Onlive - the Saviour of PC gaming?

Image via CrunchBase

There was a lot that the Onlive service and the fabled Phantom console had in common.  For one - the concept of games direct to devices, and being able to play any game on the market.  Also the almost the insurmountable tech issues that both were facing.

For Phantom, it was the downloading and playing games over 2002’s version of the Internet.  Onlive has to work with the 2010 version of the Internet.  Whereas the Phantom was merely dealing with the lack of bandwidth, Onlive has to compete for bandwidth with the movie streamers and torrents.  So many dismissed Onlive the way we dismissed the Phantom, but it looks that we were wrong, as unlike the Phantom, Onlive has actually delivered a product and is getting reviewed.

From the outset, I haven’t played with the Onlive service as: “Currently, the OnLive Game Service does not allow access to users outside of the contiguous United States.”  So I can only go on the reviews of others.  But I am not too fussed on the how Onlive is performing at this point in time, as much as I care that it exists in the wild at all.  The concept and realisation of a service that allows the gamer to play games cross platform, cross medium, and independent of the intended barriers of entry associated with high PC games, has got to be a dream.  This is what interests me, because where can this type of service take PC, and all gaming?

The Mystery of Gaming

I and many of my age got into tech mainly because of gaming.  It wasn’t until high school that I found Word Processors and Desktop Publishing programs, and found out that there were other reasons to have a PC.  Knowing this of course helped A LOT in my petitioning the parents for a computer for the family, but despite there being other reasons to use a PC, gaming was the only one that had me playing with code and pulling the PC apart to see how it worked.

I wish back then that I could have seen the future of gaming and bought into it.  Because what was then considered as a geeky past time has become so mainstream that it rivals most other entertainment industries, taking around 11.7 billion in 2008, in the US alone.  So how has this geeky past time become such a money spinner?

Many reasons, but a simplistic approach would be the introduction and success of the console and arcades.  The arcades were social places to hang and play games, not at the level of the PC games, but they did have their charm.  Then the consoles brought the arcade games to the home, again not at the level of the PC.  As the market grew though, and the console manufacturers poured money into the newer consoles, the gap closed and somewhere in there the geeky past time became a multi-national past time.  Even though the arguments will rage till the Phantom comes to the shelves, gaming has now became more console-centric and this has paved the way for a service like Onlive.

The biggest install base factor

Which has a bigger install base, the consoles or the PC?    Well of course, the PC wins, even with the Nitendo Wii doing something like 71 million world wide.  And this has always been the argument for why PC gaming will never die.  Most of the counter arguments start with piracy, hardware, piracy, and more piracy, and so the questions remain.  Can developers get enough cash out of this huge install base? Can the culture of piracy be controlled?

Well, on the piracy front the industry has done just about everything.  And yet even the little guys with cheap and open games are suffering.  So what is the answer, how can we keep PC gaming and take advantage of the install base?  Maybe Onlive is the answer.  Access to the latest games, on almost any PC, for a monthly subscription is a good start.  Though at this stage, if you start looking through the fine print, it isn’t going to be as easy as that.

The importance here is that this is only the beginning and, as we have seen with many services/products of late, if it sounds good but doesn't quite fit the bill, just keep an eye on it and check back once it is out of beta.

Jason Remnant

...If it isn’t Broken, just give it a better name.