OnLive: 'Do gamers want to pay $500 for a PS4, or get the same games with us?'

VP John Spinale on the future of cloud gaming

[jacen100]

$500? would be nice and cheap, more like £500 here in the uk lol

[decrypt]

Why pay that much for a console, when i could make an open platform like PC for the same money.

[iamnsuperman]

The game situation is interesting. True you can get multiplats on onlive but what about exclusives. Onlive doesn't have exclusives. Exclusives as well as other things sell a system. Can you get uncharted on onlive? No. What about Halo? No. Xbox and playstation are still more attractive for these reasons. They need to think about making exclusives.

[nix]

i play games. thus i buy consoles. games i get on consoles can't be found on PC/Mac. almost every game i've bought this gen has been a PS3 exclusive. so console it is for me.

that's just my pov.

[fastNslowww]

yeah because PC has much more better/exclusive games..right?

enjoy your constant PC issues...and I'll stick to my simple powerful machine that is made primarily for games.

[PotatoClock]

Yes you are right Soap. PC has a crapload of exclusives, and very very good ones too.

Indie games and especially games by Paradox are incredible and addictive as hell. Cheap as anything too. Don't even need a powerful computer to play them.

You should really try actually playing games rather than caring about what platform they are on. As soon as you close yourself off to just one platform you miss out on a lot.

[Ranshak]

@SoapnBubbles

Why is it the only games that can be good according to you are exclusives?

BF3 might be this years most anticipated game, Guess which version will be the best experience?

[jacen100]

my point exactly :) and pc is so so so much more on top of gaming

[sikbeta]

Onlive or PC can't give me the exclusives games that I love, you'll get the same answer from x360 gamers and N gamers...

[Guitardr85]

@soapnbubbles

Just off the top of my head....

Starcraft 2
Shogun Total War
World of Warcraft
King Arthur
Civilization (not societies that sucked cuz consoles got it)
Spore
Sins of a Solar Empire

Just to name a few...
But I guess you still get all of your Halo games...

[MaxXAttaxX]

Multiplatforms only.
I'd be missing out on all the exclusive PlayStation franchises.

Besides, what if OnLive doesn't do well?
The service dies and so would my games along with it. There's little to no sense of ownership.

[Ghoul]

id rather pay 2000 euro then paying a single cent for cloud gaming at this stage of development.

well talk again in 6 + years

[bumnut]

Its true, PS3 for £450 when it launched.

[Apollyn]

Wrong £425
I bought it day one and love it!

Besides retards pay £500 each year for the new iphone so it aint that bad

[Bathyj]

In Australia they were 1000 bucks.

Pretty incredible now when you think about how strong our dollar is now.

[bumnut]

Oh well I was £25 out, thats not even enough to buy a game.

As for retards paying £500 for an iphone, they probably think the same about people paying so much for a PS3.

I don't have an iphone btw

[superrey19]

@bumnut
He is referring to people who buy the new, slightly better iphone year after year at full price. People don't buy a ps3 or 360 every year.

[scofios]

Or get the same games with us??
Uncharted, killzone,resitance,litle big planet,gran turismo,infamose, ratchet,and many more sony ip's,
i really doubt that.

[FlameBaitGod]

@ SoapNBubbles = Someone who doesn't own a PC

[fluffydelusions]

Sorry Onlive but you will never have Playstation exclusives so no I would not want to go with you. The only thing this service will get is PC games which require high bandwidth to be playable...it will not even have 360 exclusives as few as there is.

[MastaMold]

PlayStation Long Live Play 4ever

[princejb134]

online sounds interesting but they don't have all the titles i want at launch
and i don't want to pay no subscription that shit adds up in the long run

[fei-hung]

Its not just about exclusives and having a machine which keeps updating itself hardware and softwarewise. You have to look at the whole package to make a comparison.

Unlike consoles, Onlive will not have any extra functions such as; XBNA, PSN, BD, DVD, HDD and other apps the consoles have.

