OnLive: Tomorrow's Gaming Today (Discussion, Links and News)

[Darklinky]

I hope its fallout 3 i loved that game and would defo play it again.

Just checked ma Playpack Bundle and sure enough Fallout is there score. Bye im away to play now

[Sprung]

I may have to re-subscribe to the playpack

[Darklinky]

Jeez its so worth £6.99 a month.

[Sprung]

Free games on OnLive

[Sprung]

OnLive Brings Console-Class Games to Tablets & Phones: Gives Away a FREE Game
By: Ed Krassenstein

Touch Controls begin rolling out now, and the OnLive wireless controller goes on sale in the US and UK soon. The Android/iOS apps should be available shortly, and OnLive is giving all those who download the mobile apps a free game. Scroll to the bottom of this article to listen to our 15 minute+ interview with OnLive Founder & CEO Steve Perlman. Also see the twitter contest we are holding for those who retweet this article.

OnLive tablets smartphones android ipad

OnLive Inc. has just announced that they are bringing console-class video games to mobile tablets and smartphones. Gamers will now be able to play games such as L.A. Noire, Defense Grid, Warhammer 40K: Chaos Rising, DiRT 3, LEGO: Batman and more via touch controls on over 500 million tablets and smartphones.

In wake of this announcement, OnLive will be giving LEGO: Batman to gamers for free, just for downloading the OnLive app. LEGO Batman will be automatically added to a user’s ‘My Games’ list within 24 hours of connecting to the OnLive Game Service from the OnLive app for Android (or iPad when available).

All-in-all there will be a growing library that already consists of over 25 games (see list below) that will have touch controls enabled. Virtually all of the nearly 200 games on the service will be playable on tablets, and smartphones using the new OnLive wireless controller. The new wireless controller will be compatible with most tablets and many smartphones. It will utilizes OnLive’s exclusive adaptive wireless technology to automatically find an optimal wireless connection for a given tablet, smartphone, PC, Mac, TV or Blu-ray player. This controller should be available very soon in the US and soon after that in the UK, via the online OnLive store which can be found at www.onlive.com/store and www.onlive.co.uk/store. Perlman informed us that there could be a slight delay in shipping the controllers to users, due to some back order issues, but the delay should not be too significant. The price will be set at $49.99 (US) and £39.99 (UK). OnLive PlayPack members can take an additional 30% off these prices.

The highlight of this news story, is the fact that games that couldn’t have even been considered playable on tablets or smartphones in the past, become as simple and easy to play for these mobile devices, as they have been on PCs and consoles decades.

Developers have been working with OnLive for quite some time. More specifically, Rockstar Games has been working frivolously to bring genuine touch controls to L.A. Noire, exclusively for OnLive. The developers of the game actually created a version specifically for use on tablets through the OnLive service. This is just the start, and just one of over 25 games that are available with touch controls already.

In talking about the touch controls for L.A. Noire, OnLive founder and CEO Steve Perlman said to OnLiveFans, “It’s a very immersive experience, and [Rockstar Games] has done just an absolutely beautiful job.”

Perlman also briefly talked to us about his experience with touch controls on another popular OnLive title, Defense Grid.

“In Defense Grid, there is a lot of zooming in and zooming out, so they did swipes and pinch & zoom,” explained Perlman. “And it’s incredible. I think the best experience is with touch on [Defense Grid].”

The entire list of games that should have touch controls enabled at launch are as follows:

4 Elements
Ancient Spirits
ARES Exctinction Operation
Around the world in 80 days
Bastion
Cake Mania 3: Lights Camera Action!
Darksiders
Defense Grid
Dirt 3
Flock
Future Wars (not yet released)
Kingdom for Keflings (not yet released)
Lara Croft
Lego Batman
Lego HP 1-4
Lego HP 5-7
Mini Ninjas
Osmos
Puzzle Chronicles 2
Puzzle Quest
Royal Envoy
Space Chem
Split Second
Steel Storm
The Ball
The Maw
Virtua Tennis 2009
Warhammer 40K: Chaos Rising

