Clouded vision: what Sony will do with Gaikai

VG247: Rob Fahey makes sense of Sony’s Gaikai buy. Streaming is only part of PlayStation’s future, but it’s going to be a vital one which leverages an enviable back catalogue across multiple devices. Question is, who’s going to buy OnLive?

[RAM-35]

Clouded vision: what Sony will do with Gaikai?

use it?

[GribbleGrunger]

lol. I've been talking about this on another forum and the only feedback I get is: 'the internet isn't fast enough yet'. It's almost as if they don't understand that Sony just bought Gaikai for that very reason.

'let's buy Gaikai!'
'It won't work!'
'Buy it anyway.'

[ChronoJoe]

Well it's true. Gaigai's application is limited and there's no physical way it can provide a better experience than playing the game locally simply because data transfer isn't virtually instantaneous as it is across your your motherboard on a PS3.

There are some games that cloud gaming can simply never benefit from. Like SSFIV for instance, are games like this to be left behind? or will Gaikai's application be very limited and selective?

I doubt I'll end up using it anyway. Cloud distribution is nice for movies, services... etc, the stuff that doesn't demand an instantaneous response, but for games when local games are always going to be better I'll stick to buying my games to play locally.

The application I see is for people who can't afford the hardware to run these games locally... with cloud gaming for instance, PS4 games could even be playable on PS3s. That'd amp up the potential distribution of their next consoles launch games, if everyone with a PS3 could already play them. After all you have to remember they don't usually make much money selling their hardware.

[Amazingmrbrock]

I could almost see sony morphing gaikai to allow video and music streaming as well. They've been trying to push their music unlimited thing for some time now but without much success.

They will definitely keep it doing games but since they also sit on a massive publishing catalog of music and movies its almost silly to not put those out streaming as well.

[BattleAxe]

Its possible that the next service that Sony will buy is Netflix. This was a rumor that was started about a year ago.

[MaxXAttaxX]

.

[princejb134]

people gotta stop saying the internet isn't fast enough
are you sony?
are you a game developer?
do you do networking?

if you answered no to all of these, let sony do their thing, they know what their doing
if they believe they can pull it off they probably can

thank you

[SilentNegotiator]

Sony has lost it. They just sunk $380M into technology that isn't ready when they're losing more and more every year.

Furthermore, Onlive proved that people don't want to pay for server use....same game prices minus expensive server costs and the customer gets less quality (compressed video, less response)....not exactly a very sound business model.

[ChronoJoe]

Yes but in what way? Replace retail releases with cloud ones? alternative method of distribution? means of supporting an otherwise incompatible back catalog?

[sllshrm]

I don't think they'll deviate from Game Demos for now

[ATi_Elite]

Gaikai is a good service and works better than onlive. With advancements in technology Gaikai will improve.

Onlive uses different Tech and it sucks! End of story!

Sony could use Gaikai to stream all it's Old games, music, and movies! This should make SOny some well needed ca$h!

also this could help the PS4 be cheaper by not worrying about backwards compatibility. This is a good move by Sony as Sony's video game division is pretty profitable.

The Tsunami, Earthquake, Radiation, and Riot in England really put a hurting on Sony's cash flow along with the recession and dismal sales of TV's!

Sony's Picture division should be profitable this year. Last year they spent Billions making movies that will release this Summer!

Spiderman, Resident Evil, Total Recall, and Skyfall will all get my money! (well maybe not Spiderman)!

[ElitaStorm]

maybe not Spiderman?

are you kiding? Do you know how many kids wanna see spiderman?

we Will see about that tomorrow.

[joab777]

How will Jack Trenton mesh with Perry. One is truthful and the other wants to tell you that gaikai will be the greatest gaming device in history, able to stream pc Battlefield graphics on the ps3 tomorrow. It'll b fun to watch but maybe Sony's purchase is an insight in to their next Gen perspective. It will be interesting to c exactly what they will do with a pc browser streaming game company. At least they are out in front of something. It's good news. I wanted them to team up with valve, but it's too much to ask.

[chukamachine]

Cut it up, put it in a sandwich and feed me.

[ApocalypseShadow]

if gamers have been watching closely,KEN KUTARAGI(yes,that guy!) has been working on cloud based computing up into December 2011.that's six months ago.the questions you have to ask yourselves is

what was he working on that was so "totally cool" that dealt with cloud computing?
http://www.google.com/url?s...

was gakai a better alternative or a grab at patents?

sony has so much content from movies,tv shows,music and games,that they would have an advantage over others.apple,microsoft,etc,don 't OWN content like sony.they just deliver content to you at a PRICE by making deals.which includes sony.

but what if sony delivered that content exclusively to every device that's capable?

not saying i like cloud,but it is convenient.netflix,amazon,hulu ,pandora,etc are convenient.if sony makes it easy for you to get it,and puts it everywhere,the money will rake in.it's why microsoft is gunning to create it's own offering of content on xbox.they know sony is working on it.it's why they LEAKED that document.stop you from thinking about last of us and beyond...or just sony in general.as halo 4 has created no hype.

but as we already know,sony will still offer bluray for those that don't have great internet.but for sony,it's easy money,no piracy and cheap hardware as ps3,ps vita are capable of doing it just like ps4.and every other capable device.if gakai can work in a web browser,it will work on anything.and with nvidia's grid.....

things just got INTERESTING.....

