OnLive Review at PC Perspective
- Thread starter A Black Falcon
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SolidsnackooFoxhound
Banned
SapientWolf said:
In a demonstration a while back it was stated that they might give out the hardware on subscription but that could possibly change.
This doesn't make any sense at all. It's impossible for Onlive to detect what networking protocol your LAN uses. If it can be transmitted over the internet, it can be transmitted over WiFi. There's no way this statement is anything but a mistake.
Ping and lag are the same thing. And the bandwidth of your connection has absolutely nothing to do with your ping.pieatorium said:
My laptop can do better graphics and it was released in 2006. A $600 computer will put out better visuals than I am seeing right now. If you've always wanted to play YouTube videos, then sure, this looks great, but unless they can get their compression to look much better, there's no chance in hell this will work out.Willy105 said:
Yes, but if my laptop could do it in 2006, I think a laptop in 2010 should be doing pretty well unless it's a netbook.Willy105 said:
And just for fun I put together 6 items into a Newegg cart that would do much better than onLive =/
http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=13619706
I wouldn't say you should buy those, because as a GAFfer as I'd spend a little more to maximize bang for gaming buck. However, that would destroy onLive and any current generation console.
bigGIRLSblouse
Member
So it is just like what I experience every day VPNing into my work each and every day. You get that slight lag with the mouse, I can only imagine gaming with that lag.
A Black Falcon
Member
Slavik81 said:
I think I'm just repeating what the article said, but again, the quote, so you can decide...
Ping and lag are the same thing. And the bandwidth of your connection has absolutely nothing to do with your ping.[/QUOTE]
Slavik81 said:
Yeah, most likely true. But my point was that with OnLive you don't have to pay extra to upgrade the system, they should do it themselves... that is, longer-term, if the company actually doesn't go out of business, people save on not having to buy new computers.
So yeah, your machine is better than OnLive now, but the idea is that eventually OnLive will be better, for the same fee, while you'll have to spend another $700 or whatever to upgrade. Which is more expensive? Without price numbers from OnLive we can't be sure right now, but it could possibly be cheaper. Now don't get me wrong, I definitely don't think it's as good a product and I'd say that paying more for something better like your own computer is an expense well worth the money, but not everyone's going to agree with me on that, I'm sure. Also of course it would depend on how high price PC components you're buying in your upgrades. Importantly for OnLive, though, a lot of people (who are not really PC gamers) don't want to go through that kind of hassle. Those are the kind of people this is (or should be) for, I think, people who think that having a real gaming PC would be too confusing or too hard to get working (and it can be confusing, I'll give them that. I don't mind it, but I can see why some people would.), but want to play PC games anyway. The question is whether that market's going to go for it, I think.
Really, they should just get low-end or midrange gaming-ready PCs, it'd be better in pretty much every way, but unfortunately some people are intimidated by PC gaming. So then they get this, get frustrated at the lag or inability to use it because they need to be spending three times more on their internet connection to get decent enough speed to make it worth using, and quit and call PC gaming stupid... so yeah, I'm not exactly betting on this thing working out. But we'll see, I'll reserve at least some judgment until it's actually out.
Gully State
Member
A Black Falcon said:Yeah, most likely true. But my point was that with OnLive you don't have to pay extra to upgrade the system, they should do it themselves... that is, longer-term, if the company actually doesn't go out of business, people save on not having to buy new computers.
So yeah, your machine is better than OnLive now, but the idea is that eventually OnLive will be better, for the same fee, while you'll have to spend another $700 or whatever to upgrade. Which is more expensive? Without price numbers from OnLive we can't be sure right now, but it could possibly be cheaper. Now don't get me wrong, I definitely don't think it's as good a product and I'd say that paying more for something better like your own computer is an expense well worth the money, but not everyone's going to agree with me on that, I'm sure. Also of course it would depend on how high price PC components you're buying in your upgrades. Importantly for OnLive, though, a lot of people (who are not really PC gamers) don't want to go through that kind of hassle. Those are the kind of people this is (or should be) for, I think, people who think that having a real gaming PC would be too confusing or too hard to get working (and it can be confusing, I'll give them that. I don't mind it, but I can see why some people would.), but want to play PC games anyway. The question is whether that market's going to go for it, I think.
Really, they should just get low-end or midrange gaming-ready PCs, it'd be better in pretty much every way, but unfortunately some people are intimidated by PC gaming. So then they get this, get frustrated at the lag or inability to use it because they need to be spending three times more on their internet connection to get decent enough speed to make it worth using, and quit and call PC gaming stupid... so yeah, I'm not exactly betting on this thing working out. But we'll see, I'll reserve at least some judgment until it's actually out.
