Roll your own GRID?

So I watched the intro of the NVIDIA GRID and I felt myself thinking "You know, I'd probably play more games if I was able to stream them to what I actually carry around with me everyday". At the moment I buy a game on Steam for it to lie idle in my Library. I've barely scratched the surface of Skyrim for example (Which is why I remain resolutely untempted by Steam sales, since I know I won't be playing whatever I buy for possibly years) and only finished GTA IV like last year.

I can post on forums to my hearts content since even if I'm moving around I always have access to the PC I use to browse 'personal amusement' sites (yes, I use totally separate, 'sacrificial' machines for this purpose) and websites can be remote desktop'ed with minimal bandwidth. Not so easy with PC gaming obviously, and I almost never lug a laptop with a GPU capable of gaming around on a regular basis.

I don't have to be able to game over mobile, but say when I'm in a hotel room or over airport wifi... might be nice. And the key tech in GRID would appear to be the end-user streaming.

When the GRID becomes able to buy, I'm actually quite tempted to install one for personal use so I can basically put my gaming PC in the cloud, and put all the older games I want to play on it plus stuff from Steam. But has anyone else attempted this personally, and what did you opt for?

 

I tried the Witcher 2 demo on the Gaikai streaming service back before Sony purchased that company, and I was surprised at how well the service worked.

The game ran better on Gaikai for me compared with my own version installed on my laptop. Witcher 2 is kind of an extreme example, but I can imagine these streaming game servers will become pretty popular. It seems Sony will integrate Gaikai into the PS4.

 

As much as I think this will be real good for some people, I'm having a couple of HELL NO moments here.

For one, I'd rather spend a few thousand dollars for a top-end gaming machine, and know that I can use it, lag-free, anytime, anywhere, without depending on 'the cloud'.
Second is, this tech is going to move consumers further into a DRM-fest.
Third is, I have extreme doubts as to the reliability of this technology, since you'll basically be endpoint-dependent.

Having your own GRID over a decent wi-fi in your own home, ran by your own server may be a really cool application, but the way they seem to be pushing this technology, it's clearly supposed to be a supercomputer-ran cloud, not available for consumer implementation, just consumption.

Besides, I lose connection to the net, have lagspikes, use a ton of bandwidth... I honestly can't see where on the planet you'd have to be to make sure your internet is reliable enough to use this service consistently.

 

Of course it's better to own your own games and it's great if you can afford a PC that can handle the most demanding games, but this is a little closer to Netflix I suppose.

You will be able to pay a monthly subscription fee and play a number of games rendered on remote server. The target market would be people who have fast internet connection and laptop or tablet that is not very powerful.

 

I'm just worried that developers like Blizzard/Ubisoft, etc. will move into even more DRM. Basically I want to avoid a future where almost everything new is offerred on the cloud only
I just know that the same mainstream consumers that now complain about PC's being outdated and extol the virtues of console gaming, will then claim how having your own computer is outdated and all you need is a cloud-pc.
Hell, I can see how having one's own brain will be outdated in a few generations. Just gimme 'dat chip brah.

...

Ok, too orwellian-off-topic there, but still, this is not a trend that pleases me

 

Hate to say it but you're right. I can't blame companies for catering to the masses, but they also need to continue to cater to their niche groups who are usually early adopters and help fund the kickoff of their larger projects. I will be quite disappointed if Cloud-PC becomes a reality. I guess I am fine from a regular use web browsing standpoint, but beyond that, I don't want to relinquish control of my hardware and performance options. We'll all just be relegated to Cloud consoles with same performance as everyone else.

 

Exactly It's the reason why, even though I have a PS3, i prefer to play my PS3 games on PC whenever they have ports. Let's be honest, Cloud gaming won't allow us to choose higher detail settings, huge Antialias, etc. unless you pay extra for the feature. If I want to game at 2560x1440 ultra-settings MSAAx16, no cloud gaming platform will offer me that, ever.

And another thing: The moment cloud gaming becomes a 'thing', developers will start making games to the spec limits offered by the cloud provider. Limits on ram usage, cpu usage, number of triangles rendered, etc.
Now there's plenty of games that are absolutely great despite technical limitations. In fact, that's how the gaming industry started. Unfortunately, these days those limitations seem to encourage developers to be lazy rather than creative.