[GribbleGrunger]

truly exciting times ahead! yes, people keep talking in terms of absolutes. they want to assume it's a 'replacement' so they can shoe horn in their claims of slow internet connections.

but the truth is that people with good internet connections will use it and those without a good connection or no connection at all will still buy the retail copy.

[LOL_WUT]

@ Gribble +1

Thanks for making things more clearer. I was under the impression that Sony would go the streaming route only, but if they have both then it's a big win.

[JBSleek]

I wonder what Sony will do with this. Do they have the ecosystem for this to be a success, I don't really follow Sony closely anymore.

If executed well this could be game changing in a sense but a hardware company pulling off a software driven ecosystem is going to be rocky.

I use Onlive on my Mac and it works fine so peoples fear on log and other concerns should be somewhat smoove if you have broadband internet.

Also, does Microsoft buy Onlive now? Hmmm this is going to be good.

[NewsForSnowflakes]

I don't think Microsoft will acquire Onlive as it's 'gaming' related.

[JBSleek]

What does that even mean?

[stage88]

@JBSleek Are you new to gaming?

[NewsForSnowflakes]

When we said we wanted 'Cloud' on PS3 we meant a FFVII remake.

But this is close enough.

[TheColbertinator]

Hah!

[TheObserver]

Haha! Very Punny.

[XabiDaChosenOne]

Things just got interesting...

[Tzuno]

Clouded vision: what Sony will do with Gaikai? Shove it??? Suddenly the vision become more and more clear.

[OC_MurphysLaw]

Gaikai seems like it should help provide Sony a better delivery system for their online games and demo's pretty quickly and be part of a near future firmware update for PSN. I would strongly doubt Gaikai will continue to be Gaikai on the PS3 & PSN...nor will it be a seperate app to launch. I would venture Gaikai will be built into the back end for PSN for delivering their games.

You also have to wonder how much red tape might be involved for them... or if games that are currently available to Gaikai.com (see Alan Wake) would be excluded from the PSN.

This to me is exciting stuff... I wish Sony had been able to ink the deal in time to announce it at E3 as that truly would have been the big buzz.

[WeaseL]

No need to waste money devoloping a PS4 then

[Straightupbeastly]

Sonys vision has been clouded for a while now. I hope they can figure things out because if I had to guess, next console gen their consumer base will be cut in half the way things are right now.

[DontBanMeBro]

Question: why does everyone think they're smarter than the people actually making these deals? If they wanted your help they will ask for it. Till then, just keep giving them money. I gladly will

[NIRVANArazor]

I wonder if the cloud based product was the thing on the back of Kaz hirai's PS3? O_o

[garos82]

great and well thought out article. one thing for sure is it will be interesting to see if sony manages to succesfully implement this to enhance rather than take over what we have grown to love over the last 15 years..

[smashcrashbash]

Everything Sony does in the modern gamers' eyes is bad.They act as if Sony didn't even consider what they were going to do with Gaikai BEFORE they brought it. To the ignorant they figure that Sony just said we have 380 million dollars in a drawer lets do something with it. Go out and buy me Gaikai. Why? Because I feel like it /s. We have no idea what Sony is going to do with it or how effective it will be but once again people jump on the 'Sony is doomed' train without a single thought.People who write articles and write on message board always seem to think they are smarter then a multi-billion dollar company. They would have always done something different even thought they don't even know the basics of business or how complex it is.

People just yell 'I would have made it cheaper' or 'I wouldn't have brought or done this' as if it would have been your decision only and everything situation would be always be adequate, cost effective and perfect conditions. I still can hear the voices of people yelling 'Bluray is crap. Who would want Bluray and all the space on it. It will fail and no one will buy it'. If gaming was left to any of you we would probably still have a joystick with one button because gamers would claim 'Who would want to use a controller with eight buttons, a cross pad and two joysticks? That would be too confusing and no one would buy it'

[majiebeast]

I just tested Gaikai with the demos on www.Gaikai.com 100% quality connection and absolutely no lag on both witcher 2 and Crysis 2 very demanding games settings were on high and im using 80mbp cable connection so i think sony knows exactly what they are doing.

[chukamachine]

Just tested nfs the run, and witcher 2 myself. Hardly any lag at all. pretty quick loading. But graphics were nowhere near my pc.

I think this tech will go far. And SONY will make it better/.

[asmith2306]

Yeah I'm gonna try out the demos when I get homw from work. I tried OnLive and was underwhelmed to say the least.

[THC CELL]

Unlimited what they can Do. I love physical media but cloud is the future

[BitbyDeath]

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