While I agree that OnLive would be crazy to be priced more than a gaming PC, I disagree that necessary PC upgrades happen more often than you infer. Maybe in 1997, but definitely not in 2010. A card like the 8800 GT (a 2+ year old card now and $100 a year ago) is still a gaming monster. It's not so much that PC gaming components become obsolete quickly as much as there are options for better visuals.
A Black Falcon
Member
Gully State said:
That's true. My computer's from early 2007, and my GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB is still pretty good... it was on the expensive side then, though, but I was trying to get a pretty good machine. Now of course they'd cost much, much less (I do have an SLI motherboard, I could get another one sometime... eh, I don't know.). But yes, because PC gaming isn't doing nearly as well now as it used to, you're right. PC games really don't push the hardware very often anymore like they used to, that's for sure. It used to be that every year brought games that looked better than the year before, but now Crysis, from 2007, is still one of the best looking games there is. Kind of sad really, even if it does mean that my computer's still able to run just about anything at decent to high settings despite being almost 3 years old. In PC gaming it shouldn't really be that way, even for a computer that cost about $18-1900...
I mean, it IS still true, computers do still get obsolete, but definitely slower than they used to be. I don't think it completely invalidates my point, but it does throw yet another challenge at OnLive, of course. They might reply (I'm guessing) that the fact that consoles are so much more successful than PCs are these days is part of WHY they're doing this, this is a very console-styled PC so it might work because it might fit in with the whole current console-centric focus, but I agree that it's probably more of a liability than a benefit. We'll see, though.
(Of course, it was also NVidia that invented the 6-month graphics card lifespan idea, so it's not entirely true that in 1997 things changed faster... 3DFX upgraded a little slower. But that's not a particularly important point, I think.)
DodgyGeezerFella
Member
Gully State said:
I think thats partly the reason people still think PC gaming is uber-expensive and not for them, the past haunts us (i know i certainly didnt PC game much then, it seemed every game i wanted to play also required some kind of upgrade)
The benefit of current multi-plat development is that engine tech isnt constantly being buffed like it was so things have relaxed a bit (in a way you could say consoles = dvd, PC = bluray), which depending on what camp your in is a good thing (no longer forced to upgrade) or bad ("i own a 5970, i demand more !").
Mind you if OnLive becomes popular, we might start seing more PC focused titles being developed, as they have the typical sell plus the subscription moneyz from OnLive.
Who knows, who knows
Fragamemnon
Member
my god what an atrocity. there are so many artifacts in that picture I am wondering when indiana jones is going to show up.
A lot of new PC games can be made to push the hardware if you want. Just crank up the graphical fidelity options (AF is free nowadays, but high degrees of AA at very high resolutions really make for a crisp, beautiful image), turn on ambient occulsion, do a 3-panel Eyefinity display, etc. The main difference now is that someone's $150 video card isn't just a piece for 'getting by', it too kicks a ton of ass.
A lot of new PC games can be made to push the hardware if you want. Just crank up the graphical fidelity options (AF is free nowadays, but high degrees of AA at very high resolutions really make for a crisp, beautiful image), turn on ambient occulsion, do a 3-panel Eyefinity display, etc. The main difference now is that someone's $150 video card isn't just a piece for 'getting by', it too kicks a ton of ass.
brain_stew
Member
Willy105 said:
Except for the fact that they're not ofcourse. By the end of the year there'll be integrated graphics solutions than can play Burnout in much higher quality than that, if they're not available already. Add a $60 GPU to any desktop bought in the last 3 years and it'll play games in much higher quality than that.
Running Burnout @ 720p w/ low settings doesn't take much of a rig, any modest gaming rig will max that game out at way higher resolutions.
TouchMyBox
Member
To be fair mister brainulous stew, the compression method isn't meant to look good in stills, but apparently looks much better in motion. Not that I'm trying to defend onlive, as I would expect high settings, but I'd wait to see it hands on for me to pass a judgement on it.
Kai Dracon
Writing a dinosaur space opera symphony
I've always seen OnLive as a trojan horse aimed at what the industry perceives as a huge "casual" audience ripe for plucking. The idea is that casuals are cheapass (look! The Wii is cheaper than PS3! Casuals all buy Wii! It's all because it's cheap!).
