OnLive demoed: lag, graphics are a problem. GASP!!!

[MetalCraze]

Good God. If you don't game that much and don't consider yourself a "gamer", then just buy a fucking $500 PC and keep it for 3 odd years. It will play all your games just fine unless you care about maxing all the shit.

But you can max all the shit. My $500 upgrade can run ArmA2 with 2.5 km viewdistance, 2x FSAA, 8x AF at 1680x1050 (higher res than in OnLive hoax-presentations lololo) and everything at high-to-max just fine. Framerate drop is only noticeable when I'm looking through a forest into a town - two most laggy things in all BIS games.
The only things I've kept from the previous PC are HDDs and a soundcard.
And AA2 is a bigger resource hog than Crysis at those settings. Considering that the absolute majority of games coming out today are mere console ports from 5 years old system I still don't understand what Xi is on about. And that situation will barely change in years because X360 is still going strong with M$ aggressively slowing down the technical progress as hard as they can (with DX10 being nothing but a hoax to sell Vista and 8800s as proven by Crysis and other DX10-"exclusive" effects that look the same at DX9)

 

[Sceptic]

Who would have thought that 10,000,000 people would pay $15 a month to play WoW?

Bad analogy. WoW has an entrance fee (you buy the game, THEN you start paying your $15 a month) and offers a service that you can get no other way (read: you can't play WoW without the monthly subscription). On release it was also cheaper than most of the other retail MMORPGs. None of these apply to OnLive.

Certainly not people like you, and you are still wrong.

My, aren't we cranky today.

EDIT: fixed a misleading quote.

 

[Castanova]

I can see where Xi is coming from. I think the point is that Xi is unlikely to purchase more than one month of OnLive after experiencing the latency, bugs, etc etc.

 

[Xi]

I can see where Xi is coming from. I think the point is that Xi is unlikely to purchase more than one month of OnLive after experiencing the latency, bugs, etc etc.

Haha, well that's an option if the service turns out to be worthless. It's really a win/win.

Also, as to the WoW analogy. It's exactly what Onlive is doing. What you wrote is exactly the business model. The difference is that Onlive will sell more than one game, but they all cost $15 to play.

 

[MetalCraze]

It's exactly what Onlive is doing.

Guys Blizzard is rendering graphics and sound in WoW for me!!!

 

[Overweight Manatee]

There has to be some catch. Either there'll be a "one-time registration fee" that you pay every time you reactivate the service, or a "cancellation fee", or just a "minimum duration" for the contract (say one year). There's no way they'd let people get on for one month then be able to cancel whenever they want.

I don't see any reason why not. They don't lose anything by someone canceling, the person canceling just loses every game they bought. Onlive makes more money the less time you play, since buying a $60 game is the equivilent of 4 months spent. They will fucking love people who try it out and dump it after the first week due to shitty-ness, its like handing them free money.

 

[Xi]

It's exactly what Onlive is doing.

Guys Blizzard is rendering graphics and sound in WoW for me!!!

You're talking about the technical model, I was talking about the business model. If you read one more sentence, that would have been clear. Contextually challenged?

 

[MetalCraze]

No how about not forgetting that OnLive can't be anything other but 1 server per user, not 1 server per 1000 users and $15 to play is clearly a bullshit.

 

[treave]

In OnLive, the ability to stream games in compressed video format is a service you can get no other way, and obviously if you WANT to stream games in compressed video format then paying for OnLive IS sensible.

There are people who want to be able to do that and I'm not going to tell them it's a very fucking stupid concept. It's understandable. When your internet connection outstrips your computer's capabilities, obviously you want to maximize what you have, and Youtube Gaming is the perfect way to achieve that.

 

[Thor Kaufman]

The idea per se seems ok, actually. A platform for very casual gamers that only play a game once every few months or so.

The problem is financing, though. As already said the whole infrastructure to make the whole shit run smoothly (if that's even technically possible that is) probably far outweighs the meager 15 bucks a month per customer. Looks to me like those ideas where 1+1=more than 2, be it realty, dotcom bubbles, unlimited growth and what not.