“Today marks a major milestone: OnLive is now delivering the latest, console-class, top-tier games—literally to your fingertips—on mobile tablets and phones for instant on-demand play anywhere, anytime,” said Steve Perlman, OnLive Founder and CEO. “Through the free OnLive app, tablet and smartphone, gamers can play top console and PC titles like Assassins Creed: Revelations and L.A. Noire—one of the most highly acclaimed, graphically sophisticated games to date—with exclusive OnLive Cloud Touch controls or with the new mobile-compatible OnLive Wireless Controller. Tablets and smartphones, the fastest-growing consumer product categories in history, are now capable of running the hottest, highest-end games. Gaming and mobile devices will never be the same.”

Gamers will be able to connect to OnLive via tablet and smartphone using a Wi-Fi connection or AT&T and Verizon’s 4G LTE cellular service. OnLive is unveiling compatibility with these 4G LTE cellular services, enabling full, HD-resolution, low-latency cloud gaming everywhere there is 4G coverage on devices such as the HTC Jetstream, Samsung Galaxy Tab and Motorola Xoom. With this new compatibility, OnLive is truly playable everywhere, whether indoors, outdoors or even in the back seat of a car at highway speeds, for the first time bringing complete mobility to console-class gaming.

When talking about playing OnLive on a 4G LTE connection, Perlman said, “LTE is the first cellular standard that was designed for cloud gaming. When AT&T invested (in OnLive) a couple years ago, the very first thing they did was say, ‘hey look, we’re rolling out this new high performance standard,’ and our wireless guys met with their wireless guys. We made sure there was a mode in LTE that was very low latency, specifically for cloud gaming. If you use OnLive on LTE tablets, it’s really incredible. You can drive on a highway, and the kids are in the backseat playing OnLive, and it’s fine.”

The HTC Flyer is the only current tablet that comes with the OnLive app already installed. However, users of all other tablets and a large amount of smartphones can simply download the app from their respective app stores. The OnLive app will be available in the Android Market as well as the iOS App Store and the Amazon Kindle App Store.

OnLive will run on 3G and non-LTE 4G devices, but there could be a few issues with with latency. Smartphones will run a lot better on the slower, lower bandwidth connections than the tablets will.

As for the growing list of games, that will have touch controls enabled; OnLive will continue to implement touch into both current and future games. Many developers will also begin adding touch controls into their games with OnLive in mind.

“The effort required to go and add the touch capability to a game is relatively small, compared to the development effort of making the game overall,” said Perlman. With that said, there are some games that aren’t really amenable to touch.”

The rollout of touch controls begins at the time this article was published. The Android and iOS apps should be available very soon, but that’s entire in Google and Apple’s hands right now. Hopefully we should see these available sometime tomorrow.

Download the app, get a free game!

[Sprung]

GameSpot, a company that has partnered with OnLive on several things in the past, has announced that they are now giving away 1 free month of the OnLive PlayPack to their members. All you need to do is visit the Gamestop page, sign in, and grab your promo code.

http://www.gamespot.com/event/codes/onlive-playpack/

EDIT: Only works if you have never subscribed to the Playpack before.

[Sprung]

OnLive on the Xperia Play: Unofficial App Makes it Work
By: Alan Blankenship

xperia play onlive gamepadThere is some good news for Sony Xperia Play users, who wish to use the the device’s gamepad while playing games via the OnLive service. There has been an unofficial app created that enables the controls of the Xperia Play on the OnLive service.

With this app only being released a few days, it is only currently compatible with LEGO Batman and DiRT 3. The developer plans to add compatibility with more games as time goes on. The good news is that everyone who downloads the official OnLive app from the android market (and the Apple App store when it is released) will get a free copy of LEGO Batman. This mean that anyone with an Xperia Play can play at least one game on their device for free.

The unofficial OnLive Helper app can be downloaded in the Android market. Like the OnLive app, it is also free of charge. So far, the reviews for the Helper app have been very good.

“Very impressive. I have to use the R trigger to select options in the menu. Very easy to set up and use. If you keep this up I might swap to OnLive,” said one user who has download the app.

