2019 will be the year that sees some of the biggest tech companies in the world diving into the cloud streaming business for games. Google announced its Stadia platform at the Game Developers Conference 2019 for a launch scheduled later this year, Microsoft confirmed plans to publicly test Project xCloud in the coming months and even Amazon is rumored to be readying its own cloud-based streaming service.
With competition often comes strife, and in an interview with the Telegraph (locked behind the publication's paywall), Microsoft's Chief Marketing Officer for Xbox Mike Nichols didn't pull any punches when he discussed the weaknesses of the upcoming cloud-based streaming platform.
While he admitted that Google has the infrastructure (7,500 edge node locations) to pull it off, Nichols pointed out that unlike Microsoft they don't have strong ties to game developers and publishers to deliver the content that fans expect.
[...]Microsoft CFO Mike Nichols also went on to reiterate that regardless of the availability Project xCloud, the 'local' experience users can get on an Xbox console or Windows PC will remain superior to the cloud in terms of quality.
Previously: Google and Microsoft Eyeing Streaming Game Services
Google Announces "Stadia" Streaming Game Service
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The Goog posted a teaser video clip about its vision for the future of gaming to be revealed on Tuesday at an annual Game Developers Conference in San Francisco.
The clip cycles through an accelerating collage of scenes one might find in video games, but says nothing about what Google will announce at the event, which will be live-streamed on YouTube.
In a potentially related bit of prospecting someone uncovered a recent patent
that Google filed for a video game controller [which] hinted that the tech firm might be planning to release its own console and controller to go along with a streaming service.
Microsoft appears to share this vision,
Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella said late last year that a keenly anticipated "xCloud" streaming service was in "early days."
Amazon also has a related pre-existing entry into this same space with it's popular Twitch game play-streaming service, and I can't imagine they are sitting still.
The US video game industry generated a record $43.4 billion in revenue in 2018, up 18 percent from the prior year, according to data released by the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) and NPD Group.
I suppose that's just too attractive a pie to leave in the hands of customer-centric game developers like Activision, Sony, and EA.
Are you ready for the 800lb streaming gorillas?
Google jumps into gaming with Google Stadia streaming service, coming "in 2019"
At the Game Developers Conference, Google announced its biggest play yet in the gaming space: a streaming game service named Google Stadia, designed to run on everything from PCs and Android phones to Google's own Chromecast devices.
As of press time, the service's release window is simply "2019." No pricing information was announced at the event.
Google Stadia will run a selection of existing PC games on Google's centralized servers, taking in controller inputs and sending back video and audio using Google's network of low-latency data centers. The company revealed a new Google-produced controller, along with a game-streaming interface that revolves around a "play now" button. Press this on any Web browser and gameplay will begin "in as quick as five seconds... with no download, no patch, no update, and no install."
"With Stadia, this waiting game will be a thing of the past," Google's Phil Harrison said. He then demonstrated Stadia gameplay on a Pixel 3 XL, followed by "the least-powerful PC we could find." The following gameplay was advertised as "1080p, 60 frames per second." Harrison confirmed that existing "USB controllers and mouse-and-keyboard" will function with Stadia games as well.
See also: The 9 biggest questions about Google's Stadia game streaming service
Previously: Google and Microsoft Eyeing Streaming Game Services
Google Stadia requires $130 upfront, $10 per month at November launch:
Players will have to pay $129.99 up front and $9.99 a month, on top of individual game purchase costs, when Google's previously announced Stadia game-streaming service launches in November. A free tier will be available some time in 2020, as will a paid subscription tier that doesn't require the upfront purchase.
The Stadia Founder's Edition and its contingent Stadia Pro subscription will be the only way to get access to the Stadia service when it launches, Google announced today. That $129.99 package, available for pre-order on the Google Store right now, will include:
- A Stadia controller in "limited-edition night blue"
- A Chromecast Ultra
- Three months of Stadia Pro service and a three-month "buddy pass" to give to a friend
- First dibs on claiming a "Stadia Name"
After the first three months, Stadia Pro users will have to pay $9.99 a month to maintain their membership. For that price, they will get access to Google's highest-quality streams, at up to 4K/60fps with high-dynamic range (HDR) and 5.1 surround sound. In 2019, users will not be able to sign up for Stadia Pro without investing in the Founder's Edition hardware package, and Founder's Edition packages will only be available "in limited quantities and for a limited time."
Also at AnandTech, The Verge, and Wccftech.
See also: Is Stadia Already Screwed?
