6 ms·

Netflix might get into cloud gaming, forms another new game studio

32 points by cpeterso 4y ago

protoster 4y ago
It's actually scary how badly the industry wants cloud gaming to happen. They attempt again and again, even in the face of over a decade of failures that include Google.
- PinkMilkshake 4y ago
  It solves so many problems for them. No piracy, no second-hand sales, no public libraries, no cheating, and perfect player stats. They can take the game away whenever they want, and make you pay for it again in the future.
- bsder 4y ago
  Technical issues didn't doom Stadia. Being part of Google doomed Stadia. Stadia was only going to last as long as the Google promotion cycle.
  - protoster 4y ago
    It's true, not all of the services died due to technical issues.
- pjmlp 4y ago
  GForceNow and XBox Cloud are doing ok, Stadia problems where managemnt related more than anything else, how they forced rewrites, how they don't know how to talk to game devs (ads KPIs instead of game tech), and their whole promotion cycle.
  - sassy_quat 4y ago
    In theory there is no real impediment to largely indistinguishable cloud gaming platforms using edge datacenters. Of course, Microsoft's ecosystem has resulted in depence on battlestations over tablets and laptops for gamers. Programmers depend on non-system libraries largely these days.
thatguy0900 4y ago
Google gave them a large gift by refunding everyone, but even still I can't imagine trust for a new cloud gaming provider being super high. If Google hadn't though, I imagine the concept would be dead in the water outside of offerings like nvideas where it is just normal steam games.
- SnooSux 4y ago
  > I can't imagine trust for a new cloud gaming provider being super high The target audience for Netflix shouldn't know they're playing a cloud game. Netflix is too big to cater to power users, casual gamers are a much much bigger group. I think there's some hope. Netflix has good expertise in streaming infrastructure and if they play to cloud gaming's strength like turn-based games, they have a chance to last longer than Stadia (RIP).
  - thatguy0900 4y ago
    That's a very good point
beams_of_light 4y ago
Let’s say it together, slowly: Cloud gaming… Is not going to take off… Until latency is unnoticeable by users. Even turn-based and other game types that don’t require twitch reactions aren’t going to be enjoyable with input latency that is obvious to the user. I sincerely believe that cloud gaming engines are going to have to be developed, such that the entire video frames aren’t being pulled from the cloud, and peripheral input is a first class citizen on fast networks like PON and 5G.
- dpkirchner 4y ago
  I think it's much more likely that P2P-hosted gaming would succeed, and even that would probably fail. If I could rent out time on my gaming PC or console to my neighbors, they'd be able to play with low enough latency they would probably never notice it. (There's also probably no money in it.)
- robswc 4y ago
  Yep. 100%. Doesn't matter how good the graphics or pricing is, if there's a delay between inputs you've certainly ruled out almost every multiplayer game and most single player games.
- finiteseries 4y ago
  Meanwhile, on a cloud gaming service that has already taken off: A native Xbox Series X test running at 60Hz gets an 85ms average - from a trigger pull to the first flash of gunfire. Xbox is far off a native PC result, which comes in at just 49ms. And the big surprise is that GeForce Now using the PC app beats a local Xbox Series X in latency, coming in at 81.7ms - while a Shield test is comparable to Xbox at 86ms. https://www.eurogamer.net/digitalfoundry-2022-geforce-now-rtx-3080-review-is-cloud-gaming-finally-a-viable-alternative https://www.eurogamer.net/digitalfoundry-2022-geforce-now-rt... It will never cease to amaze me how consistently far behind HN’s user base is on this topic, the average 20 something service worker will watch a movie like Dune on an illegal streaming site through their cracked phone screen in 720p, but we’re actually entertaining the idea non-PC native latency is a requirement for playing video games without spending >$500-$3k. The market for these services is slightly larger and more diverse than the folks currently running 4K@144hz setups.
andrewmcwatters 4y ago
Planimeter founder here. I remember doing back of the napkin calculations on frame time and latency years ago and thinking that the fundamental constraints game developers face could not be overcome. The closest you could get would be to have edge nodes everywhere, and even then, you couldn't do it. That is to say, there is no future in this universe where real-time, predicted gameplay can currently fit within 16ms (60 FPS) let alone 6ms (144 FPS). You blow the budget immediately. Today's implementations lag several frames (overbudget). For myself and other game developers I work with, that's just unacceptable, and I don't know anyone right now who is considering software-level or gameplay-level accommodations for streaming the game over a service. Take an empty game (update nothing, draw nothing) and send black over the wire. You blow the budget. Let's not dice words: cloud gaming is the cloud industry's perpetual motion machine.
- helen___keller 4y ago
  > Take an empty game (update nothing, draw nothing) and send black over the wire. You blow the budget. You say that, but as a user I wouldn’t notice the difference in this game played on cloud versus locally.
  - AustinDev 4y ago
    Speak for yourself. I've tried every iteration of cloud gaming and the frame lag is painfully obvious to me. Maybe it's because I've been gaming on a PC for 28 years.
    - _manifold 4y ago
      This dichotomy of player opinions seems to be present any time I see a discussion about Stadia or cloud gaming. I haven't tried it myself so I don't have a truly informed opinion, but just based on technical factors I'm extremely skeptical. However there does seem to be legitimate portion of the audience that either can't tell or simply doesn't care about frame lag/latency issues. I would guess that group is relatively small though. Also as PC and console hardware continues to improve and 4k+/144hz+ gaming becomes more commonplace, cloud gaming is just going to be left in the dust.
JimmyHoke 4y ago
I have two thoughts on this: 1. This is all about control over users. There won't be mods in the cloud. 2. The lag issue is going to be very hard to solve in the US, where consistently fast internet is not available to a lot of people.
arthurcolle 4y ago
Why don't they buy Stadia?
- rchaud 4y ago
  Their infrastructure may be too dependent on Google Cloud platform services for it to be worthwhile.
somat 4y ago
The company that is actually going to crack cloud gaming, and do so without really trying is valve. they already have all the games, remote play together, steam link. at some point they will offer cloud machines you can rent to run your games.
- MisterSandman 4y ago
  I highly doubt that, the biggest hurdle to solve in cloud gaming is having a widespread network with edge points close to anybody who wants to play cloud games. Valve has nothing even close to that, compared to Google, Amazon or Netflix.
  - somat 4y ago
    You don't think putting out a triple A 80 Gb game on release day needs a robust distribution infrastructure? Yeah yeah, I know, bulk vs low latancy, but it is there. None of the others have compute at the edge. All the compute is in the datacenter, the edge just has distribution.
stuckinhell 4y ago
Does anyone actually want Netflix Games ? I could see Zygna type games doing well with the netflix audience. But if they want the call of duty, fortnight, minecraft audience. I foresee them having a very hard time. At least to me those games were lightning in a bottle. Many clones but few can match their unrivaled success.

