Comparing Google Stadia and Project xCloud Is Both Unfair and Incorrect

Comparing Google Stadia and Project xCloud Is Both Unfair and Incorrect

5 years ago
Anonymous $xdcOWPpsb_

https://wccftech.com/comparing-google-stadia-and-project-xcloud-is-both-unfair-and-incorrect/

A new clash for the dominance of the cloud is about to begin across the battlefield that is the games industry, featuring Google Stadia and Microsoft's Project xCloud. First, though, some history. In the beginning, early on in the decade that's about to end, there were OnLive and Gaikai. They were too far ahead of their time and perished for it, as the networking technology simply wasn't there yet. Gaikai itself was acquired by Sony in 2012 and its infrastructure became the backbone of PlayStation Now, the subscription service that currently boasts over a million subscribers. However, Sony is destined to be some distance away from the battle's frontline for the time being, as they do not have the datacenters to be leaders in this area; after all, they had to make a deal with Microsoft to look into using their Azure cloud instead. Additionally, with the PlayStation console business resurged this generation thanks to the PS4's success, it was recently confirmed that big triple-A first-party exclusive titles will still launch first on the console. It won't be until quite some time, generally over a year if we look at how it's been so far, before PlayStation now gets those games.

There are only three companies with the global datacenter infrastructure to really pull off game streaming via the cloud. They are also, not by accident, the three biggest publically traded companies in the world (in addition to Apple): Microsoft, Amazon, and Google. Amazon's entrance in the market has been rumored in early 2019 but, as there was no official confirmation yet, we'll focus on the other two today.