Xbox One And PS4 Don't Need To Fear Google Stadia, Which Is Mired In Contradictions
Previously: Google and Microsoft Eyeing Streaming Game Services
Google Announces "Stadia" Streaming Game Service
Microsoft CFO: Google Stadia Lacks Content, Local Experience Will Remain Superior to Streaming Games
(Score: 2, Insightful) by DECbot on Saturday April 13 2019, @07:00AM (2 children)
Yeah, the Microsoft guy is correct. Local is better right now. But you know what? Turbo props were once more reliable than jet engines, so there's no chance that air liners would ever switch. Nobody will use dumb terminals again because
the cloudbig iron costs too much. Consumer automobiles will remain as internal combustion engines because they have more range. People will always buy expensive hardware for local gaming because it gets better performance. Nobody will want to use cheap tablets and smart phones to play triple A game titles because they like playing as much as they can to Microsoft and Sony. Google has no idea how to run a mobile platform and guage its limitations, but Microsoft does. Their Windows phone failure makes them more aware of the difficulties of building and sustaining a mobile platform. Nobody wants to play games on a mobile platform because nobody will write games for phones. Just look at these metrics the Windows Mobile app store. In 2019, virtually nobody plays games on Windows Mobile, so why would they play Stadia games on devices they already have? That's just crazy. Consumers want to spend money renting software and buying new, gaming only hardware every 3 years. WTF does Google know about people's devices, how people use their devices, and using gaming platforms? It's not like Google has a browser for every mobile device and general purpose OS.cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Bot on Saturday April 13 2019, @09:52AM
I would not spend CPU time wondering on the merits/demerits of streamed games. The only factor is the amount of control you can exercise. If you return to the dumb terminal, you have no control. Technical problems can be overcome. It's the same reasoning that gave you cars where you cannot simply replace a burned light.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 14 2019, @10:21PM
Local is better due to latency, which is a huge, difficult problem.
Still, there's a few options, and they can be used in tandem.
A: move the servers closer -- which is expensive, and you're still fairly heavily at the whims of your users' connections, and you're still nowhere near how local play responds.
Still, Google can totally do this one, which gives them a leg up over other prior cloud gaming services.
B: some kind of GGPO style black magic (which basically involves re-running the game whenever there's a discrepancy between what should have happened when you pressed the buttons and what actually ended up happening). RetroArch's "runahead" feature is very similar, to reduce perceived latency on a local machine.
Very intensive, and the player will still have somewhat of a disconnect, and there's going to be the choppiness of when resyncs happen.
Still, I like this option the most despite the drawbacks (seriously, it's really good at killing latency, I can fight a guy in Korea in KOF98 like he's next to me, even if there's some weirdness on the screen sometimes between syncs), I just don't know if Google's actually going to do anything like this.
But yeah, it's really intensive, and doesn't scale nicely to modern, CPU intensive games that well.
C: design games with extreme input latency in mind.
This means you don't have access to the large, existing library of games that people would want to play, and you'd need to actually go and design those games. It's harder to do this than to just keep designing for locally placed hardware.
D: literally warp space so that your signals reach faster (lol)
ultimately, the problem is that signals take time to travel, and trying to keep latency under two 16ms frames at 60fps (or one 33ms one at 30fps) is hard, let alone dealing with network pings of 100+ms
like, just the signal getting to your TV, getting decoded, and being displayed is a latency issue, what on earth are you going to do about a signal having to bounce back from miles away through the internet on top of that
I've used OnLive and whatever the hell Sony calls their service. It was nice being able to play some games way above my hardware spec on a literal netbook and a Vita, respectively. It wasn't nice how fucking long inputs took to actually reach the server and then for me to see the result.
Assassin's Creed worked a-okay on OnLive, because that game automates a bunch of movement anyway, so you don't need to react that much. Played through most of Brotherhood on the service before it shut down (also, this is one major factor against cloud play, not being able to play the games when the service shuts down).
They also offered Street Fighter 4, which showcases every possible flaw with the model in full glory. Good lord, that was awful. I think they deliberately wanted to show off the worst case scenario.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Saturday April 13 2019, @08:17AM (5 children)
Same ol' drill
Today: stadia sucks, kills your kittens and gets you ebola
In 2 years: hey here's MS remote gaming, much better than stadia because it's integrated with excel.
In 4 years: we decided to axe remote gaming kthxbye
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday April 13 2019, @09:14AM (2 children)
5 years: Everyone is so disgusted with remote play that they turn to LAN play.
10 years: Faster-than-light neutrinos invented.
12 years: Brain-to-brain gaming with FTL neutrinos.
16 years: Botpocalypse, humans get banhammer.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Bot on Saturday April 13 2019, @09:40AM (1 child)
Don't forget
15 years: a subset of brain to brain hardcore gamers become so extreme that they actively block parts of their memory so that they think reality starts within the game. Also they wire their sensory system to the game so they feel the matrix's pain and pleasure. They put scant instructions in an open ended MMO, unimaginatively called 'life', and score assessment will be held at a 'final judgement' conference. Turns out most people choose to idle and fap as much as possible, for their very own embarassment.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 13 2019, @02:59PM
no
us hardcore gamers are so extreme that we have built in blocks to stupid social media promotions and people called curators or influencers, because we only have room to actually game in our brains.
all that other stuff is for the spectators--considering it takes a beta primate or less to pay any attention at all to the kardashians or whoever is shaking ad spaces now
we all know stadia is for convenience gamers, like the people that think phone gaming is hardcore.
dedicate portable gaming systems used to be cool, but they mostly got ruined because Cloud and arbitrary limits on local gaming and even save games. pay extra to cloud, that sort of shit. local gaming shouldn't need a sign-on to someone else's far away server, etc. but maybe a local one just for scoring.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 13 2019, @11:02AM (1 child)
Will this new gaming service run on my Windows phone or my Zune?