32 points by cpeterso 4y ago

It's actually scary how badly the industry wants cloud gaming to happen. They attempt again and again, even in the face of over a decade of failures that include Google.

PinkMilkshake 4y ago
It solves so many problems for them. No piracy, no second-hand sales, no public libraries, no cheating, and perfect player stats. They can take the game away whenever they want, and make you pay for it again in the future.
bsder 4y ago
Technical issues didn't doom Stadia. Being part of Google doomed Stadia. Stadia was only going to last as long as the Google promotion cycle.
- protoster 4y ago
  It's true, not all of the services died due to technical issues.
pjmlp 4y ago
GForceNow and XBox Cloud are doing ok, Stadia problems where managemnt related more than anything else, how they forced rewrites, how they don't know how to talk to game devs (ads KPIs instead of game tech), and their whole promotion cycle.
- sassy_quat 4y ago
  In theory there is no real impediment to largely indistinguishable cloud gaming platforms using edge datacenters. Of course, Microsoft's ecosystem has resulted in depence on battlestations over tablets and laptops for gamers. Programmers depend on non-system libraries largely these days.

thatguy0900 4y ago

Google gave them a large gift by refunding everyone, but even still I can't imagine trust for a new cloud gaming provider being super high. If Google hadn't though, I imagine the concept would be dead in the water outside of offerings like nvideas where it is just normal steam games.

SnooSux 4y ago
> I can't imagine trust for a new cloud gaming provider being super high The target audience for Netflix shouldn't know they're playing a cloud game. Netflix is too big to cater to power users, casual gamers are a much much bigger group. I think there's some hope. Netflix has good expertise in streaming infrastructure and if they play to cloud gaming's strength like turn-based games, they have a chance to last longer than Stadia (RIP).
- thatguy0900 4y ago
  That's a very good point

beams_of_light 4y ago

Let’s say it together, slowly: Cloud gaming… Is not going to take off… Until latency is unnoticeable by users. Even turn-based and other game types that don’t require twitch reactions aren’t going to be enjoyable with input latency that is obvious to the user. I sincerely believe that cloud gaming engines are going to have to be developed, such that the entire video frames aren’t being pulled from the cloud, and peripheral input is a first class citizen on fast networks like PON and 5G.

