OnLive gets June US launch date

By Tom Bramwell Published 10 March, 2010

$15 per month plus cost of games.

The OnLive cloud gaming service is set to launch in the US on 17th June.

The service allows players to access PC games from 2K, EA, THQ, Ubisoft and Warner Bros. The games run on OnLive's beefy servers and players control them remotely through the OnLive client.

OnLive will initially charge a subscription fee of $14.95 per month and special offers and longer subs deals are also planned.

Once subscribed players will need to pay extra to buy or rent games. However, the first 25,000 users who sign up will get three months' subscription for free.

The OnLive service will be offered across 48 US states at launch, and is initially aimed at PC and Mac users.

Community features include voice chat, gamer tags, user profiles and free demos. It will also be possible to pause and resume games while accessing these features.

Confirmed games include Mass Effect 2, Dragon Age: Origins, Assassin's Creed II, Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands, Borderlands and Metro 2033.

The company intends to announce details of its MicroConsole TV adapter for TV sets later in 2010.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (48) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Windypops #1 2 years ago

    $15 dollars a month plus rental fees? Jeepers. I hate to be a naysayer before it's even launched, but I just can't see a service like this being viable for another ten years.

  • Shikasama #2 2 years ago

    I'm quite surprised that you need to buy the game aswell, I was unde rthe impression from the way Ron Perlman had been selling it that it would be subscription only.

  • Shikasama #3 2 years ago

    Also, I wonder how many people complaining about the Ubisoft DRM like the idea of Onlive

  • rotmm #4 2 years ago

    I am kinda confused what the $15 per month is exactly for?

  • StooMonster #5 2 years ago

    To make Ron Perlman rich?

  • MiniAmin #6 2 years ago

    + 1 Shikasama

    They'll need another 5 years before they attempt to unveil this service in the UK. Sometimes even Youtube struggles to buffer!

    Not too sure about buying games on a platform which effectively eschews a physical format as well.

  • 1Dgaf #7 2 years ago

    So.. I rent the ability to play the games I buy?

  • Emmit_Assassin #8 2 years ago

    Will it be full retail prices or rental prices? If it's full price then...

    There will come a time when I will have to choose between....

    £8 a month and then a forced £40 ish a game to play it on my laptop....

    ...or£34 or whatever the lowest price I can get the game for, and then have the choice of selling it a few weeks later to buy another and play it on my HDTV...

    ...hmmm....

    I'm thinking as book Publishers are saying that it costs almost the same to print a book as it does to digitise it, then they can still charge full price for books. Maybe the same will be said of games?

    What sort of prices are the games on Steam etc? Still the same or near enough the same as physical?

  • Shikasama #9 2 years ago

    Emmit - varies widly, mostly they are about the same, sometimes a little more and sometimes a little less. I think the driect download method is the major reason they can offer such fantastic weekend deals though.

    This does sound very expensive, but thinking about it a little more this could be great to revitalise PC gaming development. If you consider how many years of subscription and new game purchase you would need to buy before you had reached the cost of upgrading your PC, it still seems like a pretty good deal for the consumer. On the flip side of that, it gives developers making games for the PC a much, much wider potential customer pool than it has had before, with the technology being less of a barrier.

    MiniAmin is absolutely correct though. No chance of this working in the UK.

    As for arguments about paying for playing a SP game you have to be online for etc I think we (as gamers) are going to just have to suck this up. It looks increasingly likely that it is going to be the future of the industry. You are basically forced into having an internet connection anyway for DLC/Box Codes/Verification and the like, even on your sodding console.

  • Dylbot #10 2 years ago

    I wait with baited breath to see this fail spectacularly. Also, you could spend $180 for a year plus purchase price of games, or you could pick up a 360 and have it for at least three years (thank you extended warranty) and buy the games for much cheaper, as most of these titles have been out for a while, and not have to furiously believe that your internet will be able to handle 720p@60fps video with little control lag, because god knows that reality will disagree strongly with this idea.

