Google Console?

[alorotom]

So I have been out of the loop of gaming for a long long time. I do have a PS3 and a WiiU but they havent been turned on in well over 5yrs now.

I did see a news article yesterday about tomorrows rumoured release of a games console and potentially a Sega tie-up and this has really peaked my interest but struggling to find anything at all on it leaks-wise (which is good I know)

So, you ardent gamers, what are your thoughts, could they be the new disruptor like Sony (and subsequenstly MS) were?

[randlemarcus]

Honestly, I can't see the gap in the market for them, but that's not to say it's not there. MSFT and Sony are all about the horsepower of the console (as are a lot of the gamers) but Microsoft seem to be becoming more about the gameplay, especially around cross-platform gaming. Maybe there's something in the constant launches of streaming consoles, where the big stuff is done in the cloud, and you just get pixels rendered locally, on the Googlebox.

Maybe Microsoft had it right for the XBox One launch (before the Gamers kicked off), and the sweet spot is the console as the digital entertainment hub in the living room.

[Crafty_]

The whole "google console" story revolves around a patent that was filed for a controller, thats all.

I very much doubt that they will release any hardware in the vein of a playstation or xbox, instead they will just run games on whatever kit you have - so pc, phone, tablet, chromebook etc - probably just run in a browser. Games will probably be streamed, so no downloads or physical media.

[alorotom]

Hmmm interesting - I saw their final testing culminating in stream play of assassins creed (I think)

I’m even more intrigued for tomorrow’s announcement now!

[moustachebandit]

Google have moved out of the hardware space, can’t see them making a console. I suspect they intend to do what Steam has now done with the Steam Link. The controller would fit with that theory.

[captain_cynic]

randlemarcus said:

Honestly, I can't see the gap in the market for them, but that's not to say it's not there. MSFT and Sony are all about the horsepower of the console (as are a lot of the gamers) but Microsoft seem to be becoming more about the gameplay, especially around cross-platform gaming.

Because both Sony and Microsoft have been losing money hand over fist trying to make consoles like PC's whilst Nintendo have been making it hand over fist by producing a console that is meant to be a console even with the Wii U being lacklustre.

Eventually it had to give way, trying to compete on power with hardware that is practically obsolete on release day then selling it for a loss just wont work any more. However there's plenty of money from the casual market that just wants a simple, engaging game to play... a market that has belonged to Nintendo for a decade.

randlemarcus said:

Maybe there's something in the constant launches of streaming consoles, where the big stuff is done in the cloud, and you just get pixels rendered locally, on the Googlebox.

Every few years someone thinks that streaming will work without realising that 30 ms of network lag is acceptable, but 30 ms of input lag is going to annoy the living hell out of gamers. Even the older flash browser games loaded and run locally. 30 ms is a very good speed that you only get on uncontested fibre to a relatively close server, it's not unusual to have 90 ms of lag.

Also, the rendering of pixels (or voxels now, soon to be replaced by ray tracing) is the heavy lifting in games. Running scripts that progress story, perform actions, so on and so forth... these require a tiny fraction of current computing power.

This is one of the games industry's white elephants. Along with 3D helmets. It'll come along every few years and die because we haven't solved the fundamental issues (I.E. violating the speed of light)

moustachebandit said:

Google have moved out of the hardware space, can’t see them making a console.

This.

It would be a project they couldn't simply abandon, which would make them reluctant to start in the first place given that Google is quite willing to abandon an idea if it's not working.

[Zoon]

We will find out soon enough at 5PM.
Should be interesting.

[Zooks]

Looks interesting. Streaming service heavily tied in to youtube.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-47623414

[untakenname]

I can see it going mainstream if it has the right titles behind it, latency will be interesting but most non hardcore gamers won't care too much imo.

The beta google ran a few months back ran pretty well https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IRK2WJRyR_8

[deckster]

Good article on BBC https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-47634263

The main concern isn't technological (that's always fixable with time and money). It's about how a streaming service will fundamentally alter the business model of gaming companies - the same way as Spotify transformed the way that we listen to and pay for music, and the way that artists get paid for their work. The big studios will be fine but I fear for the small indies; in exactly the opposite way that Steam has democratised the process of game publishing and distribution, how likely is it that the little guy is going to be able to get by with the crumbs of micro-payments they are likely to get from streaming? Or alternatively, is it going to lead to a massive explosion in bedroom developers? Who knows. For sure, getting on the first page of the Google games stream is going to be more important than ever.

