Discussion The dangers of cloud gaming that no one seems to realize

[igor_kavinski]

If cloud gaming takes off AND becomes prevalent, it will put gamers at the mercy of cloud service providers. Internet issue? Go take a hike, dude. You ain't gaming till the network's fixed. Also, since there is no downloadable game, you can forget about being able to play the game you loved 20-30 years ago on a cloud service since there won't be any ROM/disc image and hence no emulator to relive your childhood memories. Hopefully, this romance between the cloud and gaming will be short lived as Steam would have introduced it years ago if the idea held water.

 

[Stuka87]

Well, I don't think anybody is forgetting this. MANY reviews and articles mention these very things.

Also not sure I would say there is any romance with it. Sure, big companies want it to take off. But lack luster usage suggest actual gamers are not interested.

 

[Stg-Flame]

This is pretty well-known but in all honesty, there's not much that we can do about how investors decide to funnel their money. I've always seen cloud services as a niche fad that will eventually die out just as CDs have. Everyone is just trying to find the next big thing that will make everything more convenient for everyone and at this moment, that's cloud services. Once someone figures out the next more convenient thing, that'll be where our media will head.

 

[quikah]

You could say the same about digital only distribution model. Valve could pull your Steam licenses tomorrow and you would be SOL.

 

[Stuka87]

You could say the same about digital only distribution model. Valve could pull your Steam licenses tomorrow and you would be SOL.

There have been a lot of talks about this over the years. And there would be many legal hurdles if they tried doing that.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

There have been a lot of talks about this over the years. And there would be many legal hurdles if they tried doing that.

Plus Steam is worth Faaaaaarrrrrrrr too much money to just close shop and disappear.

Back on topic, I believe everyone knows this distribution model is risky. Particularly with Google because they dump so many projects.
Appears what people were saying years ago about it is true. The added latency simply sucks for most games and there appears to be no way around it because travel times are a physical reality.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Investors seem to like it because it appears to be a nice solution to piracy. Maybe putting game assets on gamer's storage drives and running the executable off the cloud or even just offloading a few critical functions to the cloud might solve the latency issue. AI upsampling could be another way to boost the polygon counts of low res 3D models received quickly over the net. The holy grail of this strategy would be if there was some universal game engine that would receive code from the cloud and render everything in milliseconds. In 20 years maybe? By the way, the universal world engine was what John Carmack wanted to do before others at ID vetoed his idea. This was before Doom 3 if I recall correctly.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Investors seem to like it because it appears to be a nice solution to piracy. Maybe putting game assets on gamer's storage drives and running the executable off the cloud or even just offloading a few critical functions to the cloud might solve the latency issue. AI upsampling could be another way to boost the polygon counts of low res 3D models received quickly over the net. The holy grail of this strategy would be if there was some universal game engine that would receive code from the cloud and render everything in milliseconds. In 20 years maybe? By the way, the universal world engine was what John Carmack wanted to do before others at ID vetoed his idea. This was before Doom 3 if I recall correctly.

Nah, investors like it because it is recurring revenue. They get paid monthly effectively forever.
Any big business prefers recurring revenue vs windfall one time big revenue. Having reliable monthly income is far easier to budget.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Nah, investors like it because it is recurring revenue. They get paid monthly effectively forever.

Makes sense. Except unlike other media like books, music, movies etc., games are interactive and their interactive aspect is lost if someone tries to save the stream. So maybe they figure, "Hey! We couldn't keep these other media from spilling out into the world for everyone to enjoy freely. With cloud based streamable games, we finally have the perfect uncopiable medium to lock away behind a paywall!" Absolute nightmare for game preservationists.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Makes sense. Except unlike other media like books, music, movies etc., games are interactive and their interactive aspect is lost if someone tries to save the stream. So maybe they figure, "Hey! We couldn't keep these other media from spilling out into the world for everyone to enjoy freely. With cloud based streamable games, we finally have the perfect uncopiable medium to lock away behind a paywall!" Absolute nightmare for game preservationists.

