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Article: CLOUD GAMING CANNOT BE ALLOWED TO REPLACE LOCAL GAMING!!!

svbarnard

Banned
https://www.keengamer.com/articles/...ng-cannot-be-allowed-to-replace-local-gaming/

INPUT LAG
"Cloud gaming suffers notoriously from input lag. There is no getting around it. The very nature of cloud gaming requires that your input from your controller, which has input lag of its own, go through the vast network of the internet, tell a server playing your game what to do which could be hundreds of miles away, and then send that visual information back to your TV within a fraction of a second. Honestly, that technology is able to do this at all is fascinating. However, the ability to do something at all is not the ability to do something well.

The results do vary, latency for all cloud based gaming seems to be determined by a number of different factors. Internet speed, location relative to server, wireless connection vs. hardwired connection, and even the game itself all play a part in the time that it takes for your eyes to see what your fingers have commanded. It can be as low as 75 milliseconds to as high as 300 milliseconds. Regardless, hardware gaming will always be faster than cloud gaming."

In my own opinion, I don't think cloud gaming will ever replace local gaming especially when you consider the fact that consoles/PCs will always get more powerful over time (there will be a PS6 and a PS7 and so on and so forth). And also cloud gaming will always suffer from more input lag than local gaming, due to this fact alone I would rather just stick to local gaming.

THE LAST THING A GAMER WANTS IS MORE INPUT LAG WHICH IS WHAT CLOUD GAMING BRINGS TO THE TABLE!!! So my fellow gamers say no to the future of cloud gaming and say yes to the future of local gaming.
 

01011001

Banned
input lag and zero access to game files are the 2 main things that makes cloud gaming just an awful idea.
as long as it only is used as an alternative it's totally fine, but should it ever actually take over, that would mean archiving games will become impossible and developers/publishers can simply take their games out of existence at any point
 

svbarnard

Banned
I don't think it can ever replace local gaming but it may have its use cases. I personally have only used it a handful of times.
Cloud gaming will never replace local gaming because of the increased latency, the last thing a gamer wants is increased latency. Plus, local gaming will continue to get more powerful over time (there will be a PS6 and a PS7 and a PS8 and so on and so forth).

And cloud gaming will always suffer from more latency than local gaming. A gamer wants less latency not more. Therefore local gaming is the future.
 

RoboFu

One of the green rats
Input lag will Disappear with time as internet and technology advances.

But also I don’t see streaming working the same in the far future as it does now. At some point hardware will be advanced enough that even the smallest chip will produce graphics far beyond what budget, time, and skill can produce. All you will Need to stream is the data itself.
 

svbarnard

Banned
Input lag will Disappear with time as internet and technology advances.

But also I don’t see streaming working the same in the far future as it does now. At some point hardware will be advanced enough that even the smallest chip will produce graphics far beyond what budget, time, and skill can produce. All you will Need to stream is the data itself.
Yes I agree with you, if we look 20 or 30 years in the future computer chip technology will be a thousand times more powerful than it is today, in which case even the smallest chip will be powerful enough to display graphics that would look a thousand times better than what we have today. But why stream the data is my question, why not just keep the data locally on a hard drive?
 

svbarnard

Banned
Your console has a lot of input lag. Mind blown, I know.
I don't think you understand that the internet adds to the input lag!!!! Did you know that even TVs have input lag? Your TV has input lag of its own that has to be included in the equation, a game controller has input lag. So sending something through the internet to a server to be processed and then sending it back through the internet to ultimately end up on your TV (keep in mind TVs have input lag of their own, I know that my cheap TCL TV has 40ms of input lag, and that's in gaming mode) is a whole extra layer of input lag and this is what cloud gaming brings to the table.
 
I don't think you understand that the internet adds to the input lag!!!! Did you know that even TVs have input lag? Your TV has input lag of its own that has to be included in the equation, a game controller has input lag. So sending something through the internet to a server to be processed and then sending it back through the internet to ultimately end up on your TV (keep in mind TVs have input lag of their own, I know that my cheap TCL TV has 40ms of input lag, and that's in gaming mode) is a whole extra layer of input lag and this is what cloud gaming brings to the table.
Did you know that PC cloud gaming often beats native consoles when it comes to latency? There was even a thread on GAF about this. Now Microsoft is working on having similar latency on Xbox cloud.
 

Mr Reasonable

Completely Unreasonable
I've used it a couple of times, unpopular opinion but for some games it works just fine.

The natural continuation of this point would be to say for online FPS, etc. You need local. However, those online games are, I believe, doing plenty of things that make up for various different lag conditions. The game isn't taking place in as precise a way as you think it is.

I expect that with time streaming will get better at working out how to mask those problems, just as online games have. Couple that with Internet connections getting better, potential other ways of rendering visuals, as noted above and frankly, I think it's game over for local hardware eventually.

Edit: laugh if you like, but I just don't see a long term future for video game hardware when the cost of living keeps going up and services can all be built into a TV app. Look what happened to music, TV and movies. Same thing is coming for games. Sure hardcore movie fans want the 4k blu Ray. Most people aren't bothered and will use the app on their TV instead of buying a dedicated piece of hardware to play discs.
 
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Three

Member
Did you know that PC cloud gaming often beats native consoles when it comes to latency? There was even a thread on GAF about this. Now Microsoft is working on having similar latency on Xbox cloud.
Where do you read this nonsense. Xcloud uses console blades and its latency is shite even compared to other cloud services.