    I'd love it if this was a legitimate service, a real, sustainable idea that would actually work. Sadly, I'm completely convinced, and have said before, that this is a man out to waste as much shareholder money as humanly possible before reality comes crashing down and he has to move to Rio for the remainder of his life/gets a thorough raping in prison.

  • Zomoniac #11 2 years ago

    So.. I rent the ability to play the games I buy?

    11 million+ WoW players have proved this to be a viable business model.

  • bad09 #12 2 years ago

    Hold on. You pay a sub THEN pay for rental or even more stupid you pay to buy your streaming games?

    No thank you, I'll stick with Steam and if I ever go back to digital rental Metaboli is where I'll go.

  • PearOfAnguish #13 2 years ago

    "buy or rent games"

    Should read "rent or rent". If the company goes bankrupt or they decide not to support a title any longer will they post out a boxed copy to everyone who chose to "buy"?

  • Emmit_Assassin #14 2 years ago

    @Shikasama
    I agree. For me, as a console only gamer there's no point, but for PC gamers, taking into account the cost of keeping a PC up to spec year after year, it would make sense. And it would indeed giv devs the chance to go larger with their games, and would lift some restrictions. I'm sure most games are made ith a broad spectrum of able and less able PC's in mind. If they were all developing for the same sort ofg systems, then it would mean they could push the boat out.

    Maybe soon, PC games will be scrabbling for exclusives and having multiplatform games! Onlive/Regular PC will become the new PS3/360 type war.

  • Grayvern #15 2 years ago

    If you have to buy or rent games as well as subscribe then its pointless. Over 5 years that's $900.

    Add to that the next set of consoles will probably ship with full rental or full download options for all their games then it doesn't really stand up.

    Even if it does achieve modest success there are too many areas of dubious internet quality for it or similar services like it for the method of playing games to gain dominance within the next 15 years.

  • oerhoert #16 2 years ago

    The pay-per-game thing came as a surprise. Might still be decent if each game is, say, a dollar per week to rent, but otherwise, I think it'll be a hard sell.

  • PearOfAnguish #17 2 years ago

    But PCs do a lot more than just play games, most people don't have a PC only to do that. Sure as hell not going to spend the cost of a good graphics card or a console per year for the privilege of renting games that no longer work if I decide to stop paying a sub or my internet goes down.

  • SpaceMonkey77 #18 2 years ago

    I hope this bombs like Hiroshima. This is more ideas being force fed to gamers who by and large do not want to consume their games this way. 15$ per month plus cost of games, sounds very MMOish and no mistake. Paying for WoW and to Xbox Live is one thing, but this seems lame in comparison. And how easily these fools disregard human nature of buying and possessing stuff.

    On Live is a nice idea in concept, but come back in another 20 years. I have no desire to give up on physical product, just yet, like many others. I really don't see this surviving. I can see games on this being a nightmare to review too, as you always need the net and a good ping, which differs via time of day.

    Notice the big wigs on that list, but no sign of indies, I wonder why? Lol.

  • Shikasama #19 2 years ago

    I'm seeing a lot of 'I don't want to pay for just renting a game' type arguments are showing up. I think this is an attitude that is going to have to change in the not too distant future. We are being pushed closer and closer to games being made available only on a licensed basis from the publisher (which in strictly legalistic terms, they mostly are anyway) that require internet connections. I believe that this is by far the preferred model for the industry and the current spate of DRMs and DLCs are simply gently nudging us towards this outcome.

    I'm not saying it is a wrong attitude to have, but realistically it's not one that an individual will be able to sustain in say 5 years time. The games industry gets away with changing it's method of delivery so often because it's customers are always 'growing up' with whatever system it has in place. the 15/16/17 year old kids buying games today consider DLC and code veriification totally normal.

  • jellyhead #20 2 years ago

    I can see what you mean, Shikasama but i've no wish to drink poison today i can put off til tomorrow.

