OnLive postpones launch to June

OnLive, the platform for playing high-end games in the ‘cloud’, has moved its launch date to June 21st 2010.  At that date, the service starts operating via a browser plug-in for both PC and Mac. The microconsole for playing games on a TV, will be launched later, at a currently unspecified date. Currently, the launch is planned for the US only.

OnLive CEO Steve Perlman announced at the GDC last week that players will subscribe to games for 15$ per month, eliminating the need to acquire both games and hardware. As all processing for the game is done on OnLive’s servers, players only need a very basic computer. As long as it has a mouse and keyboard, a screen and a broad band connection to the Internet, it will do. 

This radically new approach was greeted with much wonder and scepticism when it was announced. The biggest challenge for separating the gaming station and the processing power was to minimise lag: the time difference between giving a command and seeing it executed on the screen. For shooters and action games in general, lag rapidly reduces the experience.

According to Financial Times, game producers have embraced OnLive’s subscription based business model as an alternative to publishing on discs, a channel in which piracy and second hand trade put pressure on income.

15 March 2010