Once the OnLive Helper app is downloaded to the Xperia play, you must change the Input Method Service to “OnLive Helper”.

[Sprung]

The OnLive web browser is ready to go, but OnLive is waiting for the server load to stabilize after the huge influx of tablet/smartphone users because of the recent release of the OnLive App.

So for those of you unfamiliar with what the OnLive web browser is and what it will be used for, we will try and provide some details. It is a web browser similar to your typical browsers such as Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Internet Explorer, and Google Chrome. However, where it differs, is that it is run in the cloud. This means that websites that run bandwidth intensive applications such as flash will be loaded by high end servers with extremely fast connections to the internet. This will then be streamed to your device, whether it be a tablet, smartphone, television, PC or Mac, just like OnLive streams video games to these same devices. The results are incredible, especially on tablets and smartphones that normally would take several minutes to load up a flash based website. Using the OnLive web browser these will load almost instantly. With this said, Perlman doesn’t expect it to replace traditional web browsers.

“Whether it’s a tablet, or whether it’s a PC or Mac, you do have a browser,” said Perlman. “We don’t feel the need to completely replace the browser you have. What we would rather do is give you a browser that accelerates things that are tough to do with a local browser.”

Back in July, Perlman told us that the OnLive web browser would be free for all users. However, this may have changed in recent times with the huge influx of people being introduced to the cloud service. A better option may be to allow the browser to be used by OnLive PlayPack members (members who pay $9.99/month in the US or £6.99/month in the UK for access to over 130 different games).

[Sprung]

Have you tried the OnLive Android app yet? If not, now’s a good time because everyone that tries the app will get an email for a full PlayPass of Defense Grid Gold for free! Offer ends on Sunday so don’t waste any time.

[Sprung]

OnLive Provides Free Trial of Saints Row: The Third for 5 Hours on New Year’s Eve


Are you a fan of Saints Row: The Third, but don’t have the money to afford a copy of it? Well there is some great news for you if you feel like playing video games on New Year’s Eve.

On December 31, gamers everywhere can play the over-the-top gangsta hit Saints Row: The Third in an extended 5-hour free trial and earn achievements for a chance to win prizes. Playing either solo or with a friend, current and new OnLive players can literally be thug for a day, cruising the streets of Steelport as a member of the Saints gang and unleashing everything from human cannonball cars to satellite-targeted airstrikes in order to put a rival outfit back in their place. For every achievement players secure, they will earn an entry into the sweepstakes. Ten lucky winners each will receive an OnLive Prize Pack featuring a free Full PlayPass to the game of their choice, an OnLive® Game System (which delivers on-demand gaming to HDTVs) and a Universal OnLive Wireless Controller.

[Sprung]

OnLive Announces Borderlands Friends Fight FREE From December 28-30


Borderlands multiplayer co-op fans should take note. There is some big news coming next week!

From December 28 to December 30, the Borderlands Friends Fight FREE Sweepstakes invites gamers to join forces with their friends for three days of FREE play with the popular action RPG Borderlands.

Gamers who play Co-op during the three-day event will be automatically entered to win one of ten OnLive Prize Packs, which consist of a pack of four Full PlayPasses to games of their choice (one for the winning player and three for their friends) and a Universal OnLive Wireless Controller—recently released by OnLive to enable seamless play across tablets, smartphones, PCs, Macs, TVs and future devices.

[Sprung]

OnLive Now Works on the Sony Ericsson Xperia™ PLAY Smartphone


When OnLive first released on Android devices, owners of the Xperia PLAY Smartphone began wondering if and when the device’s game controls would work in collaboration with the OnLive service. Until today, there really has not been any word on this. However that has changed!

Today OnLive is announcing that it’s free OnLive app for Android has been updated to work with the slide-out game controls on the Sony Ericsson Xperia PLAY, smartphone*, enabling gameplay of almost all OnLive games, including the latest AAA console-class titles. The Xperia PLAY combines Android smartphone touchscreen control with what every console gamers dreams of: slide-out dedicated gaming keys, analog touch joysticks and shoulder buttons. The just-updated free OnLive Android App delivers the missing piece: AAA high-performance console-class games playable directly with the slide-out controls, streamed over the Internet for instant on-demand play.