Most importantly, you can only play onlive as long as you have a decent connection in your home. Now what if your home is like my home where we have 3 phones, 2 netbooks, 2 tablets, apple tv, itouch, 2 ps3's, 1 pc and one mac book pro all connected to the internet, streaming music, videos, file sharing etc etc. How will this affect Onlive's streaming of a video game?

What happens if I am playing Onlive and my brother decides to download a 1.2Gb demo on psn and stream a movie on Hulu whilst my sister video talks to her niece in america?

This is why i rather pay $500 for a console. It can do a lot more than Onlive, it has more functionality and most importantly, I as a gamer can buy games, borrow games from friends, swap them, trade them and buy those sweet collector's editions for my trophy cabinet.

Onlive is designed for gamers who do not care about exclusives and the simplicity of console gaming.

[jetlian]

you would still have all those devices on if its ps3 or onlive funny how you spent so much time on nothing!

[fei-hung]

@jetlian u missed the point. I do not have to be online to play on my PS3 or Xbox, unless I am playing MP and even then, the bulk of the MP data is on the Disk and not all of it needs to be streamed.

Onlive requires your internet connection to be constantly up and steady.

[jetlian]

the same way onlive or ps3. But I will give you the always online still the whole story of everyone in your house online wasn't needed

[theonlylolking]

Onlive has a point but they need to advertise on freddieW, FPSRussia, machinima, etc... youtube channels. They also need to have ads on tv.

[THC CELL]

i would pay a grand for the next ps

[shikamaroooo]

I payed that much when the 60 gig first released in Australia

[Picture_Dancer]

I've payed 2400zł for 60 gig first released in Poland. Minimal working rate is 5zł/h so lets say I had to work 480h so it is 12 working weeks.

People in UK or USA had to pay 600$. Let's say minimal working rate is 8$/h, so you had to work only 75h that is berely 2 weeks!

That's why I hate people from UK or USA complaining that consoles and games are expensive.

Imagine paying 3840$ for PS3 - this is the equivalent price for what we in Poland had to pay.

[bumnut]

In which currency? 'A grand' is a little vague.

[meetajhu]

I had put a ticket to Japan to get my 60gb launch PS3 which also has hardware PS2 compatibility so all games work

[blumatt]

I wouldn't pay a grand. I'm hoping they price the PS4 at $400 for the highest. It would make the launch a little easier.

[FlameBaitGod]

In cuban dollars bumnut

[monkeymagik]

Err, how are we going to get the same games with Onlive when the exclusives for the PS3 will not appear on it.

Seriously there will not be Uncharted 4 with Onlive.

I wish people would think before they stink.

[Optical_Matrix]

I know for a fact, the next Playstation and Xbox 360 will retail for no more than £350. This generation laid the foundations for next generation and PS4/Xbox 720 will be a technical refinement of the PS3/360 rather than a massive leap like it was from the 6th generation.
As such, they'll be cheaper to develop and will won't retail for £425 like the PS3 once did.

OnLive sounds alright but I don't think it has much staying power at all. My opinion? Online gamers WILL pay $400 for PS4 and won't even give OnLive a second glance. You know it. I know it. This thing won't kick off for another gen or so if at all.

There will be no Gears of War, no Halo, no Uncharted, no COD (as of yet), no God of War, no Pokemon, no Mario, no Street Fighter, no Metroid, no Zelda....I need no go any further.

[CynicalVision]

I want a product that offers great exclusive games, Onlive offers no such thing.

[fastNslowww]

well said!

[outwar6010]

some pc games are pretty cool and pc does have quite a few exclusives

[beast242tru]

ill pay the $500 for a ps4 i paid that for my ps3 and have no regrets ps3's are still around $450 here in bahamas anyway

[strickers]

No Sony 1st party on Onlive.

[Ddouble]

This along with some third party games as well.

