6 ms·

>> so far unfinished cloud gaming app. As a gamer, few things would turn me away from a potential purchase more than the phrase "cloud gaming app". It sounds

>> so far unfinished cloud gaming app. As a gamer, few things would turn me away from a potential purchase more than the phrase "cloud gaming app". It sounds like DRM-infected bloatware ready to kick me from a server the moment my connection even hiccups. Only "cloud gaming app, now by Microsoft" could be worse.

WorldMaker 3y ago
xCloud (Microsoft's) and Geforce Now (nVidia's) both allegedly have large player bases. The "neat" thing about xCloud is that you can try it for free under most Game Pass subscriptions. I think that is actually where "cloud gaming" currently excels, as a faster/better/glorified replacement for the old "Demo" games and modes. (Try a Game Pass game for a bit without downloading it, on a day where you expect few connection hiccups, to see if it is worth the hour or so wait while it downloads.) I think that is also part of why xCloud probably does have large MAU numbers. I've tried to see if xCloud is also useful on my mobile devices for on-the-go gaming, but the connection issues have mostly tanked that for me. (I do know people using it to play games on the Steam Deck that the Steam Deck doesn't as well support; but they generally play at home on home connections even if they prefer the "mobile-like" form factor of the Deck.) But yeah, the argument is that the audience for "cloud gaming" is incredibly limited (needs a strong internet connection, doesn't want to invest in up-to-date gaming hardware, or wants stranger form factors) and always will be, which is why it is fascinating that Microsoft got so much flak from the UK commissioners about controlling the current "cloud gaming" marketplace: Microsoft seems to be the most successful mostly just because it is an incredibly limited audience with few gamers interested. Most everyone else who has tried to enter the market, including Google, has failed to find players. (nVidia seems the next most successful and even they admit it is a niche side-project for them. They've been partly so successful by how much money they haven't spent and how cheap they've managed to run it so far, comparatively to the investments of their peers and bigger companies like Amazon and Google.)
- tonyhart7 3y ago
  that actually make a good reason to use cloud gaming honestly, trying game for 2-3 hours before downloading 100gb for it and not to make refund if you buy themselves is pretty neat
- vel0city 3y ago
  > needs a strong internet connection I've used Xbox Cloud Gaming on a cheap $300 Walmart laptop all over my home on WiFi, several different cafe/bar WiFi networks, and several places tethered to my phone without any real playability concerns. I might not recommend it if you're playing some kind of twitch shooter kind of game, but I've played a lot of Forza, Starfield, Gotham Knights, and Ghost Recon Wildlands on it.
  - didibus 3y ago
    You must not be sensitive to lag or low latencies. Some players have no issue playing a 30fps games with dips into the 10s for example. Others do. For me, it's just simply not up to the quality I can enjoy the game at.
    - vel0city 3y ago
      I am pretty sensitive to it. It never dropped into low framerates. Sometimes I'd get a quick blast of compression noise but not often. It's not 4K 120FPS, but on a 1080p laptop the quality was fine. Maybe unacceptable when playing on a 70" TV, but a 14" laptop or a 1920x1200 27" screen it's fine. Not as nice as natively rendered, but way nicer than what that $300 laptop could have done on its own! It never dropped into the 30s, I consider framerates like that unplayable.
      - danielbln 3y ago
        Compression artifacts, spotty connections etc. all of those can be issues with remote gaming. What is never an issue is framerate or graphical fidelity (minus video compression artifacts), which makes sense, considering you tend to have a nice machine remotely that plays your game (e.g. a 4080 on GeForce Now).
        vel0city 3y ago
        One thing I noticed was loading times on Starfield were even faster than on my desktop with an NVMe drive.
vel0city 3y ago
It all depends on what you're looking for in your gaming. I rarely replay old games. I'm often on the go, and don't really want to spend the money on a high end gaming rig nor a console at home. So from my non-gaming laptop I can hop on Xbox Cloud Gaming and play recent games in high quality pretty much anywhere. I've been able to play on cafe wifi, tethered to my phone, on wifi around the house, loads of places. And after finding the subscription on a sale its cheaper than buying even two new games a year. If you're the kind of gamer who does love having a collection of old games you go back to, then yeah its pretty terrible.
- ryandrake 3y ago
  Definitely depends on how you approach gaming. To me, gaming is something you have dedicated gear for, set aside dedicated time for, sit down somewhere comfortable, remove all distractions, turn down the lights, and so on, like watching a movie. The idea of playing a game "on the go" is as ridiculous to me as watching a movie "on the go" (or, really doing anything on the go--when I'm going somewhere, that's what I'm doing, I'm not doing something else). To others, I guess picking up a casual game in a cafe might be interesting... Maybe they're a great target market for Cloud Gaming, I dunno. I sure am not!
kbenson 3y ago
Honestly, there's a bunch of games where cloud gaming could really help the cheating problem. The issue with it is that if you're a ways away from the cloud servers it puts you at more of a disadvantage. Then again, for a lot of these games you currently get some level of advantage for throwing a lot of money at your system so you can run with better settings at a faster framerate, so maybe it's not so much less fair as differently fair. Having your competitive game reduced to pure input output doesn't solve cheating (especially in an age of image recognition and trained AI/ML), but it does even the playing field a lot.
CobrastanJorji 3y ago
On the contrary, I'm quite happy about "cloud gaming app" because all the DRM-infected software stays remote. I get a web browser or whatever, and they pipe video to me and pipe input back up. Really lightweight on my side, less room for insane anti-cheat whatevers. Now, the connection issues, the online-only requirements, the resolution, the lag, etc, these things are less good. But I really like the software part.
tnel77 3y ago
Laying in bed while playing my game on the cloud is real neat. Call it whatever you’d like, I love it!
mcpackieh 3y ago
HN is the only place on the net where I've ever seen people defending the premise of cloud gaming and it's usually (not always) people saying something like "Well I don't game much myself but cloud gaming sounds compelling..." I think this is why tech companies keep trying to implement cloud gaming and it keeps flopping with consumers. Tech industry people who aren't much of gamers themselves think there is some large untapped market of people who aren't gamers right now but could become gamers if the barrier to entry were lowered. In theory that logic makes sense but in practice that market just doesn't materialize. The barrier to entry for gaming is already quite low, it's a very cheap hobby and almost everybody who really wants to play games has already found a way to do so without cloud gaming.
- vel0city 3y ago
  I do game a good bit, and I like cloud gaming. I find myself away from my gaming desktop often, which makes cloud gaming pretty enticing. And overall it's currently incredibly cheap, a good value.
  - danielbln 3y ago
    Same, and I enjoy having maxed out graphics on a large screen while my MacBook stays at ambient temperature, instead of having a noisy space heater howling under my desk.
  - mcpackieh 3y ago
    I get this use case, but I don't think it's very common. Most gamers are near their gaming hardware most of the time. Gamers who travel often usually have some mobile gaming hardware already. The number of people who would game but can't because they travel often and aren't satisfied with existing mobile gaming hardware is minimal. Not zero, but not a huge untapped market either. Personally, I game almost exclusively on a laptop (even at home.) Suppose I was unsatisfied with gaming on a laptop because only the most powerful gaming PC with graphics turned all the way up will satisfy me... would cloud gaming really be an enticing answer to somebody with such high standards? Sure the 'cloud' server could max out the graphics settings, but latency and compression would probably ruin the experience for somebody with such high standards. Now maybe my issue with laptop gaming isn't the fidelity but instead the hassle of traveling with a laptop. The convenience margin between traveling with a laptop vs an ipad isn't zero, but it's pretty small. I think this is the niche cloud gaming fits into. So cloud gaming is for people who travel often and light, who don't care about fidelity/latency but do care about saving ~1kg of weight in their carry-on bag.