“From the moment we launched our OnLive Android app, gamers began asking about Sony Ericsson Xperia PLAY game control support,” said Steve Perlman, OnLive Founder and CEO. “We listened and delivered. Now Xperia PLAY gamers in the US and UK can play almost all of OnLive’s 200 premium titles—including hit AAA games like Saints Row: The Third and Assassin’s Creed: Revelations—on their Xperia PLAY smartphone with a full console-class experience, including multiplayer and social features.”

Released to the Android Market on December 8, the free OnLive app is the first cloud gaming app to enable users to play high-performance, console-quality games—previously playable only on the highest-end computers and gaming systems—on devices as simple as smartphones and tablets. Unlike downloaded games, OnLive games are streamed over the internet just like streaming music and video, never taking up storage. And OnLive games are cross-platform—meaning you can start play on your PC or Mac®, then pick up your game on your smartphone and finish on a friend’s TV via the OnLive Game System with all your save game data intact. Or, play multiplayer with friends on entirely different devices. Now, with Xperia PLAY, gamers will be able to extend OnLive’s high-performance game touch experience with the greater control, better accuracy and the physical feeling of a game console controller, all in a single compact smartphone. Customers can find the OnLive app in the Android Market by following this link: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.onlive.client.

Tablet and smartphone owners who don’t own an Xperia PLAY can choose two other ways to play on an Android tablet or smartphone. They can jump instantly into free demos of 24 touch-playable games, such as Dirt 3 and Defense Grid Gold, which have been either redesigned with native touch controls or include various virtual gamepads on-screen. Or, they can play nearly every game in OnLive’s growing library using the recently released and highly-acclaimed Universal OnLive Wireless Controller, designed to optimize wireless play across tablets, smartphones, PCs, Macs, TVs and Blu-ray players.

[Sprung]

Super Street Fighter IV Launches on OnLive with Free Demo & Chance to Win Prizes

Super Street Fighter IV Arcade Edition has been one of the most awaited games on the OnLive service. Today, the game is releasing on the service with a free demo and a chance to win some really great prizes.

- Players who demo the game between 4:00 PM PST today (12:00 AM GMT 23rd December) and 11:59 PM PST January 1 (7:59 AM GMT 2nd January) will be automatically entered to win fighter-friendly prizes, including the Mad Catz Official Street Fighter IV FightPad™ and 95%-off promo codes!

- Gamers who play the game for more than three hours are automatically eligible for a Grand Prize trip to Las Vegas to watch the Evolution Championship Series, the largest and longest-running fighting game tournament in the world. Runner-up prizes include the Mad Catz Official Super Street Fighter IV FightStick™ – Tournament Edition, autographed by game producer Yoshinori Ono!

“We’re incredibly proud of everything that OnLive has been able to deliver this year and it is time for a celebration,” said Steve Perlman, OnLive Founder and CEO. “Super Street Fighter IV is not only the gold standard of fighting games, it’s the latest in a long line of AAA titles that have been added to OnLive’s growing library of almost 200 top-tier games. And, with the recent release of our free OnLive app for Android and the Universal OnLive Wireless Controller, we’re truly empowering gamers to play these high-performance games on-demand, anywhere—even on smartphones and tablets. The Winter Three-for-All is a celebration of how far OnLive cloud gaming has come, and the incredible potential for its future.”

Super Street Fighter IV Arcade Edition carries a normal price tag of $39.99 (US) and £29.99 (UK), but it is currently on sale for $19.99 (US) and £14.99 (UK). PlayPack members can take an additional 30% off these prices.

