Microsoft the power of the Cloud or pie in the sky

photofinish

Right now Xbox One is struggling on Multi-platform games delivering lower res and lower frames per second.

Microsoft has said when they launch the Cloud proper it will multiply the power of the console by four.

I think they are talking rubbish to try and mask that fact they released and underpowered console.

Am I wrong does anybody else thing this magic cloud is going to transform the Xbox One and the world of gaming?

2Mad2BeMad

photofinish wrote: »

Right now Xbox One is struggling on Multi-platform games delivering lower res and lower frames per second.

Microsoft has said when they launch the Cloud proper it will multiply the power of the console by four.

I think they are talking rubbish to try and mask that fact they released and underpowered console.

Am I wrong does anybody else thing this magic cloud is going to transform the Xbox One and the world of gaming?

I have a ps4 and xbox one but this just seems like a thread to flame the xbox one :pac: and no one knows what power the "cloud" has yet because it has not been introduced into the system yet
its a wait and see kinda thing, all speculation

Twilightning

500 quid at launch for a ****e console with little to no exclusives, overly expensive multiplat titles with inferior performance compared to its rivals, mandatory paid online together with putting bog standard services like Internet Explorer and Netflix behind a paywall at the same time. Revolutionary, truly next gen. I don't think this cloud business is going to fix any of that.

Pushtrak

I don't see it materializing in single player games. If a game can be played offline, then what happens when someone is offline? If there really is anything to it, then the only way I could see anything come from it would be some equivalent thing to say, Perfect Dark on the Nintendo 64 with the expansion pack. A lot of that game didn't work if you didn't have the expansion pack. Do I see developers releasing games with online mandated features? Maybe, but not many.

Retr0gamer

The game has to send information to the server, the server has to build up that info from packets then process it, convert the output to packets, send that to the machine which then converts the packets back to usable information. The lag behind that means there's no way it could really be used for rendering in fast paced games.

5uspect

It wouldn't need to be rendering performance directly. Imagine something like GTA or Skyrim with Google Earth style streaming. Why bother with optical media when you can deliver an enormous world terabytes in size over the internet? Every building could realised when you go inside. Of course this content has to created somehow.

Alternatively this could allow for complex AI and physics simulations in both single player and multiplayer games. Look at the waves in BF4. Supposedly everyone sees the same conditions while they're being disconnected and one hit-killed across the map. Imagine if that simulation was server side. Potentially it could lead to better destruction, wind and water effects that would allow for unique outcomes each time.

You could have RTS or sports games where complex AI is performed on a server and the tiny amount of data requured for the instructions sent to be rendered on your telly box.

It's kinda like Siri.

I've no love for MS or the current batch of consoles but the advent of very fast network speeds , dressed up as 'The Cloud' buzzword ****e, could be a very powerful new thing.

Retr0gamer

Again there's far too much lag for it to be used for AI or destruction effects, it just wouldn't work. Maybe it could work for morecomplex AI systems behind the scenes, perhaps in an open world where the AI continues even after it's reached the point where it's no longer rendered.

_Redzer_

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Again there's far too much lag for it to be used for AI or destruction effects, it just wouldn't work. Maybe it could work for morecomplex AI systems behind the scenes, perhaps in an open world where the AI continues even after it's reached the point where it's no longer rendered.

In reality it was all just PR talk in order to give the illusion of bridging the performance gap. I remember them talking nonstop about the power of the cloud, yet a short while later stating raw performance didn't matter.

If the cloud did work it could be used to put a lot of multiplat games on par, but that's obviously not the case.
You don't hear them banging on about the cloud these days.

Pushtrak

_Redzer_ wrote: »

If the cloud did work it could be used to put a lot of multiplat games on par, but that's obviously not the case.

Single player games/features can't really use the cloud even if it were to provide any benefit. Offline gamers would be in a bit of a pickle.

Apparently, Forza 5 uses it, as will Titanfall and apparently it only works (or will work) as it does/will on the basis of the cloud.

_Redzer_

Pushtrak wrote: »

Single player games/features can't really use the cloud even if it were to provide any benefit. Offline gamers would be in a bit of a pickle.

Apparently, Forza 5 uses it, as will Titanfall and apparently it only works (or will work) as it does/will on the basis of the cloud.

Titanfall is out on PC and 360 too, how's that working without the cloud?

Pushtrak

_Redzer_ wrote: »

Titanfall is out on PC and 360 too, how's that working without the cloud?

Presumably, the version on the One is using it in such a way that is better than in its absence. The game itself will have to make such a case though.

_Redzer_

Pushtrak wrote: »

Presumably, the version on the One is using it in such a way that is better than in its absence. The game itself will have to make such a case though.

Sounds extremely vague. If it runs on PC without the cloud, and it'll most likely run better, I see little practical need for the cloud. Sure like that we'll wait and see.

"The power of the cloud" was a PR stunt used to justify their always online DRM, since the reversal the cloud talk has sharply tapered off. I don't think it's coincidental.

Pushtrak

_Redzer_ wrote: »

Sounds extremely vague. If it runs on PC without the cloud, and it'll most likely run better, I see little practical need for the cloud. Sure like that we'll wait and see.

