[Follow-Up] OnLive Service Officially Coming to US and Europe in Autumn 2011

[dgstorm]

A few days ago, we shared a story about the possible future of gaming, cloud based gaming service called OnLive, with its own dedicated universal wireless controller. OnLive just shared their official press release, and it will be available in the United States and Europe, in the Autumn of this year. Furthermore, the folks over at BGR were able to demo the service on an HTC Flyer, a Motorola Xoom, and an Apple iPad, and came away mightily impressed. Here's a quote from their story, followed by the official press release.

We had a chance to go hands-on with OnLive running on the iPad, HTC Flyer, and Motorola XOOM, and the experience was virtually the same across all three devices; we were blown away at the performance. The custom controller, which will also launch later this summer, felt a lot like an Xbox 360 controller, and we felt right at home.

This stuff has the potential to be a truly "disruptive" technology. The primary upsides to define a technology as disruptive are already starting to fall into place for this service. One is that in the future, most people will probably have a tablet of some kind anyway, and with this service, you will never need to buy a gaming console again, since your tablet becomes your console. That covers the price and convenience aspect of a "disruptive" tech. Two, the ease of networking with your friends for multiplayer gaming creates a social aspect to it that typically drives consumers in that direction. That covers the marketing aspect of it. This is definitely something to keep your eyes on. Here's the Press Release:

OnLive Unveils iPad/Android Tablet App that Far Outperforms New Consoles

iPad, Android Tablet Instantly Becomes Touch/Motion Controller

or Standalone Cloud Gaming System with Touch/Motion or Game Controller

Seamless Integration of Tablet with or without HDTV

First Touch/Controller Game from Major Publisher Unveiled for OnLive

Unparalleled Multiplayer Mobile or In-Home Experience

Available in Autumn 2011 in US and Europe

Los Angeles (E3 Expo 2011) — June 7, 2011 — OnLive, Inc., the pioneer of cloud gaming, is pleased to report that gamers throughout the world can immediately experience the seamless integration of tablets and HDTVs with high-end gaming. Their current iPad or Android tablet and current HDTV will not only provide this experience in 2011, but will provide it with far higher performance, richer gameplay and deeper social integration than any console announced for 2012, with more than 100 games available today.

OnLive is pleased to announce the OnLive® Player App for iPad and Android. Like the recently announced consoles, the OnLive Player App will enable gameplay of virtually all OnLive games on an iPad and Android tablet with touch or OnLive’s new Universal Wireless Controller. In addition, the OnLive Player App allows the tablet to be used as a touch and motion controller combined with an HDTV (or PC/Mac® if preferred), and allows both synchronized or independent video on the tablet and HDTV screen, enabling combined gameplay with tablet and HDTV, or separate gameplay on tablet and HDTV.

Full voice chat-enabled multiplayer is supported, both in-room and with others throughout the world, providing a complete multiplayer experience whether at home or on the go with a mobile device.

Core patent-pending exclusive OnLive cloud gaming features such as massive spectating of live gameplay throughout the world, instant no-obsolescence gameplay, Facebook integration with Brag Clip™ videos, etc., will work seamlessly on both tablets and HDTVs and will continue to distinguish OnLive from consoles, both in 2011 and beyond.

“The power of the cloud is definitely the theme this week, displacing what had been assumed to be platforms that could never be displaced,” said Steve Perlman, Founder and CEO of OnLive. “The OnLive Player App for iPad and Android shows how with the power of the cloud, the question is not whether cloud gaming will be able to catch up to consoles, it will be whether consoles will be able to catch up to cloud gaming.”

OnLive is excited to demonstrate the first game from a major publisher supporting both OnLive’s iPad/Android tablet touch and game controller, as well as running seamlessly on an HDTV, PC and Mac, to be released later in 2011. Come to OnLive’s booth (South Hall, Booth #801) for a demo.

For gamers preferring a smaller screen, OnLive will provide the exact same functionality on iPhone and Android smartphones, allowing them to be used both as game systems themselves with touch and the OnLive Universal Wireless Controller, or as a controller to an HDTV (or PC/Mac), for simultaneous or independent play.

OnLive is also unveiling as part of this experience the first 10 gigabit cloud-based full-featured browser for iPad, Android and HDTV; bringing the full richness of the Web loading from ultra-fast 10 gigabit/second Web connections to OnLive’s cloud-based servers, including support for full-featured Flash and video sites. Mobile and home devices will no longer be limited to the speed of their local connection for Web browsing or Web plug-in compatibility, opening up access to Flash games and social gaming for tablets and HDTVs.

All OnLive games played using the OnLive Player App will play seamlessly across all OnLive-compatible devices, including iPad, iPhone, Android, on HDTV via the OnLive Game System, on connected HDTV and Blu-ray/media players and on PC and Mac.

The OnLive Player for iPad and Android is being showcased live at OnLive’s booth (South Hall, Booth #801) and will be available later this year. For a video presentation please visit OnLive: Press Room.

Source: Android.net via BGR

 

[Vakharn]

I've tried this on demo on my computer, and while it's a really cool concept, and delivers very good performance over my 25mbps fios connection it has one really big problem and a couple minor ones.

The biggie: There is control lag. It's not terrible, but it's definitely noticeable, as is to be expected on a system where your inputs are sent out over the net and back again before you see a response. This would be fine for certain kinds of games, an RTS or MMORPG won't suffer too badly from a little control delay, but in an FPS it's horrible. You feel like your mouse is connected to your character with rubber bands.

Minor things:
-There isn't a great selection of games yet, though I imagine this will improve over time.
-If you planned to use this as a substitute for PC or console gaming the video quality leaves something to be desired since you're only seeing a streaming video version of what you would see if you were rendering locally. Essentially it's the difference between watching someone play a game on your computer/console, and watching the same (with very good quality) on youtube.

All in all, it's still probably better than anything else on the market for tablet gaming, but it won't be replacing pc or console gaming anytime soon, if ever.