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday April 13 2019, @02:49PM
If a streaming game service ends up running in a web browser and not an app, maybe somebody will get it to run on a Windows phone.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 13 2019, @08:51AM (5 children)
I'm skeptical Stadia will take off, for two reasons:
(1) For fast paced games, you can't get around physics. Latency to the nearest data center will always be a thing, no matter what. If you thought seeing another player character rubber-banding due to latency was bad, then oh boy.. Wait until not only that but also your every action and movement input takes some 50-100 milliseconds for the server to register and send a video frame with your character's response back to you. (This problem will be magnified for those living in rural areas, far from the cities and and large data centers, or those with crappy ISPs and bad network routes.) And that's not just the AAA shooters. Even opening a menu in a game will suffer that round-trip penalty, so any type of game is impacted. So for real gamers this will never work well. These people will not be the target audience.
(2) Some simple games are not hindered by latency. (e.g. the average mobile match-three game) But those games are already heavily optimized by the developers so that even a potato phone can run them well. So casual gamers are not the target audience either.
So who really is the target audience? Perhaps game developers are the target audience. Deploying a new binary to a server to change functionality is a lot easier than pushing an update to the app/play store and waiting for everyone to update, and you don't need to worry as much about compatibility with many devices.
(Score: 2) by J_Darnley on Saturday April 13 2019, @09:27AM (1 child)
People who hate their own property rights? Why do you think devs will be interested? Why does a dev care what version I am running? Oh you mean online games! Yeah, they'll want to force everyone to run the same version. I mean they have done away with standalone servers so they can control people inside and outside of the game.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday April 13 2019, @09:54AM
People these days don't care about "property rights". If they can get X dollars of enjoyment out of something, they will pay it. All the better if the experience can't be easily pirated.
Then you can factor in the advantages of streaming games: portability, no lengthy updating process, modest hardware requirements, etc. The main disadvantage will be shitty ISP service.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 13 2019, @08:22PM (1 child)
I stated this in the last discussion: the target is chromebooks. Most chromebook platforms are underpowered, especially when compared to gaming laptops. Plus, the killer app for a huge chunk of the population is whatever AAA game they want to play at the moment. If Stadia takes off and works "good enough" on most chromebooks, then Google's percentage of the laptop market could potentially increase by a huge margin. Plus, the money from the service itself could become self-reinforcing with enough market buy-in, thanks to the vertical integration.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday April 13 2019, @08:41PM
Chromebook performance could be trending up soon:
https://chromeunboxed.com/new-chromebook-zork-takes-amd-to/ [chromeunboxed.com]
The AMD 15 Watt chips should be cheaper than Intel versions, with halfway decent integrated graphics (and could become much better yet again on "7nm" or later nodes). I'm not too interested because I prefer fanless, which means <10 Watts.
But you are right. The majority of Chromebooks will continue to be lower-powered, yet supporting 802.11ac or better connectivity, suitable for being thin clients.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Saturday April 13 2019, @09:21PM
I have seen a lot of people theorize about latency, ignoring the fact that people have already used the underlying technology, which was open for beta testing last year as Project Stream. People have already tried it. It works. Yes, there are limitations: professional competitive gaming is a no go. You need a decent Internet connection. But for most games and most players it doesn't matter.
One of the most popular games at the moment, Fortnite, can be played on a mobile device, which is objectively a horrible controller interface. Most people don't give a shit about a few dozen milliseconds of latency.
Some benchmarks showed that Stadia's latency is roughly equivalent to an Xbox with a TV screen (slower refresh/latency than a gaming monitor). Again, you're not winning any competitive tournaments on it, but for most games and players it's fine.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Saturday April 13 2019, @09:02AM
I'm a filthy casual, you insensitive clod!
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday April 13 2019, @04:55PM (2 children)
Where do I go to find this MS content?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 13 2019, @05:43PM
Plays For Sure?
---
AOC 2024
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday April 13 2019, @06:45PM
Xbox Four
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Saturday April 13 2019, @09:12PM
What else would he say? The only reason Windows is still relevant for most people is games. If Google Stadia ends up being even 50% as good as Windows for games, Windows is dead. Of course the only thing a Microsoft CFO can say is that Stadia isn't going to work. If it did work he's going to be out of a job (of course he'll still get a nice exit package).
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