WorldMaker 3y ago

xCloud (Microsoft's) and Geforce Now (nVidia's) both allegedly have large player bases. The "neat" thing about xCloud is that you can try it for free under most Game Pass subscriptions. I think that is actually where "cloud gaming" currently excels, as a faster/better/glorified replacement for the old "Demo" games and modes. (Try a Game Pass game for a bit without downloading it, on a day where you expect few connection hiccups, to see if it is worth the hour or so wait while it downloads.) I think that is also part of why xCloud probably does have large MAU numbers. I've tried to see if xCloud is also useful on my mobile devices for on-the-go gaming, but the connection issues have mostly tanked that for me. (I do know people using it to play games on the Steam Deck that the Steam Deck doesn't as well support; but they generally play at home on home connections even if they prefer the "mobile-like" form factor of the Deck.) But yeah, the argument is that the audience for "cloud gaming" is incredibly limited (needs a strong internet connection, doesn't want to invest in up-to-date gaming hardware, or wants stranger form factors) and always will be, which is why it is fascinating that Microsoft got so much flak from the UK commissioners about controlling the current "cloud gaming" marketplace: Microsoft seems to be the most successful mostly just because it is an incredibly limited audience with few gamers interested. Most everyone else who has tried to enter the market, including Google, has failed to find players. (nVidia seems the next most successful and even they admit it is a niche side-project for them. They've been partly so successful by how much money they haven't spent and how cheap they've managed to run it so far, comparatively to the investments of their peers and bigger companies like Amazon and Google.)

