Crytek believes streaming games will be viable ... in 2013

by JC Fletcher on Apr 2nd 2009 1:45PM

Crytek revealed that it has considered the possibility of a streaming game service like OnLive or Gaikai before, but abandoned the idea due to technological limitations. "We had our research in 2005 on this subject but we stopped around 2007 because we had doubts about economics of scale. But that was at a time when bandwidth was more expensive," CEO Cevat Yerli told GamesIndustry.biz.

High-speed connections have yet to be cheap or reliable enough to work, in Crytek's estimation: the company determined that a streaming service may be possible sometime between 2013 and 2015. This is also the approximate period in which most consumer PCs will begin to be able to run Crysis. Yerli said that such services must rely strongly on broadband providers.

"We're not involved [with OnLive], we just allowed Crysis to be tested on it," Yerli said. Publisher EA is behind the addition of Crysis Warhead to the service.

Source

Tags: crysis, crytek, gaikai, onlive, streaming

Reader Comments (56)

"Note: they didn't say it was technically impossible like other people are saying, just not feasible given the availability of bandwidth and broadband connections."

Aren't those two things the same thing?

At the rate ISPs are capping bandwidth, we'd be luck if we can still read Joystiq in 2013

Unfortunately for everyone, if this caught on, it would be the end of the mod community as we know it. Do not support this product :(

He means possible from Crytek's side, with an issue of server stability and whatnot.

but wait isnt 2012 suppose to be the end of the world?

2013 sounds like it could be almost right.

It's certainly not happening anytime soon. These people are nuts if they think they can stream 60 HD images a second over the rapidly staked-out copper available today.

The best part is, there's not even going to be a fight or controversy. OnLive will tell people there's no problem, and then around the 12th of the month subscriber's internet will shut off. Around the 16th they'll get the letter from Comcast or Warner.

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