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Why Game Streaming Will Finally Work
Services like OnLive have tried and failed. Stadia and xCloud should succeed.
The future of gaming won’t require a powerful console sitting under your TV. In fact, it’s boxless, wireless, and streaming from a magic server, miles and miles away.
At least that’s the vision spun up by some of the world’s most important companies. Google is preparing to launch its Stadia streaming gaming platform later this year, Microsoft has xCloud, Ubisoft’s got UPlay+, and so on. The race is on to become the dominant cloud console — but it’s actually a race that started quite some time ago.
A service called OnLive offered streaming games back in 2012 that connected players to a virtual desktop running on a remote server. The company lasted a few years and came to offer a dedicated device for connecting to its service, but it eventually folded because of lack of customer interest. OnLive was only ever available in a few markets, and it had data centers installed directly in the heart of those cities.
There is also Sony’s PlayStation Now service, which launched in 2014 and allows gamers to stream an array of titles to their console or PC. Nvidia’s GeForce Now is another, though it’s still in beta.
