10 Sep 2011

OnLive the future of gaming? Implications in Education

Image representing OnLive as depicted in Crunc...

Image via CrunchBase

Now being a technology enthusiast, I do on occasion like to play video games. I'll admit it, i'm part of that generation where video gaming at home just started to take hold. Instead of heading down to your local arcade (some of you will remember this) and emptying your pockets full of quarters, you may have powered up your television and started to play your Nintendo, Atari, Intellivision, Sega, or the like. 

PC gaming was also coming into its own, and the games became more sophisticated in terms of graphics and realism. However, the only caveat was the best games out there only ran on computers with the best hardware. So, like most users you bought only those games which could feasibly run on your machine and when the time came you upgraded the components in your computer so that it could run more intensive applications. 

Now its possible to play the games you would like without having to upgrade your computer or be worried about whether or not it will work on your OS. Now there is OnLive.

OnLive is a cloud based gaming service. This means that you don't have to download or install anything to your machine. Well not completely true, you have to download their client program (very small- 8 MB), so you can access their service. You are actually playing the games on their machines via the Internet. 

Currently there are 90 plus titles on the site. You can trial many of the games in the Marketplace (aka game store like STEAM) for 30 minutes for free. You can rent these games on a 3 or 7 day Playpass. There is also the option of buying specific titles with no limits on time for the game. One of the most interesting aspects of this service is that it has given its users the option of playing a majority of the titles for $9.99 a month. Think of it as the Netflix of gaming.

Sounds too good to be true? Well there are some catches to this service. 
  • First of all you need to have a decent Internet connection (3 Mbps minimum, 5 Mpbs is recommended).
  • It plays better if you are using a wired connection rather than a wireless or wifi setup (make sure that your wifi router is fast and broadcasts in the 5 Ghz range). 
  • It may not look as nice on your bigger monitors that support high resolutions. This service has a box that is compatible with televisions so you can game on your tv like you would with your other consoles (XBOX 360, PS3, Wii etc)
  • You will want to make sure that you have many of your background apps are closed while you are using the service. (I had it hang on me twice while I was using this on my IMac)
  • OnLive's catalog is small at the moment. It may not have what you are looking for.
Conclusion

Does this service actually work? Absolutely.

Is a cloud based gaming service cool? Yes!

Is it worth the ten dollar a month subscription fee? Depends. If you are a hardcore gamer then you might actually want to have the downloaded program living on your machine. However if you want to try out games that would certainly outstrip your machine's specs then definitely. Besides all the hassle of making sure the game works or patching is done for you. One user was able to play CRYSIS on his netbook! Check out that review here. So there is lots to think about if you want to start shelling out for this service.

My humble opinion is that this type of business model for games will certainly become more common in the future. 

Implications for Education

As many educators are now paying particular attention to, is how video gaming can be used in education. There are games in the industry that are suitable for use in the classroom that can be used to engage students with the content. However, since the OnLive service does most of the heavy lifting in terms of hardware, students/schools could access these games on more affordable hardware. Cloud Based services could make these games more accessible at a fraction of the cost. The students would be playing more engaging games rather then the drill and kill games that are cranked out in the name of Education.

For more information on video games in education check these links:

Tom Barrett has a list of posts about video games in education here.

Kurt Squire's paper on Video Games in Education.

Also:

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P.S. This is not an endorsement of the OnLive service. Just thought I'd share my 2 cents as David Warlick would say. Try it out, let me know what you think and how you might use something like this.

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