 

...which is why I mentioned rolling your own GRID, i.e. use the same streaming tech on games you own, be it via Steam of by discs (I guess we'd have to make use of no-disc matches in that scenario).

 

So no options, huh?

 

Have you watched this presentation video? If GRID rolls out in the next couple years, there won't be any need to upgrade your laptop for next gen games.

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Exactly. The question, which I might have repeated several times now is

a) Whether you can buy an 'end user GRID' to install your own games on
b) Failing that, whether you can roll your own using disparate software if you have the infrastructure for a private cloud already.

 

I imagine these servers are going to be primarily used by huge publishers and sales platforms like Valve, EA, and since Jen-Hsun Huang specifically pointed out that you can run the service on a current Xbox, I wouldn't be surprised if Microsoft makes use of this technology or something very similar in an effort to avoid losing market share by making it possible for that huge installed base of current gen console owners and 45 million XBoxLive subscribers to run next gen games. Sony is likely planning something similar following its acquisition of Gaikai.

Doesn't really seem to be intended for home servers, since it sort of eliminates the need to keep any games installed on your local PC.

 

Home setups - I don't think anyone is expecting it to be a practical proposition. I'm not exactly a 'home-grade' user. So e.g. would seriously look at if I could buy a ready-to-go GRID setup scaled for 1-3 users to slap into a colocated rack at say <$20K.

 

So the next thing we've got left is beyond human capable internet speeds

 

I don't see that there would be much of a market there. Not many people would be inclined to spend that much for a home system, especially when you could buy three individual computers for much less. Even for huge Internet cafes in Asia I imagine it would likely work out cheaper to simply provide access to a service.

Nvidia will make money on this not so much from selling / renting the server racks, but primarily from the high margin backend services they will provide their clients, taking a cut of subscription fees, or however the model will work for the end users.

 

Latency is always my concern with this.... I wanted to give OnLive a fair shot and bought a couple games, but it's just not enjoyable... input latency kills the experience in fast paced games I like to play. I was never able to get an enjoyable experience that compared to having my own PC running the game. In theory it's cool to be able to play the latest games on my tablet or phone, but reality isn't there yet. And like others have said I'm torn if I want it to be, ie: I'd love the option for mobility's sake, but not at the cost of the entire industry going that direction and gaming enthusiast PC's being eliminated.

 

I'm on a fast Internet connection, but I was surprised to notice Witcher 2 ran much better on Gaikai, with less lag, compared to the steam version installed on my laptop.

 

I guess it depends on how much latency-non-impacting compression there is in the tech - that's the most important thing in the chain really. And that's what I can't readily seem to get my hands on if I wanted to roll my own GRID.

I'm already starting to, or are in the advanced stages of planning to, lay high-speed (100Mb-200Mb symmetrical) lines at the places I spend time at, so that I can start a transition to a remote app delivery system instead of having to pick a specific machine to do a specific job. Half of my stuff is up in my private cloud anyway, and I'm working to get the rest up there - including all my serious computational horsepower. While that's easy to say, there are a LOT of hurdles in the way. I'd like gaming to follow as well.

A lot of short-sighted 'lowest-common-denominator-consumer' types are dismissing Windows RT for example, but the more I use it, the more I'm kind of seeing it ultimately as the do-it-all mobile OS, especially if I can solve the various hurdles for delivering x86 apps on RT (it's possible right now, but there are technological challenges for fully practical delivery). If I can have my 'heavy lifting' apps delivered remotely and my games as well, technically all I'd need to walk around with for example is a future Surface RT which I can run with dual-or-more touch monitors (and use-appropriate HIDs) at each base for optimal remote app use, but I see remote app usage (if not the most complex games) also within the bounds of e.g. hotel Internet as well. That means that I can dump pretty much every notebook (and desktop, bar 'entertainment' machines such as kitchen PC's) I have.

While that's not good for my notebook geek, it'd make a lot of sense.

 

Driving games are what killed it for me... instant and accurate control input is needed exactly as controlled or else it's a mess. I could see a slower paced Witcher type game fairing better. Of course my only point of reference is Onlive.

 

Gaben seems to think cloud gaming is not going to happen:

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EDIT: however, WSJ reports Sony will incorporate cloud gaming in the PS4