It's one of things you don't even have to understand, it just works, only a genius could understand it. Maybe it runs on Vault OS.

 

[Sceptic]

I don't see any reason why not. They don't lose anything by someone canceling, the person canceling just loses every game they bought. Onlive makes more money the less time you play, since buying a $60 game is the equivilent of 4 months spent. They will fucking love people who try it out and dump it after the first week due to shitty-ness, its like handing them free money.

Fuck you're right I didn't think of this. So if someone registers and buys say 2 games during that one month, he's already spent $135 (I'll go with $60 a game). Then he cancels and loses his games. Two months later he wants to play the same games again, he pays another $135...

If enough people go in just the first month they stand to make a fortune. Especially if Skyway's right and their whole infrastructure is a cheap joke that cost them little money.

 

[Kraszu]

Fuck you're right I didn't think of this. So if someone registers and buys say 2 games during that one month, he's already spent $135 (I'll go with $60 a game). Then he cancels and loses his games. Two months later he wants to play the same games again, he pays another $135...

I doubt that you would have to re-buy your games. I guess that they would be on hold when your subscription is canceled.

 

[Silellak]

Fuck you're right I didn't think of this. So if someone registers and buys say 2 games during that one month, he's already spent $135 (I'll go with $60 a game). Then he cancels and loses his games. Two months later he wants to play the same games again, he pays another $135...

I doubt that you would have to re-buy your games. I guess that they would be on hold when your subscription is canceled.

Yeah. At least until they announce 6-12 months down the road that due to space restrictions and other made-up technical bullshit, they'll have to "remove" purchased games from accounts after X months of inactivity.

 

[GarfunkeL]

The difference is that Onlive will sell more than one game, but they all cost $15 to play.

THEY HAVE THEMSELVES SAID THAT THAT'S ONLY THE COST FOR THE SERVICE AND YOU HAVE TO BUY THE GAMES SEPARATELY

for fucks sake!

It's whatever your PC costs + possible registration fee (we have heard nada about) + 15$ a month for xboxlive-analogue + buy every game separately.

You can replace your PC with their modem/controller/box-thingy when those come to markets "in near future" but which you have to buy separately too.

That's the business model. And they can't count on people not playing, at least not much - they have to take into account that everyone who bought Dragons Age: Origins, might want to play it at the same time.

Then on their tech side you have magic virtual machine technology processing magic video technology streaming on magic router technology, none of which has been publicized but we're expected to believe, especially since they will have five (5) datacenters in the whole UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

It's going to be awesomely horrific but as pointed out earlier, people are so fucking stupid that they will wheelbarrow money to onLive. Just check the comments on any site reporting about this - the retards can't get over each other in their hurry to get ass raped.

 

[Melcar]

When this turns out to be a massive scam of some sort, remember me to point and laugh at Xi. I may forget.

 

[Silellak]

When this turns out to be a massive scam of some sort, remember me to point and laugh at Xi. I may forget.

Just because this particular implementation of the technology turned out to be a sham, doesn't mean the concept behind the technology isn't sound in and of itself. This - or something very much like it - will be real in 5-10 years, mark my words.

 

[fizzelopeguss]

You can take that 180 dollars a year and spend it on a GPU or cpu upgrade, this is ridiculously bad deal. If the publishers dictate the prices of games then i guarantee you they'll be priced at RRP, you thought Steam EU was a rip off or 360 games on demand? lol

When this turns out to be a massive scam of some sort, remember me to point and laugh at Xi. I may forget.

Hell, people bought "beta access" to the phantom.

 

[DraQ]

Fuck OnLive, fuck DRM, fuck the industry. Honestly, I don't think people should be allowed to sell art for profit. Capitalism is pretty damn good for most stuff but it skull fucks any creative field until there's nothing left but a bunch of retarded consumers drooling onto their own protruding guts.

 

[Gragt]

OnLive is like a furry convention without any fursuit.