dpkirchner 4y ago
I think it's much more likely that P2P-hosted gaming would succeed, and even that would probably fail. If I could rent out time on my gaming PC or console to my neighbors, they'd be able to play with low enough latency they would probably never notice it. (There's also probably no money in it.)
robswc 4y ago
Yep. 100%. Doesn't matter how good the graphics or pricing is, if there's a delay between inputs you've certainly ruled out almost every multiplayer game and most single player games.
finiteseries 4y ago
Meanwhile, on a cloud gaming service that has already taken off: A native Xbox Series X test running at 60Hz gets an 85ms average - from a trigger pull to the first flash of gunfire. Xbox is far off a native PC result, which comes in at just 49ms. And the big surprise is that GeForce Now using the PC app beats a local Xbox Series X in latency, coming in at 81.7ms - while a Shield test is comparable to Xbox at 86ms. https://www.eurogamer.net/digitalfoundry-2022-geforce-now-rtx-3080-review-is-cloud-gaming-finally-a-viable-alternative https://www.eurogamer.net/digitalfoundry-2022-geforce-now-rt... It will never cease to amaze me how consistently far behind HN’s user base is on this topic, the average 20 something service worker will watch a movie like Dune on an illegal streaming site through their cracked phone screen in 720p, but we’re actually entertaining the idea non-PC native latency is a requirement for playing video games without spending >$500-$3k. The market for these services is slightly larger and more diverse than the folks currently running 4K@144hz setups.

andrewmcwatters 4y ago

Planimeter founder here. I remember doing back of the napkin calculations on frame time and latency years ago and thinking that the fundamental constraints game developers face could not be overcome. The closest you could get would be to have edge nodes everywhere, and even then, you couldn't do it. That is to say, there is no future in this universe where real-time, predicted gameplay can currently fit within 16ms (60 FPS) let alone 6ms (144 FPS). You blow the budget immediately. Today's implementations lag several frames (overbudget). For myself and other game developers I work with, that's just unacceptable, and I don't know anyone right now who is considering software-level or gameplay-level accommodations for streaming the game over a service. Take an empty game (update nothing, draw nothing) and send black over the wire. You blow the budget. Let's not dice words: cloud gaming is the cloud industry's perpetual motion machine.

helen___keller 4y ago
> Take an empty game (update nothing, draw nothing) and send black over the wire. You blow the budget. You say that, but as a user I wouldn’t notice the difference in this game played on cloud versus locally.
- AustinDev 4y ago
  Speak for yourself. I've tried every iteration of cloud gaming and the frame lag is painfully obvious to me. Maybe it's because I've been gaming on a PC for 28 years.
  - _manifold 4y ago
    This dichotomy of player opinions seems to be present any time I see a discussion about Stadia or cloud gaming. I haven't tried it myself so I don't have a truly informed opinion, but just based on technical factors I'm extremely skeptical. However there does seem to be legitimate portion of the audience that either can't tell or simply doesn't care about frame lag/latency issues. I would guess that group is relatively small though. Also as PC and console hardware continues to improve and 4k+/144hz+ gaming becomes more commonplace, cloud gaming is just going to be left in the dust.

JimmyHoke 4y ago

I have two thoughts on this: 1. This is all about control over users. There won't be mods in the cloud. 2. The lag issue is going to be very hard to solve in the US, where consistently fast internet is not available to a lot of people.

arthurcolle 4y ago

Why don't they buy Stadia?

rchaud 4y ago
Their infrastructure may be too dependent on Google Cloud platform services for it to be worthwhile.

somat 4y ago

The company that is actually going to crack cloud gaming, and do so without really trying is valve. they already have all the games, remote play together, steam link. at some point they will offer cloud machines you can rent to run your games.

MisterSandman 4y ago
I highly doubt that, the biggest hurdle to solve in cloud gaming is having a widespread network with edge points close to anybody who wants to play cloud games. Valve has nothing even close to that, compared to Google, Amazon or Netflix.
- somat 4y ago
  You don't think putting out a triple A 80 Gb game on release day needs a robust distribution infrastructure? Yeah yeah, I know, bulk vs low latancy, but it is there. None of the others have compute at the edge. All the compute is in the datacenter, the edge just has distribution.

stuckinhell 4y ago

Does anyone actually want Netflix Games ? I could see Zygna type games doing well with the netflix audience. But if they want the call of duty, fortnight, minecraft audience. I foresee them having a very hard time. At least to me those games were lightning in a bottle. Many clones but few can match their unrivaled success.