Sort of think of it like this, nearly every company or person willing to invest in something would rather get $10 per month forever vs $120 once per year.
Net result is the same but monthly payments make paying your over head easier, typically it is easier on your taxes (in the US) and looks better to a bank when you need a loan to expand your business.

 

[Borealis7]

latency

not a problem for turn based games (i.e. 4X, Civ, some RPGs), puzzles/quests/hidden object games, hearthstone...just not for twitch reflex shooters and action games.
but those tend to be less demanding (hardware-wise), so that kinda beats the purpose of thin-clients...not having to invest in cutting edge hardware.

 

[aigomorla]

You could say the same about digital only distribution model. Valve could pull your Steam licenses tomorrow and you would be SOL.

I think gabe said should it ever happen, steam would allow you do download your library and they would remove the DRM's.

The real issue is if you get permaban'd on the service subscription and not individual games where they lock out steam for you.
I think then steam has to either refund your entire library purchase, or face a lawsuit (especially in EU) on epic levels.

 

[KentState]

My biggest fear is that cloud gaming will basically turn everything into a shell of a game and start offering massive amounts of paid additional content. Not only will you not own anything, but you will be paying for additional content on top of what you don't own.

 

[aigomorla]

My biggest fear is that cloud gaming will basically turn everything into a shell of a game and start offering massive amounts of paid additional content. Not only will you not own anything, but you will be paying for additional content on top of what you don't own.

lol look at maplestory 2.... game didn't even last a year, and i know of people who spent like 500 dollars to unlock prime real estate to setup a guild house.

 

[BFG10K]

The dangers of cloud gaming that no one seems to realize.

If only there was a thread right in this very forum already discussing this topic at length...

The anti-DRM thread

Fallout 76 not on Steam Just what we need, yet another garbage “service” to add to Steam/Uplay/Origin/Rockstar/Battle.net/Denuvo/Windows store/etc. Some people say this is competition with Steam but it isn’t. This is simply fracturing the gaming market and tying the pieces to different silos...

forums.anandtech.com

I think gabe said should it ever happen, steam would allow you do download your library and they would remove the DRM's.

Not gonna happen, ever. In the entire history of companies closing down, not a single one has ever released patches to freely allow their products to be used, nor have they continued to host data for millions of users at their own cost.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Meh the speculation of “what happens if steam goes out of business” is just that. Fun to speculate about but will never happen within the foreseeable future. Steam has a ton of cash, has a ton of assets in its customer reach and would simply never just close up because reasons.....
I believe steam is valued north of 4 BILLION. If crap became that serious they’d get a loan or sell to Microsoft or whomever. This fantasy scenario is the more interesting talking point. What happens *if* Gabe sells or dies or whatever.
The prospect of steam just shutting down and locking its doors AND locking you out of your games is less than zero.

 

[Borealis7]

Trump could ban them because...he's Trump.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Trump could ban them because...he's Trump.

Take it to P&N

 

[TheELF]

If cloud gaming takes off AND becomes prevalent, it will put gamers at the mercy of cloud service providers. Internet issue? Go take a hike, dude. You ain't gaming till the network's fixed.

Yeah and playing video games in general puts you to the mercy of the power company.Black out? Go take a hike, dude. You ain't gaming till the network's fixed.Lets stop gaming and go back to board games, they can't take those away from us.

I get it, going all digital is scary enough and going cloud only would be even more so but that's how it's going to be.
You can't watch a black & white movie in the theater with accompanying piano anymore and in the future you won't be able to play most online games anymore, it might be sad but that's the only way to go.Filling our landfills with plastic garbage has to stop at some point.

But lack luster usage suggest actual gamers are not interested.

Because the technology is just not there yet, as the internet infrastructure improves so will the adoption of the cloud.

Instead of having to wait for hours for a game to download and then maybe even more hours for it to update just to play it for 10 minutes you will be able to just connect and play right away.For Moms and Dads that don't care and just want to have fun for a few minutes it will be perfect.