tonyhart7 3y ago
that actually make a good reason to use cloud gaming honestly, trying game for 2-3 hours before downloading 100gb for it and not to make refund if you buy themselves is pretty neat
vel0city 3y ago
> needs a strong internet connection I've used Xbox Cloud Gaming on a cheap $300 Walmart laptop all over my home on WiFi, several different cafe/bar WiFi networks, and several places tethered to my phone without any real playability concerns. I might not recommend it if you're playing some kind of twitch shooter kind of game, but I've played a lot of Forza, Starfield, Gotham Knights, and Ghost Recon Wildlands on it.
- didibus 3y ago
  You must not be sensitive to lag or low latencies. Some players have no issue playing a 30fps games with dips into the 10s for example. Others do. For me, it's just simply not up to the quality I can enjoy the game at.
  - vel0city 3y ago
    I am pretty sensitive to it. It never dropped into low framerates. Sometimes I'd get a quick blast of compression noise but not often. It's not 4K 120FPS, but on a 1080p laptop the quality was fine. Maybe unacceptable when playing on a 70" TV, but a 14" laptop or a 1920x1200 27" screen it's fine. Not as nice as natively rendered, but way nicer than what that $300 laptop could have done on its own! It never dropped into the 30s, I consider framerates like that unplayable.
    - danielbln 3y ago
      Compression artifacts, spotty connections etc. all of those can be issues with remote gaming. What is never an issue is framerate or graphical fidelity (minus video compression artifacts), which makes sense, considering you tend to have a nice machine remotely that plays your game (e.g. a 4080 on GeForce Now).
      - vel0city 3y ago
        One thing I noticed was loading times on Starfield were even faster than on my desktop with an NVMe drive.

vel0city 3y ago

It all depends on what you're looking for in your gaming. I rarely replay old games. I'm often on the go, and don't really want to spend the money on a high end gaming rig nor a console at home. So from my non-gaming laptop I can hop on Xbox Cloud Gaming and play recent games in high quality pretty much anywhere. I've been able to play on cafe wifi, tethered to my phone, on wifi around the house, loads of places. And after finding the subscription on a sale its cheaper than buying even two new games a year. If you're the kind of gamer who does love having a collection of old games you go back to, then yeah its pretty terrible.

ryandrake 3y ago
Definitely depends on how you approach gaming. To me, gaming is something you have dedicated gear for, set aside dedicated time for, sit down somewhere comfortable, remove all distractions, turn down the lights, and so on, like watching a movie. The idea of playing a game "on the go" is as ridiculous to me as watching a movie "on the go" (or, really doing anything on the go--when I'm going somewhere, that's what I'm doing, I'm not doing something else). To others, I guess picking up a casual game in a cafe might be interesting... Maybe they're a great target market for Cloud Gaming, I dunno. I sure am not!

kbenson 3y ago

Honestly, there's a bunch of games where cloud gaming could really help the cheating problem. The issue with it is that if you're a ways away from the cloud servers it puts you at more of a disadvantage. Then again, for a lot of these games you currently get some level of advantage for throwing a lot of money at your system so you can run with better settings at a faster framerate, so maybe it's not so much less fair as differently fair. Having your competitive game reduced to pure input output doesn't solve cheating (especially in an age of image recognition and trained AI/ML), but it does even the playing field a lot.

CobrastanJorji 3y ago

On the contrary, I'm quite happy about "cloud gaming app" because all the DRM-infected software stays remote. I get a web browser or whatever, and they pipe video to me and pipe input back up. Really lightweight on my side, less room for insane anti-cheat whatevers. Now, the connection issues, the online-only requirements, the resolution, the lag, etc, these things are less good. But I really like the software part.

tnel77 3y ago

Laying in bed while playing my game on the cloud is real neat. Call it whatever you’d like, I love it!

mcpackieh 3y ago

HN is the only place on the net where I've ever seen people defending the premise of cloud gaming and it's usually (not always) people saying something like "Well I don't game much myself but cloud gaming sounds compelling..." I think this is why tech companies keep trying to implement cloud gaming and it keeps flopping with consumers. Tech industry people who aren't much of gamers themselves think there is some large untapped market of people who aren't gamers right now but could become gamers if the barrier to entry were lowered. In theory that logic makes sense but in practice that market just doesn't materialize. The barrier to entry for gaming is already quite low, it's a very cheap hobby and almost everybody who really wants to play games has already found a way to do so without cloud gaming.

vel0city 3y ago
I do game a good bit, and I like cloud gaming. I find myself away from my gaming desktop often, which makes cloud gaming pretty enticing. And overall it's currently incredibly cheap, a good value.
- danielbln 3y ago
  Same, and I enjoy having maxed out graphics on a large screen while my MacBook stays at ambient temperature, instead of having a noisy space heater howling under my desk.
- mcpackieh 3y ago
  I get this use case, but I don't think it's very common. Most gamers are near their gaming hardware most of the time. Gamers who travel often usually have some mobile gaming hardware already. The number of people who would game but can't because they travel often and aren't satisfied with existing mobile gaming hardware is minimal. Not zero, but not a huge untapped market either. Personally, I game almost exclusively on a laptop (even at home.) Suppose I was unsatisfied with gaming on a laptop because only the most powerful gaming PC with graphics turned all the way up will satisfy me... would cloud gaming really be an enticing answer to somebody with such high standards? Sure the 'cloud' server could max out the graphics settings, but latency and compression would probably ruin the experience for somebody with such high standards. Now maybe my issue with laptop gaming isn't the fidelity but instead the hassle of traveling with a laptop. The convenience margin between traveling with a laptop vs an ipad isn't zero, but it's pretty small. I think this is the niche cloud gaming fits into. So cloud gaming is for people who travel often and light, who don't care about fidelity/latency but do care about saving ~1kg of weight in their carry-on bag.