  • Zaiz #21 2 years ago

    Gee, I'm so lucky to be a PC gamer and have a 3 year old PC that needs to be updated once every...console generation. And it was basically less expensive than your parent's desktop PC for something several times more powerful than your console. People who love the newest hardware can update yearly if they really want to, but that is unnecessary.

    Anyways, think of it this way. You build a PC, stick several gigs of ram in it for very little, get your 500+ gigabyte hard drive, your dual core processor(Quad cores are still unnecessary at the moment, and games aren't even optimized to run on them) and a well-priced graphics card,(alongside case and power supply) will run you about 600-700 dollars, so, a little more than a launch PS3. It'll only be several times more powerful, and have far, far more features, not to mention games that are ten dollars less.

    Unless you happen to be Supreme Commander 2. Fuck off, I'm not paying 10 extra dollars for a PC game, especially not after the last 60 dollar PC game.

  • Zomoniac #22 2 years ago

    @ Zaiz

    Find me a PC that cost $600 in 2006 that is "several times more powerful" than a PS3 and can do much better than Uncharted 2 quality graphics.
    Edited by 1 at 10/03/10 @ 22:07

  • Shikasama #23 2 years ago

    Rather annoying when people mark down your post and then don't contribute

  • Zaiz #24 2 years ago

    @Zomoniac

    Mine.Tee hee. Nvidia 8800 bargain pricing, inexpensive AMD 6000, +2 gigs of ram, a 300 gigabyte harddrive, case, and power supply.

    Rough cost? 500ish dollars, then I used an old Windows XP license(So, if it was your first PC build ever, it'd run you 700 dollars for a machine with a ton more features than a PS3). Oh, and that's Uncharted 2 at 720p(or better) at 60 FPS, with probably about 2xAA(or better).

  • Mkwone #25 2 years ago

    I thought it was still in closed beta? Going from that to laucnh in a couple of months seems a bit fast.

  • Red-Moose #26 2 years ago

    15 quid for unlimited games from all those publishers and i'd be happy with the blasted DRM problems.

  • TheJuriel #27 2 years ago

    This will be SO interesting if this works out. Cannot see how it can function, logistically, but we'll see.

    I really don't see it being a good idea to charge for games separately, though...
    Edited by 1 at 10/03/10 @ 22:24

  • polaris70 #28 2 years ago

    I think OnLive's argument with the subscription fee is that currently you have to pay for hardware (console/PC) and then buy the games separately, so this is no different. Plus the fact that their hardware gets improved on an ongoing basis to take advantage of the latest games, without no cost to the consumer.
    Great idea but with a few drawbacks at present. Stable Internet connections, which you absolutely need for this service, can only be provided by your IP and not OnLive, which anyone who has had an internet connection for the past 10 years knows that there is no such thing as a guaranteed consistent connection which this service requires.
    Secondly, the reports say the lag and picture quality don't stand up to identical games played on a local system, and some games (twitch FPS's) are unplayable, and I haven't even mentioned multiplayer. But I suppose this is a wait and see point although I'm highly dubious of their claims.
    I hope this system works as it would add another option to us gamers, but in my opinion it may be a few years away (20+) before this type of service is viable.
    Edited by 3 at 10/03/10 @ 22:49

  • dillingerdan #29 2 years ago

    I've already read a preview of the closed Beta on one of the Tech/PC sites, and it didn't fare well. Graphics were muted and controls were slow, especially when using cursors, with a mouse. Pads are essential, as you feel the lag less, apparently. Of course it maybe better with a monster net connection, but lets be honest, most of us aren't in Korea where net connections stretch well into the Gbps range. And we've no doubt given the Digital Foundaries lag review a once over, and seen that local gaming has some pretty noticeable lag at times.

    Now, considering this is to launch as a PC application first, how is this going to take off? The first 25,000 will be alright, but PAYING to connect and use the service? How is that going to help with Steam getting bigger and more popular (and moving to Mac before this too). So if you buy a game, outright, and you cancel your subscription payment, that means you cannot play it? Or cannot play it online? But surely they aren't even going to let you stream it without the service, as it costs them to run it on servers, stream it etc etc, so you'll need the subscription for as long as you own the game, JUST to play?

