Regarding the whole "long term rental" concept it's no different than Steam. They're just being outright with it. We all know that if their service dies we lose the game, but they just want to make it clear in case someone out there isn't aware that you don't really own the game. Steam normally tries to hide this by not mentioning it which is probably better for PR.

Quote: Original post by ddn3
In theory this is pirate proof technology (unless the pirates hijack your account which is totally possible). Onlive is selling itself on convenience but it would be better to sell it on the piracy angle. Also since it's acting as a marketplace and hub, it can facilitate micro transactions like how Apple does, another very lucrative revenue stream. Also they could in theory go the all free model with subscriptions paid by advertisers (ie how TV works, and what they are offering now for early subscribers its essentially free). So they have plenty of options and probably enough capital investments to last a few years as bandwidth catches up. If anything they would do better in Asia and Europe since the bandwidth there is usually higher.

-ddn

you can get cable television for free (including pay per view porn) with a hacked box.

Quote: Original post by Sirisian
Regarding the whole "long term rental" concept it's no different than Steam. They're just being outright with it. We all know that if their service dies we lose the game, but they just want to make it clear in case someone out there isn't aware that you don't really own the game. Steam normally tries to hide this by not mentioning it which is probably better for PR.

Except, with Steam I have the assets, and Steam cracks exist. So, if Steam tries to pull that crap, I can protect my investment. Plus, Steam even states that if something happens, a patch will be released to liberate all games. OnLive cannot offer that even if it wanted to.

Quote: Original post by Sirisian
Regarding the whole "long term rental" concept it's no different than Steam. They're just being outright with it. We all know that if their service dies we lose the game, but they just want to make it clear in case someone out there isn't aware that you don't really own the game. Steam normally tries to hide this by not mentioning it which is probably better for PR.

There's a huge difference between not being able to re-download a game, and not being able to play it at all.

Actually there isn't that great a difference. Steam can ban u or if they go out of bushiness you lose all your virtual goods. (I'm pretty sure their terms of service, limits their liability under those cases). You can try to download all those games onto your drive, but the reality is each game is like 10-20 gigs now and most people only keep 1-2 active games on their drive at once and can have literally over 100 games on Steam. I personally stop using Steam along time ago, so things might be different now, but I think you have to be connected to Steam to play any Steam games.

Steam is the transition from traditional to a digital distribution model while Onlive is the full realization of that, where all content and execution, is virtualized into a video stream making it fully digital.

It's a new model and will take a few years to settle out. The technology is more than proven now (ie there are 1000's of people using it now). The biggest hitch is latency (which everyone knew from start), but it's not insolvable, you just need a more servers and a better connection. Once they get enough servers so the average latency is down to 40ms it will be imperceptible to local execution.

-ddn

What frames per second do you get with onlive?
If it is 30fps, just yuck.

I believe there will come a day where everything will run on servers... but that day will not come until fiber optics run over the ENTIRE planet and Internet service is taken for granted.

OnLive runs the game capped at 720p with the graphics settings turned down a bit. That's garbage. I'll stick to my cleanly rendered 1080p with ZERO lag. Oh, and my games still function even when the Internet is down or having a slow day.

Enjoy your OnLive subscription...

Quote: Original post by liquorice
What frames per second do you get with onlive?

I actually had to to look it up since I wasn't paying attention when I played. They're running at 60 fps 1280x720 resolution.

Quote: Original post by TheBuzzSaw
OnLive runs the game capped at 720p with the graphics settings turned down a bit.

For a comparison Halo 3 on the XBox 360 runs at 640p at 30 fps.

Honestly the games look fine. I imagine the people that are complaining might be seeing the dynamic quality changing in response to a poor connection. On a fiber line like I mentioned it's flawless. I bet it would look better on my 720p LCD at home but I only have a 768 kbps connection there. :P

Should be interesting if they do choose the 1080p route. That kind of quality would be amazing. hmm I don't even run my computer's screen at 1080p. I use 1440x900 so yeah gotta take all the "omg 720p sucks" with a grain of salt. Maybe when I get my new laptop I'll drink the kool-aid.

Quote: Original post by ddn3
I personally stop using Steam along time ago, so things might be different now, but I think you have to be connected to Steam to play any Steam games.

That has never been the case for Steam.

Quote: Original post by Sirisian
I actually had to to look it up since I wasn't paying attention when I played. They're running at 60 fps 1280x720 resolution.

Are you sure that's the framerate the game is rendering at, and not just the rate of the video stream? When I played AC2 at E3, it was not holding a steady 30fps (and this was at settings worse than the Xbox 360 version).