Ubisoft Touches on the Future of Gaming
[shal]Ubisoft[/shal] CEO Yves Guillemot spoke with CNBC on the future of gaming, and touched upon two topics: gaming services, and production budgets, the latter of which Guillemot expects to rise significantly.
“The next generation is going to be so powerful that playing a game is going to be the equivalent of playing a CGI movie today.”
Guillemot expects next-gen video game budgets to average $50~60 million, which is a little over double what the average retail [shal]PS3[/shal] and [shal]Xbox 360[/shal] game costs to make. The forthcoming [shal]OnLive[/shal] service, which applies the concept of cloud computing to games, was also discussed.
Ubisoft currently supports the service, and Guillemot believes that the success of OnLive may push console manufacturers to release the next round of hardware earlier than expected. OnLive had a big showing at GDC, but barely made an appearance at E3. The service faces a lot of potential issues, including network bandwidth, hardware fees on the provider’s end, and ability to handle the number of users.
Consoles still have a major advantage over cloud computing because they don’t fully rely on a user’s internet connection speed/quality, but with small upfront costs OnLive still has the potential to become a major contendor.
[Source]
9 Responses to “Ubisoft Touches on the Future of Gaming”
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June 18th, 2009 at 8:26 AM
“Guillemot believes that the success of OnLive may push console manufacturers to release the next round of hardware earlier than expected.”
Isn’t he getting a bit ahead of himself? OnLive has yet to be proven in the real world, where people suffer caps, packet loss, large ping times and even total loss of service.
With the internet in its current form, I believe OnLive is frequently going to be unplayable. We get enough lag in online gaming now. OnLive will bring you a new phenomenon – lag in single-player games.
And how long are you going to use OnLive when you realised that the slightest delay, even in a single player game, is going to cost you lives? Any game requiring quick, accurate control is going to suffer.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:22 AM
yeah the servers of this gen can hardly make it without a bunch of lag and glitches and all that… what makes anyone think they are going to get all their s*** together so soon anyway? psn is nowhere close to being ready for people to run games entirely off of the server. this is going to take a lot longer than people think imo
June 18th, 2009 at 11:34 AM
I wouldn’t want this kind of service to introduce “next gen” gaming much sooner than planned. I feel that developers have yet to tap into current gen hardwares’ (PS3 and 360) full power & potential. This will just be a headache no gamer needs. I haven’t played a lot of Ubisoft games, but did play Rainbow Six Vegas 1 & 2, and I wasn’t impressed with the online one bit. I’m sure there are many others that agree that Ubisoft is in no real position to force this service on gamers with the track record they have with the games I just mentioned.
June 18th, 2009 at 11:45 AM
I am so sick of Yves Guillemot, who put this guy in charge? something about him smells like douche & vaseline.
I wish he would just go make film special effects and leave gamers alone.
/rant mode off
June 18th, 2009 at 2:01 PM
Sony IS working on something of similar nature to OnLive, I think that they’ve got a much better shot at making it. I mean, if this sort of thing can be firmwared into the PS3, and be used to only boost graphical computations even SLIGHTLY, this would give the PS3 an edge on basically everything out there. Since the PS3 is already a gaming machine and can already pump out good graphics, lightening the computational load even remotely could yield very noticeably differences. In the case of OnLive, pretty much everything has to be done server-side, and I think pretty much everyone realizes that this is just a pipe f***ing dream. Sony already said Onlive is not gonna work. Better said, expressed there doubt. Id prefer to own, rather than rent. At the end of the whole thing, you actually have something tangible. Not a hole in your wallet, and empty hands
It’s an interesting concept regardless. However, Netflix can’t stream a movie to me in HD AND with a Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack, so what are the limitations of the OnLive service going to be when (if) it launches for real? I hope Sony and Microsoft wipe these people off the face of the planet.
IT’S THE GAMING APOCALYPSE! if you ask me.
June 18th, 2009 at 2:02 PM
so after dishing out 500 (or more) for a new system, we will have to shell out uber bucks for T3 connections in order to play the games he is dreaming of?
BTW those are big dreams for the makers of the most terrible games I have ever played. I still cant even figure out how they came up with a sequel to Assassin’s crap… That game was awful.
Leisure Suit Larry – Box Office Bust was a better crafted game.
June 18th, 2009 at 3:30 PM
That controller looks like ass.
Sorry but I have a love affair with my DS3
June 19th, 2009 at 1:59 PM
Yeah, skip that controller. Get the 360 controller for PC.
June 20th, 2009 at 10:42 AM
Mmm… good service, but I’ll pass.