[Matrix_]

owning the game

or

not owning the game

is the question

And I choose owning the game.

[majiebeast]

Im sorry i didnt know onlive owned naughty dog,santa monica studios,Polyphony digital,suckerpunch,media molecule,ico studios and guerrila games among other. Ohh wait they dont sony does.

[KMCROC]

I want to pay it & am willing to buy both the PS4 & Xbox?. than buy that generic looking gizmo you have .

[gazgriff2k12]

thought onlive wasn't in competition with xbox 360 or ps3 or did i dream up that statement

[bobtheimpaler]

I'd rather spend $1500 for a pc and a ps4 than bother with cloud gaming. On live doesn't have exclusive titles like playstation or xbox. Also, not all countries have good network infrastructure.

[koehler83]

In Canada, I pay quite a bit for decent speed but only 90GB.. Yeah. Just 90GB and that's like almost top tier consumer bandwidth. OnLive would drain that pretty damn quick.

[pucpop]

I am happy with my Amiga 500+

[koehler83]

There's not enough content specifically on PC and far too much content coming specifically from Sony. So 'the same games from us' is BS.

[Dogswithguns]

Consoles and PC for me... OnLive ain't gonna cut it.

[user8397144]

Cam I get God of War games on onlive? I don't think so.

[lukasbolander]

I want to pay 500 for the PS4

[Mr_Luke]

Since my net is crap, i prefer whatever console in my room.
EDIT: tried it on my computer, it tells me that my net is too slow for a good quality video.... ok, i continue with my consoles, they work perfectly online.

[lukasbolander]

And I only have 25 gigabytes of bandwidth per month. So onlive is not an option.

[xX_Altair_Xx]

By next gen MS/Sony will have their own cloud services so Onlive will become irrelevant, especially if it cant offer exclusives. Just look at Origin - EA has BF3 to force it onto gamers.

Also my net is far too slow for cloud/streaming services. It takes hours to download DLC like MW maps.

[Rai]

500$ games are not something i want to stream or download.

[WitWolfy]

No wonder OnLive only does business in 1st world countries seeing that here in a country like mine (South Africa) this would NEVER materialize, seeing we have the world 34th fastest internet in the world... MEANING, our ADSL line speeds are:

256KB
384KB
512KB
4MB
10MB

Where the 10MB might sound the most decent to some. BUT has a 250m/s ping AT LEAST to both international P2P and servers alike.

So I Would LOVE to see OnLive try and convince me as a South African to adopt their package as a substitute for my trusty consoles. When they EVENTUALLY go international.

GOOD LUCK!

[mixelon]

I thought onlive only went up to 720p? I'd be surprised if 1080 isn't standard for the next gen consoles, and obviously the real pc version trounce that too. The only thing I see appeal in with onlive is running relatively high end games on very low end systems. I don't think a little startup like theirs has a hope of becoming the predominant cloud gaming platform either. If it really takes off I doubt they'll be steering things.

[LNDCalling]

1) How much is OnLive per month/year and what does that equate to over a typical console lifecycle?

2) What happens when your network provider happens to be doing maintenance or upgrades in your area and your network is down (as happens with Virgin to me quite often)?

Edit: And of course there is the matter of no physical copies or even electronic ones and the current quality of streaming!

[radphil]

You can really see the anti-PC bias in the early comments.

[smashcrashbash]

Sad attempt by Onlive to pedal their system by tearing into a system that doesn't exist yet. Pathetic.

[turgore]

the question is do you really want to play your games on Youtube like quality ?

[moodgamer]

Yes , i wanna get a PS4 for 500€ whats the problem ? I wanna buy "real" games , wanna have special edition , wanna collect games. Ohh i must have internet to use OnLive ? Not all games are multiplayer. Why do i need OnLive. ( Cool thing i enjoy this evolution , but OL is not for me ) xDD

[palaeomerus]

I like onlive, but the catalog needs to get a LOT better before it is a full console replacement. Right now it's older games, and a few newer games.

