Game-streaming service Happy Cloud coming July 18
Happy Cloud, a game streaming service that downloads in the background as you play, is planned for launch July 18.
Another challenger is getting ready to enter the game streaming arena. Happy Cloud is set to launch on July 18, reports Joystiq. It follows a familiar blueprint set by services like OnLive and Gaikai, with a new wrinkle to set itself apart.
While other cloud services stick to streaming, Happy Cloud creates a hybrid of streaming and actual game downloads. You get the files needed to start a game, then download the rest in the background as you play. This lets you play offline as well as online, and potentially without the lag found in services that stick to streaming only.
The downside? Happy Cloud is also a very tiny cloud for the time being, with only nine titles available in its beta phase. More games are planned for the service, but its competition is already lapping it several times over. OnLive alone boasts over 100 games, so Happy Cloud will have to snatch up as many as it can to even begin to compete with the selection.
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Steve Watts posted a new article, Game-streaming service Happy Cloud coming July 18.
Happy Cloud, a game streaming service that downloads in the background as you play, is planned for launch July 18.-
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This was going to be a feature of Triton, that DD service that 3DR used for PREY and which subsequently went belly-up. I don't know if it ever actually got used in any games though
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triton_(content_delivery)
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If the service is simply "We will stream you the relevant files for the area of the game you are attempting to play while the game executes on your machine" then it won't scale. There is no guarantee that a game you would like to play is architected in such a way that it could be split up to take advantage of this service. Beyond the core executable/.dlls, most game assets are stored in large contiguous files to optimize file I/O. Splitting those up to allow for streaming would require close cooperation with individual developers to develop custom solutions on a per game basis. Then you have games/technologies like Rage and its megatextures, which at least according to public comments clock in at several GBs, that seem completely unfit for this service insofar as it hopes to be a mainstream solution.
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