OnLive Service Launched, After E3 Ended

[Atrayo]

Hi Guys,

For those that haven't read my past forum posts speaking about the OnLive site you'll be intrigued to say the least.

It's a portal software service for gamers where games are streamed to you. No matter your platform entry, be it a Windows PC, Mac, or iPad. Where you can be playing on a obsolete PC that has a broadband internet connection to play a AAA game title.

This past Thursday June 17th the "OnLive" service launched about after an hour of E3 closing for this year. For those in the States there's a special offer of having the 1st year of service in terms of a: profile, friends list, video replay, etc... Free of Charge. Due to a corporate sponsorship from AT&T, but this offer will end this coming July 15th. Here is the link to the Founding Member Sign-Up form. This service will also eventually roll out to those in the UK via a deal with British Telecom / BT.

Down below i'm going to link to an article posted on a former beta tester blog site. That was in the beta testing program for "OnLive", please note the article will get technical in some spots and the read is over 20 minutes long.

Link to the article posted yesterday June 18th @ Wolfire.

Hardware is no longer relevant

The main feature seems to be that OnLive removes the user's hardware from the equation. No matter how obsolete your computer may become, you can count on it being able to play the latest AAA title. The implications of this are massive.

Furthermore, OnLive could theoretically publish games that even the latest desktop computers couldn't reasonably play.

OnLive is its own self contained platform

You "port" a PC game to OnLive and it gets sold to OnLive clients. However, the OnLive platform runs on Mac OS X and Windows, and soon, independently on your TV. At E3, OnLive demoed it running on the iPad.

Mac OS X users now get access to a ton of games that they wouldn't have otherwise. If OnLive creates a Linux client, that will be even more dramatic: Linux users who traditionally are lucky to see a AAA title per half decade would suddenly be treated to a buffet of games.

It's very interesting stuff, where i've been following "OnLive" since they were first announced in last year's E3 show.

[Ned]

Great idea. Australians however won't see this working due to our pathetic internet setup.

All OnLive games are currently HD resolution and we recommend a 5 Mbps connection speed or higher.

SOURCE OnLive Technical FAQ

[SJ777]

it is certainly a big conceptual shift in gaming.

[Ashlann]

Seems to be the obvious application of the cloud computing concept to the gaming world - a great idea But, no, it will be a long time before Australia's infrastructure will support this type of ingenuity.