[narutogameking]

OnLive won't have Uncharted,Killzone,InFamous,Fi nal Fantasy,Grand Theft Auto, Call of Duty,Resident Evil,Tekken,Street Fighter,Halo,Gears of War,Gran Turismo,Forza....etc...etc

PS4 and Xbox 720 > OnLive

[newn4gguy]

OnLive SUUUUUUUUUCKS!

[TheMutator]

sorry but i dont support digital games!!!

[SRTold]

I would never use this OnLive service, and here is why.

#1. Internet infrastructure sucks ass where I am from, Canada. Using OnLive to play a game would result in INSANE monthly prices from ISP. Most internet companies in Canada have a cap for bandwidth, and not very high speeds, which they still charge way too much for. I only get 90G ever month, and I always come dangerously close to hitting that. That withough OnLive. Netflix is harsh enough on our internets here in Canada.

I pay about $70 / month for 16mbps connection (which it never hits), and that includes 90GB of bandwidth. If you go over, you pay like $2 per GB over your limit.

Now imagine the ammount of bandwidth required to play these games over OnLive.. I can only imagine it must be quite a lot.. Sending 1080p signals over the net with no lag must be astronomical.. I get some lag in games now, and it is not sending video over the net, but just other players movements, etc.. practically nothing. I bet if I did play OnLive as much as I play Xbox and PS3, I would pay $300-400 per month on internet, instead of my already overpriced $70 / month + extra.

#2. I don't know anyone else who has this service, and don't know anyone else willing to get this service.. How can I play with friends? Buy playing Xbox, PC, or PS, that's how.

#3. OnLive is a new, unproven service. Sure, all new systems are unproven at the start, but so far I have yet to see any proof..

#4. What happens if OnLive tanks and goes bankrupt.. I suddenly lose ALL my games, and hundreds to thousands of dollars worth of purchases.

#5. Can't play it at the cottage.. Sure, I don't own a cottage, but if I did, or went camping or something.. I couldn't play because there is no internet connection.

#6. Xbox 360 and PS3 do so many other things than just games. What else does OnLive do?

[archemides518]

considering my internet speed sucks....i'll go with the ps4

also i hate unnecessary compression

[BattleTorn]

OnLive is an very interesting idea. And I like watching what they are trying to do.

But personally I would never convert to stream-gaming.
It put 100% of the operation on Internet. Sometime Internet is down, sometimes it's slow, and most of the time it's shared.
I like having physical copies, or a complete download.

none-the-less I wish the best to OnLine, becuase the more competition, that succeeds, the most likely the PS4/X720 will arrive sooner. (much like my WiiU opinion, I don't 'like' it, but I like what it does to the industry, *it is moving it along)

[BlmThug]

Same games?! more like 1% of the PS4 library

[Shadowaste]

Onlive is trash and right now it is NOTHING compared to a dedicated pc.

Heck, it basically looks as bad as the consoles do, it only supports 720p, sure it has a bit better texture res than the console versions but that is about it.

We do severely need new consoles, they are so far behind pc right now it is unbelievable!

As long as the next playstation and xbox console have MANDATORY 1080p @ 60 frames with 4x anti aliasing always for EVERY GAME, I would pay $600 again for it just like I did for the ps3 at launch back in 2006 when I bought it day one!

If they cheap out and go the wii route and the games are still covered in jaggies and pop-in but higher res, I won't be buying day one for sure!

Heck, I don't xpect the next consoles to be able to do what my pc can, but i want them to be close!

I know they will not support 1200p, 1440p, 1600p like my pc does, I am not expecting that, I know they will not do 16x anti aliasing

I know the graphics will not be as good as the recent gta mods or metro2033 dx11

But They Damn well better do 1080p with 4x AA @60 frames

[achmetha]

How about integrate onlive as an optional feature you can use on the ps4...