Outriders Latency at 60Hz (ms)Native PCNative Xbox Series XGeForce Now PC AppGeForce Now ShieldxCloud Xbox Series XStadia Chrome Browser
Average49.3107.9103.0107.8172.4141.8
 

ZehDon

Member
As others have said, Input Latency and Game Ownership are the core issues. Input latency will get better, and as it does, the adoption of cloud streaming will improve. This leads to the second issue: you don't own, have access to, or interact with the thing you pay money for. When Google closes Stadia down, and everyone loses the full priced games they bought, that issue will come home to roost.
 
xCloud is the one I have available and image quality is what really bothers me, way more than latency. I like cloud as an alternative to buying hardware not as a replacement for it.

Edit: laugh if you like, but I just don't see a long term future for video game hardware when the costs keep going up and it can all be built into a TV app. Look what happened to music, TV and movies. Same thing is coming for games. Sure hardcore movie fans want the 4k blu Ray. Most people aren't bothered and will use the app on their TV instead of buying a dedicated piece of hardware to play discs.
How is console hardware cost going up? Certainly not for the player.

Also your own argument that most people aren't bothered about quality is what will keep them playing on mobile instead of using the cloud to play traditional games. It's a lot more simple and hassle free to just play on a console than to worry about all the problems that comes will gaming streaming for the people that actually like these games.
 
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zero access to game files are the 2 main things that makes cloud gaming just an awful idea.
Just like home consoles allow access to the game files...Right? Right??:messenger_tears_of_joy:

And even now input lag is relatively unnoticeable. It is already good enough for a lot of locations so it will be fine. Convenience will win.

rather than the lack of ownership and preservation?
Does that many people even care bout ownership or preservation? Convenience will always win and inability to play Daggerfall from the disk right now without dealing with Dosbox or whatever does not matter for a lot of consumers.

So many luddites on the forums :messenger_tears_of_joy: (no machine can replace human hands!!) But convenience will win - just like physical dying on PC, it will die on consoles too and everything else will be won by more convenient technology.
 
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Does that many people even care bout ownership or preservation? Convenience will always win and inability to play Daggerfall from the disk right now without dealing with Dosbox or whatever does not matter for a lot of consumers.

So many luddites on the forums :messenger_tears_of_joy: (no machine can replace human hands!!) But convenience will win - just like physical dying on PC, it will die on consoles too and everything else will be won by more convenient technology.
No, I agree, convenience will win out. But on a core gaming forum I think the focus should be on the issue of ownership rather than on tech problem which will go away with time.
 

Filben

Member
It's already bad enough that the big companies seemingly want you to pay monthly or annual for playing and accessing games (e.g. Nintendo which have some DLC and retro games only available for subscribers and not for purchase; Sony for their classics now; at least one game on mobile only available via Netflix Gaming and not for purchase). Cloud gaming, if not as an alternative, is even worse.

I don't want to be at mercy of my internet connection, their servers and their decisions of graphics, settings, availability, etc.
 

ParaSeoul

Member
Did you know that PC cloud gaming often beats native consoles when it comes to latency? There was even a thread on GAF about this. Now Microsoft is working on having similar latency on Xbox cloud.
sexy the walking dead GIF
 

reksveks

Member
It's a good thing that it won't. At least not completely but honestly I cant see myself downloading P5R if I am playing it on a device the size of a steamdeck.
 

Ozriel

M$FT
As others have said, Input Latency and Game Ownership are the core issues. Input latency will get better, and as it does, the adoption of cloud streaming will improve. This leads to the second issue: you don't own, have access to, or interact with the thing you pay money for. When Google closes Stadia down, and everyone loses the full priced games they bought, that issue will come home to roost.

Cloud streaming as a tech should not be conflated with whatever licensing terms you dislike. Some cloud streaming services allow you play games you already own.
With GeForce Now, you play your own library. So unless your argument is that Steam harms ownership too…
 

Sakura

Member
I played through the Halo series via the cloud and it was shit. I had to put it on easy because of the input lag. Not to mention the image quality was trash. And what happens if say the "PS7" for example was 100% cloud based? Do we really trust that the company would be able to provide excellent quality, uninterrupted access to 100 million gamers? MMOs can't even have solid launches (some with issues still months after release), and those are individual games. Every time a big game comes out will we be waiting in a queue to play the game we paid for?

Even if those issues didn't exist, I don't really agree with handing over the keys for everything to MS, Sony, whomever. I don't trust them to not nickel and dime us to hell and beyond for the "services", especially as time goes on.
And what happens if we want to play a game that game out say 20 years ago? What if one of the companies folds? What if they just decide to shut down servers? I can still hook up a 30 year old SNES and play whatever I want, but I don't trust that to be the case with cloud based gaming.
 
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01011001

Banned
Just like home consoles allow access to the game files...Right? Right??:messenger_tears_of_joy:

yes they allow that... I can literally copy all the data from an Xbox game from my Series X.

the PS5 also has been jailbroken and you can now get those files.

not to mention the data on retail versions of games

And even now input lag is relatively unnoticeable. It is already good enough for a lot of locations so it will be fine. Convenience will win.

relatively unnoticeable to casual plebs with low standards yeah. also stutters in the video stream will always be an issue due to the nature of the low latency priority of the stream as the video stream can not buffer ahead and therefore any missed transfer will result in hitching.

cloud streaming is dogshit and will forever stay dogshit 🤷
 

64bitmodels

Reverse groomer.
I don't think cloud gaming will replace local..... on PC

On consoles, yeah local will eventually be going away. The simple fact is that the majority who play on console do not care about input lag, preservation, or access to game files. They just want their fucking 2k.
PC gamers are too hardcore and competitive to just let control of their games and hardware fall away like that.
 
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VN1X

Banned
Cloud gaming could literally save every multiplayer game with regards to anti-cheat. However can't imagine that technology is able to keep up with competitive games any time soon where you're dealing with the tiniest of margins of input lag.

Would be amazing to one day play a first person shooter that you know for a fact has zero cheaters.
 
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