Mind-Bogglin'

So the 2009 Game Developer Conference is underway and right out of the gate there is a pretty big announcement that has already created a lot of buzz. OnLive is a new service in development that is promising streamed games that rely solely on your internet connection, putting games on demand and taking the onus of needing high-end hardware away from the consumer. We're not talking Bejeweled here, but actual Big Deal™ games like Crysis and the new Prince of Persia, streamed from a server to your PC or TV. It sounds like a pretty cool idea, and I would love to be proven wrong when this thing drops, but I can't see how it could possibly work efficiently. The service comes with their state-of-the-art magic box doohicky that claims to use "advanced algorithms" to reduce latency, but even if there's a little lag it wouldn't be standard connection lag like you'd experience playing an online game. Even if they got it down to a ping 30-50ms, since your part in the connection is essentially uploading your input on the controller, that would represent 30-50ms of input lag rather than just connection lag. The input lag on my HDTV isn't too high but very noticeable when playing something that demands precision, like Mega Man 9, and becomes a chore. This service would be perfectly acceptable for turn-based strategy games but I can't imagine anything else, certainly not online shooters, would play too well. Maybe it's just me having a hard time wrapping my head around it being a functional concept, but as I said, it would be great if I were proven wrong.

-K.