[Sprung]

OnLive gamers knew there would be sales for the Holidays. They just didn’t know when they would be announced. Well the wait is now over. OnLive has put over 40 games on sale in both the United States and the United Kingdom. Here is a list of all the current sales, including some of the one that had previously been announced:

AaaaaAAaaaAAAAa-aAAAAaAAAAA!!! – On Sale For £1.62 UK /$2.50 US
Aliens vs. Predator – On Sale For £3.75 UK /$5.00 US
Alpha Protocol – On Sale For £3.75 UK /$5.00 US
Amnesia: The Dark Descent – On Sale For £3.50 UK /$5.00 US
Assassin’s Creed II – On Sale For $14.99 US ONLY
Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood – On Sale For $29.99 US ONLY
Borderlands – On Sale For £2.50 UK /$5.00 US
Borderlands: Game of the Year Edition – On Sale For £5.00 UK /$7.50 US
Call of Juarez: The Cartel (US Only) – On Sale For $37.49 US ONLY
Darksiders – On Sale For £9.99 UK /$9.99 US
Defense Grid Gold – On Sale For £2.50 UK /$3.50 US
Duke Nukem Forever – On Sale For £7.49 UK /$9.99 US
Deus Ex: Human Revolution – On Sale For £11.90 UK /$16.99 US
Doc Clock: The Toasted Sandwich of Time – On Sale For £1.74 UK /$2.49 US
Fishdom 2 – On Sale For £3.50 UK /$5.00 US
Ghostbusters: The Video Game – On Sale For $4.99 US ONLY
Homefront – On Sale For £14.99 UK /$14.99 US
Just Cause 2 – On Sale For £3.50 UK /$5.00 US
Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days – On Sale For £3.75 UK /$5.00 US
L.A. Noire – On Sale For £17.49 UK /£24.99 US
Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light – On Sale For £2.50 UK /$3.75 US
Mafia II – On Sale For £3.75 UK /$7.50 US
Metro 2033 – On Sale For £9.99 UK /$9.99 US
MLB 2k10 – On Sale For £3.75 UK /$5.00 US
MLB 2k11 – On Sale For £7.49 UK /$9.99 US
MX vs ATV Reflex – On Sale For £7.99 UK /$9.99 US
NBA 2k10 – On Sale For £2.50 UK /$5.00 US
NBA 2k11 – On Sale For £3.99 UK /$7.49 US
Orcs Must Die! – On Sale For £5.99 UK /$7.49 US
Osmos – On Sale For £1.62 UK /$2.50 US
Patrician IV: Conquest by Trade – On Sale For £6.00 UK /$6.00 US
Puzzle Chronicles – On Sale For £3.99 UK /$4.99 US
Red Faction: Armageddon – On Sale For £7.49 UK /$14.99 US
Red Faction: Guerrilla – On Sale For £7.49 UK /$9.99 US
Remington Super Slam Hunting: Africa – On Sale For £3.50 UK /$5.00 US
Royal Envoy – On Sale For £3.50 UK /$5.00 US
Saints Row: The Third – On Sale For £29.99 UK /£20.99 US
SAW – On Sale For £9.99 UK /$9.99 US
Shaun White Skateboarding – On Sale For $14.99 US ONLY
Silent Hunter 5: Battle of the Atlantic – On Sale For $22.49 US ONLY
Super Street Fighter IV Arcade Edition – On Sale For £14.99 UK /$19.99 US
Tom Clancy’s H.A.W.X.2 – On Sale For $22.49 US ONLY
Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell Conviction – On Sale For $14.99 US ONLY
The Ball – On Sale For £3.75 UK /$5.00 US
The Maw – On Sale For £1.62 UK /$2.50 US
Tropico 4 – On Sale For £9.00 UK /$11.99 US
Virtua Tennis 2009 – On Sale For £2.50 UK /$2.50 US
Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II Chaos Rising – On Sale For £9.99 UK /$9.99 US
World of Goo – On Sale For £3.24 UK /$4.99 US

OnLive has also said that they will be holding daily deal sales, so we may even see more discounts added to this list.

[Sprung]

OnLive Adds Rush, NBA 2K12, and Driver: San Francisco To The Service


OnLive has just delivered a couple of games that were promised earlier this year and just in time for the new year. OnLive has added Rush to the PlayPack, and both NBA 2K12 and Driver: San Francisco as PlayPass releases for the marketplace. These games may be the last games added to the OnLive service this year but lets hope OnLive surprises us.

Note: this is not the Rush you are thinking of. This is a puzzle game