    If so that little TV box is a launch ESSENTIAL. It has NO MARKET without it. If you need a PC to use the service no-one will pay for this, when they can get it for free, and presumably the games cheaper too. There are loads of em too, not just Steam.

    That just isn't a viable option. If you need a PC too, it's pointless. Yeah maybe a netbook is worth considering the service, but you can probably play a hell of a lot of the games that appear first, on a netbook anyway if you tinker with the settings enough. I just can't see how anyone would want to buy this? After 3 months it'll have no customers.

    And that's not even considering how expensive the back end must be to run.

  • Hexagon #30 2 years ago

    That's $180 a year. Not too bad considering that the Xbox 360 cost $400 at launch and the PlayStation 3 managed a hefty $600. Strangely enough, I still have to buy games separately for those two.

  • Altrezia #31 2 years ago

    @Hexagon - yes, you have to buy games too - but you get to keep them if sony goes under tomorrow, or if your internet goes down..

    Also, you can sell the system and games at any time and not lose all your money.

  • Zomoniac #32 2 years ago

    @ Zaiz

    Really? Cos my Core 2 Duo 2.4, 4GB RAM and 320GB 8800GTS cost around £700 ($1k-ish) around 4 years ago, and doesn't come close. I can't get Crysis at 720p on high settings above 15fps, without AA. Whilst I don't doubt a current gaming PC could comfortably outperform a PS3, a comparably priced unit at the time of launch wouldn't come close. Plus if you factor the cost of a BD-ROM drive at the time, it's even less believable.

  • Shikasama #33 2 years ago

    Altreza - Or do you? I think the recent 'Apocalyp3e' answers that

  • IneptPercy #34 2 years ago

    at that kind of cost its only a matter of time before you could afford a decent PC to which you would get better picture quality etc aswell as all the other features of a good PC.

    To build a 360/PS3 beater is quite cheap these days so just do it.

  • laharl80 #35 2 years ago

    I wouldn't pay 10p for this.From what i've read it lags worse than battlefront 2 on the xbox and has ps1 graphics.Why not just buy a decent console?

  • Ryze #36 2 years ago

    @Shikasama

    If games and console developers ignore customers who buy boxed optical media for offline play without an Internet connection, then they'll lose out massively.

    It'll be a VERY long time yet, before this changes completely or even largely.

  • Xerx3s #37 2 years ago

    For the price of live it might have had a chance but for 15 $ a month ex. actual costs, it will fail hard. Why would anyone get a lesser experience and want to pay more?

  • Praetorianer #38 2 years ago

    I am not a believer. I don't see this working, because like Dylbot said:

    [...]because god knows that reality will disagree strongly with this idea.

    Then again, Larry Wachowski is going to become Linda Wachowski in the future, so a lot of strange things, that seem to disagree with reality, happen. Let's see, but I'll bet it'll bomb.

  • Zomoniac #39 2 years ago

    You didn't ask about Crysis, you asked about Uncharted 2. Don't try and pretend that the two are in any way comparable technically.

    Well given Crysis is the only PC game that looks better than Uncharted 2, it's a reasonable comparison. You can't really use any other game to compare, because nothing else comes close.

  • sneetch #40 2 years ago

    @Zomoniac
    So.. I rent the ability to play the games I buy?

    11 million+ WoW players have proved this to be a viable business model.

    There's a significant difference. WoW is an online only game where you're paying for the servers and for updates to the game, here you're paying for hardware to play single player games that you could otherwise own. I wonder if you can install a copy of the games you buy on this service or do they remain the property of OnLive?

    Either way it's $180 dollars a year (presumably ex-taxes as this is the States) you could buy an Xbox for that and rent/own the games yourself. Or you could just play the games on the PC or (possibly) MAC you currently need in order to access OnLive. I'm not seeing much of a "win" for the user apart from the convenience of not having to go out and buy and then install the games.

