First impressions of OnLive

[Bill_Loguidice]

I did a casual unboxing video if anyone is interested in seeing what you get with the OnLive console: http://www.armchairarcade.com/neo/node/3711

[hiphopcr]

Dang Bill, you think you got enough video games over there lol?!

Are you doing the $10 a month deal? If I was a non-videogaming parent with kids who were clamoring for a system, I would definitely go the Micro Console route, it's sooooo much cheaper.

Although, if I were a non-videogaming parent I'd never have heard of OnLive... they need some commercials!

[Flare]

OnLive wouldn't work for me. My gaming time is so sporadic I would hate to have to pay a monthly installment and only play it a few times per month. It would make me crazy.

[Bill_Loguidice]

Are you doing the $10 a month deal? If I was a non-videogaming parent with kids who were clamoring for a system, I would definitely go the Micro Console route, it's sooooo much cheaper.

Yes, I will likely do the $10 month a deal when it goes into effect on January 15th. I do not consider this a suitable primary console under any circumstances and certainly not something for kids given the relatively limited selection. It is a good option for those who want to add high end PC gaming to the mix, but don't want to invest in a dedicated system. Heck, this works just fine on any old system from even the XP era, but if you have a good HDTV, you may as well invest the $99 in the console.

Honestly if the barrier to entry wasn't so low on this, I wouldn't have bothered, but the timing with the holidays (getting the console and the powerline networking solution as gifts) and the low cost makes it a no brainer for someone like me. Though their early experimentation with pricing and logistics was off base, I give them all the credit in the world for rectifying that quickly and being so aggressive.

I honestly still wonder about the potential audience for this service though, let alone the console itself. I'm certainly not the type of customer they need to be targeting and I don't know if that type of customer really exists...

[Bill_Loguidice]

OnLive wouldn't work for me. My gaming time is so sporadic I would hate to have to pay a monthly installment and only play it a few times per month. It would make me crazy.

That's how I feel about paid MMO's. I don't want appointment/obligation gaming. I can barely touch what I have between all the new and old stuff (I know, boo hoo for me). I figure though that for a rotating selection of monthly games I can spend the ~$120 per year for the service, which will allow me to experience games in a non-demo setting without having to actually buy any. So for that I consider it a good value, much like Netflix, where even if we don't get a lot of use out of it in a particular week or even month, it's still nice that it's there when we want it (naturally there's a limit to how many of these services I'll actually support - heck, I'll have OnLive, PSN premium, Xbox Live Gold, Netflix, etc., in 2011, and it's starting to add up!). I'll still naturally own what I want to actually own boxed (like Civ V and Starcraft II, which I purposely bought boxed).

[Flare]

So what are the minimum bandwidth requirements in order to play OnLive games? I mean, so the game looks just as good as it would running on a maxed-out PC at 1920X1080 resolution with the highest quality settings.

As I understand it, OnLive is supposed to replace that type of computer gaming experience right?

[Bill_Loguidice]

So what are the minimum bandwidth requirements in order to play OnLive games? I mean, so the game looks just as good as it would running on a maxed-out PC at 1920X1080 resolution with the highest quality settings.

As I understand it, OnLive is supposed to replace that type of computer gaming experience right?

Others here can speak to that. I've only thus far tried it on a wireless N network and the experience was not a good one (I hope to try it on a wired connection soon, and I hope to try the OnLive console itself around December 25th). It's definitely not yet there for wireless, so I highly recommend you try it with a wired connection. It's free until January 15th, so you may as well give it a try on your PC if you're interested. The client is pretty light weight. And yes, it's supposed to be the equivalent of a maxed out PC, though it does the Netflix thing of degrading the visuals when the connection is not up to snuff. In the case of Mafia II, I'd be curious if "maxed out PC" means the full physics-enhanced version. I'm sure there are many variables to "maxed out" and it could just means details and resolution rather than other enhancements. Not sure, though.

[Nectar]

As I understand it, OnLive is supposed to replace that type of computer gaming experience right?

It's for people who can't afford that experience. Regardless of how much bandwidth you have or how crisp the video that is being streamed, it will never beat graphics rendered natively by hardware. The tech will only get interesting when its used to play games on super-advanced hardware that few can afford.

[Bill_Loguidice]

It's for people who can't afford that experience. Regardless of how much bandwidth you have or how crisp the video that is being streamed, it will never beat graphics rendered natively by hardware. The tech will only get interesting when its used to play games on super-advanced hardware that few can afford.

Well, there are two issues that the OnLive service and/or OnLive service and console address. One is certainly one of cost like you say. It's not cheap or necessarily simple to keep your PC at the state of the gaming art. The other is the fact that even if you have an ideal system, it may not always work properly, be buggy, have DRM that doesn't like something about your system, etc., in short all of the negatives associated with PC gaming. So this essentially makes the PC gaming experience as close to the plug and play ("it just works") console experience as possible. Naturally that has its own set of downsides, not the least of which is that you lose out on what makes the PC platform most interesting, the ability to mod, enhance and expand software.