And I'm a guy who still has nintendo and master system cartridges.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Yeah and playing video games in general puts you to the mercy of the power company.Black out? Go take a hike, dude. You ain't gaming till the network's fixed.Lets stop gaming and go back to board games, they can't take those away from us.

I get it, going all digital is scary enough and going cloud only would be even more so but that's how it's going to be.
You can't watch a black & white movie in the theater with accompanying piano anymore and in the future you won't be able to play most online games anymore, it might be sad but that's the only way to go.Filling our landfills with plastic garbage has to stop at some point.

Because the technology is just not there yet, as the internet infrastructure improves so will the adoption of the cloud.

Instead of having to wait for hours for a game to download and then maybe even more hours for it to update just to play it for 10 minutes you will be able to just connect and play right away.For Moms and Dads that don't care and just want to have fun for a few minutes it will be perfect.

And I'm a guy who still has nintendo and master system cartridges.

I agree with much of what you said but I have to point out.
Assuming the internet infrastructure gets built out enough to have super bandwidth and low latency, wouldn’t regular consumers have a connection that allows downloads and patch to take less than hours?

They way I see it is engineers missed their target audience. They want people who regularly play games. These typically a shooter players. These games are the worst on a streaming network.
I already know the sales engineers were like “it only adds a little lag” or “most people can’t perceive a difference between 30fps and 60fps” or “people don’t like buying new machines”
Guess what all that is incorrect with people who regularly play shooters.

 

[Stuka87]

Instead of having to wait for hours for a game to download and then maybe even more hours for it to update just to play it for 10 minutes you will be able to just connect and play right away.For Moms and Dads that don't care and just want to have fun for a few minutes it will be perfect.

And I'm a guy who still has nintendo and master system cartridges.

If you have to wait hours for a game to download, you most likely lack the bandwidth to play games from the cloud anyway. Cloud gaming is *NOT* for people with limited bandwidth. So the 'have to download game' argument just doesn't apply.

 

[igor_kavinski]

A couple of points to consider:

1) All of Steam's principal team members work in the same place.

2) Once a year, they fly out together to some vacation point to unwind.

Is it so inconceivable that all of the core Steam team dies at once, for whatever reason, including natural disaster, terrorist attack, angry gamer suicide bomber, plane disappearing into thin air etc.?

Unless Steam addresses this point in their FAQ or someplace else on their website and lays out their backup plan for such a contingency, it is a possibility. The Universe, it seems, has a sense of humor and irony in such matters.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

A couple of points to consider:

1) All of Steam's principal team members work in the same place.

2) Once a year, they fly out together to some vacation point to unwind.

Is it so inconceivable that all of the core Steam team dies at once, for whatever reason, including natural disaster, terrorist attack, angry gamer suicide bomber, plane disappearing into thin air etc.?

Unless Steam addresses this point in their FAQ or someplace else on their website and lays out their backup plan for such a contingency, it is a possibility. The Universe, it seems, has a sense of humor and irony in such matters.

Steam appears to use an unconventional and IMO utterly dysfunctional management model it appears to work for them. I am very sure there is some kind of succession model. Yes I am sure it would be a chaotic quarter but I am 100% confident steam would continue to function.
Also I am pretty sure there is another co-founder guy who I am sure could handle a disaster or at minimum bring someone in who could handle a disaster.

 

[aigomorla]

Trump could ban them because...he's Trump.

Nah he would make a great virtual firewall, and have Gabe pay for it. lol...

Take it to P&N

I don't really think its political and more sarcasm... but if it offends you and other people, then i will moderate these type of posts more seriously as its definitely a gray line.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Nah he would make a great virtual firewall, and have Gabe pay for it. lol...



I don't really think its political and more sarcasm... but if it offends you and other people, then i will moderate these type of posts more seriously as its definitely a gray line.

nah, I found it as good humor but I have seen this stuff go off the rails rapidly.