  • sneetch #41 2 years ago

    Oh and ah, once again to the people saying you have to constantly upgrade a PC: you don't.

    I just replaced my previous PC that I've had for over 5 years with a new one but I didn't have to; I wanted to. I hadn't come across a single game that taxed the old one but I wanted Windows 7 and DirectX 11. Now I normally couldn't run new games with all the graphical bells and whistles on the old one but it still more than exceeded the minimum and recommended specs of all new games.

    There is a fallacy that all games on PC are developed so that they require bleeding edge tech, it's just not true: PC developers know that most people out there don't buy a new PC every couple of years and they design their games accordingly.

  • HenryFitz #42 2 years ago

    Publishers want us to have coin-ops in our own homes. That's what all this is leading to. They know we feel compelled to play games, and they're looking to exploit that to the maximum possible. No more one-off payments, just constant revenue every time you play. "The next level costs €2, which will be deducted from your credit card. Continue?"

  • Shikasama #43 2 years ago

    Ryze - It's already happening. If you console isn't connected to the internet and you buy an EA game you're missing out on content that is already on the disc. Every game comes with a deluge of DLC designed to 'enhance' the game you buy, but if you can't get to the internet then you can't access it. Even the expansion for Dragon Age isn't having a physical release as far as I'm aware.

    Gamers are constantly being pushed towards being online and I'm pretty confident, based off the DLC numbers that are reported, that most of them are. Companies can do these measures and assume an internet connection very very easily.

  • insincere_dave #44 2 years ago

    I think it's great purely from the point of view of technical advancement that someone is doing this. But if we ever get to the point where I can no longer buy and trade my games unless prices drop to App Store levels then I'll likely be waving goodbye to gaming as a major hobby.
    Edited by 1 at 11/03/10 @ 13:11

  • tossum #45 2 years ago

    @ Zomoniac: afroofdoom is correct, crysis and uncharted 2 are not technically comparable. Your pc cant run crysis more than 15fps? The ps3 wouldnt get even that (talking about original crysis, not the newly developed console cryengine). Try comparing cross platform games instead, you should find your pc will run smoother with a higher framerate with higher resolution textures.
    If not you could always overclock it until it does! :D

  • Zaiz #46 2 years ago

    @Zomoniac

    I'm not talking about PCs you buy from dell, I'm talking about build your own PCs. Much, much cheaper. Half the price, really.

    Also, comparing Crisis with Uncharted 2? Okay. Uncharted 2 has -tiny- texture sizes, poor physics, and low poly models in comparison to Crysis. Uncharted 2 looks spectacular on console, of course, but consoles are much, much weaker than a PC. And Crysis was developed not for even the PCs of that day, it was developed for a hypothetical future PC that still doesn't exist.

  • Zomoniac #47 2 years ago

    @ Zaiz

    I did build my PC. And I did shop around extensively for the cheapest components. Either prices are MUCH cheaper in the US (I presume you're from over there given you post pricing in dollars) or you have rose-tinted glasses re pricing. My 320MB 8800GTS, which is shit but I got because it was the only DX10 card I could afford, four years ago cost me around the price of a new PS3 now, or more than double the current RRP of an arcade 360. Let's do a cross-platform game comparison. Red Faction Guerilla, 720p, high detail, no AA, 20fps if I'm lucky. 360 version is 720p, 30fps and much smoother. For a device a fraction of the price.

    How long till you tell me you can build a PC better than a 360 for under £109?

  • Zaiz #48 2 years ago

    Brilliant job at moving the goal posts. Absolutely brilliant. And no, I could never build a PC for 100 pounds, it's quite impossible without some major-league bargain bin hunting. So yes, the Xbox360 is cheaper than a PC, but we were talking about launch PS3s.

    Oh, and there's your problem, you bought a fancy graphics card at launch. I wait a good amount of time before upgrading, since the price falls dramatically after the early adopters have snapped up the newest part.