So a lot of the people backing OnLive's development see it, in reality, as a way to slide in and undercut even stuff like the Wii with an "inexpensive" subscription to play all these games and never have to buy them, download actual digitally distributed titles, etc.
So a lot of the people backing OnLive's development see it, in reality, as a way to slide in and undercut even stuff like the Wii with an "inexpensive" subscription to play all these games and never have to buy them, download actual digitally distributed titles, etc.
Firestorm said:
...$600... and that's before an OS/monitor. You clearly aren't getting the point here.
OnLive might cost $15/month, is plug and play, and never requires an upgrade at your end/out of your pocket. In other words, assuming that OnLive will be $15/month, you could get 40 months of OnLive for the price of those 6 components, and still not have to upgrade. You don't have to build it yourself, you don't have to worry about bad parts, you don't have to worry about it breaking or getting a virus, you don't have to tweak with the video settings or worry if your computer will be able to run it at all, and on and on and on.
Second of all, lag arguments need to be tabled right now. In the "review", the OnLive service even tells the reviewer that he's out of the prescribed range of the server, and therefore subject to lag. I think the fact that he's outside of the recommended range (1000 miles) and even with the lag the games are still playable is a great sign. Calling OnLive a failure based on the report of someone who isn't in server range, isn't even in the beta, is stupid. For all we know the OnLive software isn't optimized to work with some part in his computer yet and that's screwing his service up. Probably not, but the point is that no one here knows enough about OnLive to say otherwise.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5Z5Rsw7cNY&feature=related
If you look at that video around 1:30, the only part of America not within range of the final OnLive servers is somewhere in northern Montana. Sorry, northern Montana. For anyone who doesn't live there, right now is a little early to start bitching. Also, towards the end of that video is the CEO of OnLive (Steve Perlman) running Crysis allegedly straight off of OnLive in the middle of a lecture hall. He says that they have all of the effects on and that the game is running at high settings. The camera's pretty far away, but it looks fine for me, as someone who almost built a computer this Christmas before realizing that since I was stuck having to buy an operating system it would cost over $700. I can definitely say that Crysis looks better there than Burnout in the review, which makes me think that games need to be optimized for the server hardware, which probably hasn't been done on some of the games. Makes sense, still being beta and all.
Also, the argument that games'll cost more on OnLive that was made somewhere else in this thread doesn't seem even close to plausible. The games are just the software installed onto the OnLive servers. There's no box, dvd, manual, or other miscellaneous crap to manufacture (which some people may dislike, but that's a different argument), and I don't think that piracy is even possible. If anything, these benefits will let OnLive and publishers have lower prices than other retailers to push the service.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tW5-xD7gzLY&feature=related
At 9:30 in that video, Perlman shows a chart detailing the difference in publisher revenues from OnLive and a brick and mortar retailer. Basically, at a store a retailer only grabs $21 from a $60 game. Through OnLive, the publisher grabs whatever percent is agreed upon between them and OnLive, because they are the only 2 parties involved. I realize that a lot of PC game sales have turned to digital downloads, but the potential increased earnings here is still more than enough to persuade publishers to agree to not only hold sales for their games, but offer them for a lower price on any given day.
What it all comes down to though, is that OnLive isn't meant for most the people on this board. Despite the general feeling in this thread, 720p on the big screen in their living room or on their non-gaming notebook is good enough for most people, especially if they can make everything look as good and run as smooth as Crysis did in that lecture hall. You don't need, as someone posted, "1080p at 60+ fps with 16x AF and 8x AA" for OnLive to work. Give me 720p at at least 30, preferably 60 fps, and I'll be more than happy. I know how to build a computer, but I think that if OnLive works well enough I'll never build one again because I just don't enjoy wasting my time with the bullshit that computers come with. If they can keep the lag down, put the graphics at high, and have a good selection of games, I'll be more than happy to use OnLive to meet my PC gaming needs.
I still believe that they're looking to be bought, before it goes live on their own dime. It all comes back to the capital necessary to build the infrastructure, to be able to accommodate each individual who's looking to play Crysis (let's be generous and say, one million on day one), and to keep it running and up to date. Then there's what you've already blown through with R&D.
How far in the hole are they already? Can you recoup all of that with a cheap monthly fee, while still writing checks for what will be exorbitant maintenance fees?
It just doesn't seem feasible, unless there's bottomless pockets involved.
How far in the hole are they already? Can you recoup all of that with a cheap monthly fee, while still writing checks for what will be exorbitant maintenance fees?