Some interesting points also on the potential impact on, for example, tedious grinding time-sink game mechanics if they move to a remunerate-per-minute-played model - are we going to see the fun bits padded out with ever more 'do this 500 times to get this important skill'-type tasks?

It's probably the future - after all, games are about the only form of media that we commonly pay for once rather than subscribe to these days - but if it takes off to the same extent as Spotify and Netflix then the gaming industry is in for a seismic upheaval.

[schmunk]

It's not clear how this is significantly different from an Nvidia Shield TV.

[Zoon]

schmunk said:

It's not clear how this is significantly different from an Nvidia Shield TV.

Because it isn't a console, just a connection to a data center.

[Ransoman]

Given how most games are reliant on timing and reaction times, I can't see how streaming is a good idea. What problem is it trying to solve?

I can't play classic mega drive games on my PS4 compared to my actual mega drive because of the almost imperceptible controller input lag and emulation processing lag, My timing is completely off and even modern games I really struggle with timing because their is a minute lag on inputs. Streaming will make it far worse.

[Zoon]

Ransoman said:

Given how most games are reliant on timing and reaction times, I can't see how streaming is a good idea. What problem is it trying to solve?

I can't play classic mega drive games on my PS4 compared to my actual mega drive because of the almost imperceptible controller input lag and emulation processing lag, My timing is completely off and even modern games I really struggle with timing because their is a minute lag on inputs. Streaming will make it far worse.

Digital Foundry tested the latency and found it identical to playing locally on an XBOX One X.
That's pretty impressive.

[Ransoman]

Zoon said:

Digital Foundry tested the latency and found it identical to playing locally on an XBOX One X.
That's pretty impressive.

That is impressive then, It must do some local processing (I haven't read the article in detail yet).

[Zoon]

Ransoman said:

Zoon said:

Digital Foundry tested the latency and found it identical to playing locally on an XBOX One X.
That's pretty impressive.

That is impressive then, It must do some local processing (I haven't read the article in detail yet).

Everything is processed by the instance on google's server.
There is no local machine.

[schmunk]

Zoon said:

schmunk said:

It's not clear how this is significantly different from an Nvidia Shield TV.

Because it isn't a console, just a connection to a data center.

OK, I'll rephrase:

It's not clear how this is significantly different from Nvidia's GeForce Now service.

[Munter]

Zoon said:

Ransoman said:

Zoon said:

Digital Foundry tested the latency and found it identical to playing locally on an XBOX One X.
That's pretty impressive.

That is impressive then, It must do some local processing (I haven't read the article in detail yet).

Everything is processed by the instance on google's server.
There is no local machine.

The signal has to get from the controller to the internet. Presumably via something local. Or witchcraft.

What get's me is the signal has to go
Controller
Router
Internet
Google (converting signal to a new image)
Internet
Router
Screen

That tends to have delay when moving a mouse cursor over RDP to a chunky server on a good network. Never mind something graphics intensive.

The proof is in the eating but...it sounds unlikely to be as good as almost everything being local.

[Ransoman]

Zoon said:

Ransoman said:

Zoon said:

Digital Foundry tested the latency and found it identical to playing locally on an XBOX One X.
That's pretty impressive.

That is impressive then, It must do some local processing (I haven't read the article in detail yet).

Everything is processed by the instance on google's server.
There is no local machine.

In that case, I don't believe it, I will have to wait for real world anecdotes to judge the performance. They will be using the best leased line available, possibly even over a VPN to optimise the traffic to make it that good.

[captain_cynic]

Munter said:

The signal has to get from the controller to the internet. Presumably via something local. Or witchcraft.

There is going to be something local, but Google are making what that something is pretty agnostic. So it could be a smart TV, Android phone, heavy duty gaming rig.... Linux?

Munter said:

What get's me is the signal has to go
Controller
Router
Internet
Google (converting signal to a new image)
Internet
Router
Screen

That tends to have delay when moving a mouse cursor over RDP to a chunky server on a good network. Never mind something graphics intensive.

The proof is in the eating but...it sounds unlikely to be as good as almost everything being local.

Considering that Steam Link users are complaining heavily of lag and that is just between a TV and a gaming PC on the same local (5GHz) network. I remain skeptical. With Steam Link it goes

Controller -> Switch -> Gaming PC -> Switch -> TV.