OnLive CEO Says Service Is Not For Hardcore Gamers

When you’re creating a service advertised to play hardcore games without a costly computer, it’s a little confusing to say it’s not for hardcore gamers.

OnLive CEO Steve Perlman is doing anything he can to prove the value of his service’s game streaming technology. However, he may have made a misstep in a recent interview with CNet where he said the service is not for the hardcore.

“If you’re a hardcore gamer and you’ve got a big rig and you want the highest quality graphics than OnLive is not the place where you’re going to play your high-end game,” he said. This appears to be in stark contrast to earlier statements that led us to believe that OnLive could play high-end games on maximum settings through a television with nothing required other than an internet connection.

Instead, he appears to paint it more “as a demo service, as a rental service, as a purchase service, as a social network.” He says: “To not have a huge download in order to trial something before you make the purchase decision, why not? Just click OnLive and give it a go. If you like it, terrific. Download the thing from Steam or order a copy on DVD.”

Perlman might be talking about the top 1% of gamers here; the kind that have no qualms about spending $1000 on the newest upgrade every four months. He could mean that OnLive isn’t going to be a replacement for the type of a player that always has to have bleeding edge hardware. Still, I got the impression that OnLive was particularly designed to replicate the high-end so that people wouldn’t have to spend thousands of dollars to build their own computers.

I don’t think anybody expects OnLive to replace a constantly upgraded big-rig computer, but does this statement mean high-end games can’t be played as previously indicated? I don’t mean to look too much into it, but it’s a bit confusing after being told I would be able to play games such as Crysis on maximum settings through OnLive. At least the service is pretty much free so it can be wholly tested without too much risk for now.

Source: CNet