It just doesn't seem feasible, unless there's bottomless pockets involved.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
I really don't see how it would be possible for OnLive to only charge $15 if they actually plan on having relevant games on the service. Their costs are going to be immense what with bandwidth, purchasing computers, maintaining hardware and acquiring licenses for all of the games they intend to have on the service. Assuming they go with an all-encompassing subscription plan, I don't see how they could make nearly enough money at $15 / month or even $30 / month. If they go for a "per game" pricing plan like how people purchase games on Steam then I really can't see them succeeding at all unless the per-game cost is really low. I guess it is probably too early to comment on their pricing since they haven't announced anything.
Does anyone know how their hardware is supposed to work? Do they just have farms of computers with the game software installed on them? I assume it is going to be one client connected to one computer at a time. I wonder what they plan to do in situations where all of the hardware for a certain game are being used and other clients want to log in and play the same game. It will probably be an epic clusterfuck each time a popular new game is released.
Does anyone know how their hardware is supposed to work? Do they just have farms of computers with the game software installed on them? I assume it is going to be one client connected to one computer at a time. I wonder what they plan to do in situations where all of the hardware for a certain game are being used and other clients want to log in and play the same game. It will probably be an epic clusterfuck each time a popular new game is released.
Zefah said:
The subscription fee doesn't give you access to all of he games on the service, it gives you the ability to use their service to purchase and use the games, streamed from their servers. Steve Perlman said in the videos that I posted above that they're renting their servers initially, so that they don't have to deal with the costs of buying them and maintenance. Also, OnLive doesn't pay for the rights to a game, it sells them and takes a cut of the sales, like steam. Perlman said that between subscription fees and game sales, they expect build their own servers in time.
As for their hardware, I doubt anyone really knows how it works, it's seems fairly cutting edge stuff. If someone could've done it before, they would've.
AzureNightmare
Banned
God, what a shitty service, not only do they play to take away the rights of gamers as consumers, they also intend to subject us to mediocrity.
Last night I was at home playing dragon age on my 880GT, tonight I am on a 4 year old laptop away from home. I WANT to play Dragon Age but instead I am forced to look at wiki's and forums posts.
Color me interested.
EDIT: FPS's tend to be the graphical beasts where you need that beefier hardware to run them. So the games that could be the strength of OnLive ( FPS's ) turn out to it weakest ( due to input lag ). Shame really. I upgraded to play Crysis. BTW, I feel as if it was worth every penny
Color me interested.
EDIT: FPS's tend to be the graphical beasts where you need that beefier hardware to run them. So the games that could be the strength of OnLive ( FPS's ) turn out to it weakest ( due to input lag ). Shame really. I upgraded to play Crysis. BTW, I feel as if it was worth every penny
brain_stew
Member
Zefah said:
You're paying a monthly fee to get access to the game's you've already bought or may buy in the future. Want to just continue playing those $50 games you bought last year? Better keep paying that subscription. Fed up with the Onlive service and want to quit your subscription? Well you can but you'll come out of it with no hardware and no games to show for all that money you've invested.
brain_stew said:
Yea buying game makes absolutely NO sense. I assume renting is going to be the main method which people game OnLive.
Valve is a pretty stable company so buying games off of Steam I don't really worry they will go under in a year or two. I wouldn't have that same confidence with the guy who invented Web TV :lol
Alain-Christian
Neo Member
This service is ahead of it's time. The Internet is still too slow in the US for this type of thing. I like the idea, though.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
SILVO said:
Wow, you have to pay a subscription fee on top of your internet connection and computer hardware necessary to run the software and then you have to pay for the games as well? I wonder if they are going to be able to heavily discount the game for sale on their service or if people will have to pay the standard $30 - $50 for each title. You will "own" the games even less than on digital download services by buying them from OnLive.
I just really don't see why anyone with desktop hardware wouldn't just buy a budget graphics card and buy their games from Steam or some other download service. I guess we have to wait for more details to come out to be sure, though.
It seems to be a trend of PC games stripping out LAN play (Starcraft 2). So they are coming out with a service that MP depends on LAN and games are stripping it out. Do you think devs would put LAN play back in? I doubt it. Putting the game OnLive reduces piracy while including LAN could increase it outside of the OnLive environment? Seems like a weird possible paradox.
I am insulted that some slacker hasn't started talking about how he could play games on his work PC. Surely there is some 3rd shift slacker that could use this product. (Assuming you had admin rights to install the program).
