An anonymous reader wanted to know the future of gaming. I know I encourage everyone to send ideas to me but I have to say that this one had me a little stumped. I don’t know if this reader was trying to stump me but I do know that I couldn’t let anyone down and that I owe it to my readers to address this in some way.

I have actually sat down to write this article several times. This has been one of my most difficult topics to address and I appreciate the challenge. Thanks anonymous.

I found it very difficult to come up with some insightful idea of my own which would one day change the face of gaming.  I had to resort to searching the internet for some answers and I came across a few older articles that talked about technology that we currently have in our home. This topic seems to keep coming up over an over throughout the years.  We all eagerly anticipate the next big thing that will change the way we play our games.

There were a few search results that I reluctantly clicked on knowing that they were just some sort of bloated PR stunt, and I never thought I would see results from these, but I have to say I may have seen a glimpse of a possible future in one of these known as OnLive.

In retrospect the name ‘OnLive’ kind of turned me off; I kept wanting to call it ‘Online’. I remember being unenthusiastic about looking over their webpage, which actually sparked enough interest for me to look them up in more detail. I soon found that they had a presence at the Game Developers Conference but for some reason I had been overlooking information about them until now. In my search I found a  juicy videos on YouTube.  I happened across their full GDC conference which was really an eye opening experience. I was so impressed by this idea that I can bravely say that this is the future of video games (in one form or another).

I am not saying that you should run out and invest in OnLive, nor am I saying that the next console you own will be from them. I could see where OnLive’s idea could be implemented into the gaming of tomorrow. If it is not adopted then it will at least be duplicated, integrated, or incorporated into the games of the future.

Let’s get down to brass tacks.

What it is. This is the use of compressed, streaming information sent over a high speed connection allowing remote servers to host the actual game and all of its content. You will be playing the most up to date game without the need of a console or a high end PC. Personal save information for the game and player stats are held safely on a server, as well as any screenshot or video capture that you have performed.

How it works. Specially built racks are installed into a nearby server plant. These cutting edge racks would house the horsepower behind running these games in addition to sending them to you in blazing fast speeds. You would need a high speed internet connection of some sort. A small modem sized box sits in your home to decode the images coming into it and it also routes the controller actions going out. You simply see a real-time image of the game which is provided from a server miles away.

Imagine if an entertainment giant like Sony decided to invest in this. If this thing can really process that much info, then not only could they use this for video games but they could also use this for delivering all sorts of video in high definition.

If this technology catches on like Windows did, then we could be seeing the beginning of a one console future. We could finally have an industry standard being born for video game consoles. No matter how cool this all sounds I could still imagine some companies taking a while to adopt such an idea. I’m sure Nintendo would never join and they would be just like the whole Mac community is today (strong and very proud).

OnLive has some very cool features like the ability to rent a game, play a demo, or even watch someone else play the game live. You can use any USB controller, or even a mouse and keyboard. You can even see what your friends are playing at anytime and watch their real-time gameplay.  Your profile is connected to your login, so go anywhere and play your games on any TV or Computer.  It’s a really well thought out product and one that I am excited to hear more about.  I can’t wait to see what they bring to E3 later this year.

If you have a good chunk of time to kill then I would recommend watching the GameSpot coverage of the GDC conference found here.

Could you imagine this thing becoming so powerful that you wouldn’t even need to have a full fledged computer anymore? If this can deliver content of this size in such a short amount of time then why couldn’t it support all media? Why couldn’t your computer be basically a dummy console with just enough processing power to run its own operating software and peripherals?  I’m sure one of our readers is super smart in computing and may already know the answer to those questions.  Just imagine the possibilities.

Got something you wanna talk about, email me at jphelps@levelselect.co.uk I swear I will not use your email address for evil purposes.