?

I am so very confused as to how this is scaling. Isn't the rule of thumb for
scalability and performance to move client state and UI processing onto the
client? Are they going to run an XBox VM for every simultaneously connected
customer? How does it perform for games that require low controller lag, like
FPS - or Megaman for that matter.

~~~
wmf
Yes, it's basically VNC applied to games. I would guess that each simultaneous
user has a dedicated PC on the server side.

~~~
Charuru
It's virtualized, and considering not everyone plays games at the same time,
you would prob get a lot more than 4 players per "pc"

~~~
T-R
True, but the hardware still needs to scale linearly with the number of
concurrent connections, and it leaves them pretty susceptible to high traffic
related problems, like at peak times when games are first released. What if
someone decides to launch a DDoS? Virtualization also limits the type of games
they can run - you can't run a dozen PS3 games without a dozen PS3s.

On top of that, they shoulder the cost of upgrading the hardware, along with
the risk - another Dreamcast (high initial sales followed by a severe dropoff)
would be disastrous. I'm not sure how they can pass those costs on to their
customers at a price point that's attractive to anyone who doesn't play _lots_
of games per month (also making it possibly a net loss), or that's competitive
with the more scalable, more performant, and lower risk model of running the
games on the client, whether it's a console or a PC.

~~~
Charuru
AFAIcantell they only do PC games (or ports), so they don't have that problem.
They probably won't deal in specialty hardware, that would be a nightmare.
Just standard, out of the box hardware that can contribute to their overall
processing power even 5-10 years later.

~~~
T-R
That would definitely mitigate some of the risk, but I'd imagine they'd have
to steer clear of new games that push hardware too much - even if every system
running the same game runs it from shared memory, it's still optimistically
one processor per connection. They're also likely to run into the same
problems that Netflix is having with ISPs, but even harder, without caching as
an option. It's like they tried to conjure up the least scalable application
imaginable... well, props to them if they pull it off.

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chaostheory
The big question is how good are broadband connections in the US? I can see
this working in Korea, Japan, or HK really well; but I have my doubts given
the wide range of internet access quality here in the US.

Given the complaints about always on Internet DRM schemes, there's bound to be
some problems I don't want to deal with for Onlive.

~~~
jhuckestein
I don't think it has to work super well right now, the benefits are so big
that we'll find a way to make this work.

The first SaaS applications were horrible to use and it has taken 10 years
until webapps have arrived at desktop performance (as far as responsiveness
goes).

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sshirokov
They also gave out a free console to anyone that pre-ordered one with intent
to pay when they came out, and that came with a free game as well.

If there was ever a business that got attracting customers and rewarding early
adopters, it's OnLive.

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swolchok
Wait...this sounded fantastic, but this isn't like a normal games console or
even Steam. If OnLive folds or stops supporting older games, your console is
worthless, right?

~~~
div
Since their model is subscription based, they don't have an incentive to stop
supporting older games.

~~~
swolchok
So if I stop paying, the games I _already bought_ are worthless, right? After
all, the headline says "if you buy a game." Yech.

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geuis
Well, their UX is bad. Initially when you don't have an account and you click
anywhere on the big homepage ad, it takes you to info about the offer but no
where to click "Buy". So then it leads to creating an account, and after that
when you click on the homepage ad it just takes you back to your account page.

Edit: This might have been an instant buy for me. Except I can't figure out
how to pre-order their damn game, so now I've lost interest. There's no way to
even search for games. Its like no one actually sat down with a credit card
and walked through the "We Like Money" part of this whole operation.

~~~
CrazedGeek
You're supposed to download the desktop app and buy it through there, I think.

~~~
jaysonelliot
Helpful to know, thanks. But how would anyone ever discover that fact on their
own?

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e1ven
Does anyone know what the cost of the Pre-Order is? I don't have an account,
so can't easily check this out.

I'd worked on tech like this before, but never got acceptable performance, so
I'd be curious how well theirs work, if I could get it cheap.

~~~
wmf
$50

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PureSin
I heard about OnLive two years ago when they presented at E3. Glad to see
their product is actually out and they're pushing hard to get it adapted. I'm
interested to take up this offer just to test out the response time.

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chris11
I wonder how long it will take before someone hacks it to stream hulu and
netflix. It should be able to if it streams video games in 720p;

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Charuru
What they really need is some sort of Flash plugin version. I have a CR-48
that would be perfect for this.

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PHPAdam
I had this idea years ago, but its implementation that matters for that I wish
it all the best! (and its quick expansion into England)