I am insulted that some slacker hasn't started talking about how he could play games on his work PC. Surely there is some 3rd shift slacker that could use this product. (Assuming you had admin rights to install the program).
ZombieSupaStar
Member
you think the console makes will like this?
there is no "pc maker" so I cant see any other solution than pc market will grow alot with this tech. Or of course 1 of the console maker makes this their entire next gen type platform :lol
xboxonlive 720
there is no "pc maker" so I cant see any other solution than pc market will grow alot with this tech. Or of course 1 of the console maker makes this their entire next gen type platform :lol
xboxonlive 720
huh... the beta test is taking place in california, this dipshit "gets" an account and plays from where? cincinatti? that's well over the range (1000miles is max, cincinatti to california is almost 2000) that onlive has stated to be optimal working distance from the servers (when onlive goes live, they will have 3 or more servers)
yellowjacket25
Member
This.kiruyama said:
I can understand GAF and others being curious about how it is coming along but its in closed beta, being reviewed by a guy thats not even in the beta and is out of range of the servers. Its a little ridiculous to judge it right now. I personally still dont think it will be great or something I would be interested in but im willing to give it a chance to prove me wrong.
Reginald P. Linux
Banned
Valru said:
The OnLive parts look way too soft. Either the person who made the video screwed something up or OnLive is over-compressing the video they're sending.
I'm pretty sure that OnLive will deliver despite of all the naysayers. Yes, it will not replace gaming PCs, not even the cheap $600 ones.
But if I were Sony or MicroSoft, I would be fu*king terrified right now. That's what you get for subjecting your consumers to mediocre detail levels, aggressive LOD, and a lag-inducing control scheme. Somebody comes along and does it even better than you.
OnLive will eat your marketshare for breakfast.
But if I were Sony or MicroSoft, I would be fu*king terrified right now. That's what you get for subjecting your consumers to mediocre detail levels, aggressive LOD, and a lag-inducing control scheme. Somebody comes along and does it even better than you.
OnLive will eat your marketshare for breakfast.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
erick said:
Really? I have a feeling people who still game exclusively on consoles like to actually go and buy their games in stores or at least have physical copies. Is the statistic that says only 50% of Xbox 360 owners have ever made Xbox Live accounts still true? How many of those are even gold accounts? I don't think console makers have much to fear from OnLive. Anyone willing to go all-digital probably already games on the PC and a monthly subscription will be a hard thing to swallow for a lot of people out there who simply want a console they can play a game on every once in a while.
erick said:
Yes, network quality is currently good enough to have somewhat decent renditions of (what are now) pretty old PC titles, and that's in very limited places where you meet the requirements for connecting to OnLive. It'll be years before the entire country can connect to OnLive in a way that even threatens a tiny little portion of what Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo are pulling in with console sales.
The lag is larger than ping, though, since beside classic ping for network transmissions you have to add computations (that you also have when you play offline) and encoding (maybe only a couple of ms, but at the end, it makes much)Slavik81 said:
I agree... But they may mean that the WiFi is usually has unsufficient bandwidht/is too slow...Slavik81 said:
The investment to have a sub-10ms lag (you can't go really farther with the speed of light limit) would be insane and since there's not so many reasons to have a very low ping, I doubt we'll see this soon.Alain-Christian said:
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
RJT said:
While we don't know their pricing plans, we do know that people who only play a few hours a week do not like subscriptions. There is a reason why so many people play those facebook games. They are free unless you want to get more involved and even then you can pay as you go.
A Black Falcon
Member
DopeyFish said:
The author updated the article with some information on the distance and lag issues, actually. http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=859&type=expert&pid=6 Go read it if you haven't. The way it works in beta is that each beta account is tied to a specific server, while with the retail version you will be able to switch servers. He was indeed connecting to the West Coast server from the East. This means that the retail OnLive will probably not have as much lag as he experienced.
He also says this about the "1000 miles" thing:
Overall he thinks that the lag and latency issues were much worse because of the distance issue than they would be otherwise, but the image quality issues he thinks were unrelated and it really does look that bad. He offered to try it out on the East server if they'd let him, though, to see what the difference would be like.
I was under the impression that we would still have to pay an additional fee for games on top of the $15 a month or whatever they end up charging us.SILVO said:
Also, you also weren't getting my point. That was $600 worth of parts I threw together. Everyone before me was right that you could take an off the shelf PC, add the new super-efficient Radeon 5670, and see performance better than onLive without having to be connected to a monthly service. Personally, I don't see onLive offering prices better than Steam.