Well, you can get PCs that are a hell of a lot better than the One. If your yardstick for success is a console doing better than a PC then even if there are advantages to the cloud you aren't going to be satisfied. Honestly, I'd like to see it prove itself as it'd be nice to have something like this actually add something. It's the kinda thing that'd only get better as people get more reliable internet connections.

"The power of the cloud" was a PR stunt used to justify their always online DRM, since the reversal the cloud talk has sharply tapered off. I don't think it's coincidental.

Your kinda ignoring a couple of things here. Single player aspects can not use the cloud, and we aren't seeing a whole lot of talk about new games coming from MS or Sony right now anyway.

Retr0gamer

Pretty sure the PC version and 360 version will use the cloud. It's not something specific to the One.

Pushtrak

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Pretty sure the PC version and 360 version will use the cloud. It's not something specific to the One.

Yeah, you're right.

www.respawn.com/news/lets-talk-about-the-xbox-live-cloud/

So what is this Xbox Live Cloud stuff then?

Microsoft has a cloud service called Azure (it’s a real thing – you can go on their website right now and pay for servers and use them to run whatever you want). Microsoft realized that they could use that technology to solve our problem.

So they built this powerful system to let us create all sorts of tasks that they will run for us, and it can scale up and down automatically as players come and go. We can upload new programs for them to run and they handle the deployment for us. And they’ll host our game servers for other platforms, too! Titanfall uses the Xbox Live Cloud to run dedicated servers for PC, Xbox One, and Xbox 360.

But it’s not just for dedicated servers – Microsoft thought about our problem in a bigger way. Developers aren’t going to just want dedicated servers – they’ll have all kinds of features that need a server to do some kind of work to make games better. Look at Forza 5, which studies your driving style in order to create custom AI that behaves like you do. That’s totally different from what Titanfall uses it for, and it’s really cool! So it’s not accurate to say that the Xbox Live Cloud is simply a system for running dedicated servers – it can do a lot more than that.

How is this different from other dedicated servers?

With the Xbox Live Cloud, we don’t have to worry about estimating how many servers we’ll need on launch day. We don’t have to find ISPs all over the globe and rent servers from each one. We don’t have to maintain the servers or copy new builds to every server. That lets us focus on things that make our game more fun. And best yet, Microsoft has datacenters all over the world, so everyone playing our game should have a consistent, low latency connection to their local datacenter.

Most importantly to us, Microsoft priced it so that it’s far more affordable than other hosting options – their goal here is to get more awesome games, not to nickel-and-dime developers. So because of this, dedicated servers are much more of a realistic option for developers who don’t want to make compromises on their player experience, and it opens up a lot more things that we can do in an online game.

Wrapping up…

This is a really big deal, and it can make online games better. This is something that we are really excited about. The Xbox Live Cloud lets us to do things in Titanfall that no player-hosted multiplayer game can do. That has allowed us to push the boundaries in online multiplayer and that’s awesome. We want to try new ideas and let the player do things they’ve never been able to do before! Over time, I expect that we’ll be using these servers to do a lot more than just dedicated servers. This is something that’s going to let us drive all sorts of new ideas in online games for years to come.

AirBiscuit

Pushtrak wrote: »

Yeah, you're right.

www.respawn.com/news/lets-talk-about-the-xbox-live-cloud/

Good news for Irish gamers then, because one or Microsoft's 2 european datacentres is in Dublin. Low pings all around!

COYVB

My vague understanding of how it partially works is that it does the heavy lifting and processing, simply outpouring the results to a server for stuff like particle effects, learning ai and character interactions

5uspect

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Again there's far too much lag for it to be used for AI or destruction effects, it just wouldn't work. Maybe it could work for morecomplex AI systems behind the scenes, perhaps in an open world where the AI continues even after it's reached the point where it's no longer rendered.

There a a difference between the fine grained visual effects and the overall simulation. Almost all fluid and solid mechanics simulations are about resolving stresses and strains in a fluid volume or structure split up into a volumetric mesh. These simulations are massively parallel and can take a long time to solve to accurate levels for engineering purposes. You can quickly get a first order result in realtime on a fast accelerator board like a GPGPU.

So imagine a game with a bridge over a river. The cloud side would monitor the coupled fluid structure interaction of the river on the bridge. So in some sort of shooter game impacts and explosions would feed into the simulation boundary conditions within milliseconds. The frequency response of the bridge structure is measured in seconds. As the bridge starts to deform as members are destroyed the rushing water will play a role in how further deformation occurs. The various AI would receive instructions on overall strategy (dig in and shoot from cover, retreat, flank to left or right) depending on the overall game activity with animations and individual decisions done locally.

The fluid vector field and bridge deformation coordinates are tiny vectors that would take minimal bandwidth but would be impossible to compute locally.

Lag here isn't an issue. A few fractions of a second on AI stance and decision making while the dumb AI locally fill the gaps would not matter. It's no different than a realistic command structure.

As a I said the bridge structure and fluid respond relatively slowly. You can garnish the result and render it as pretty as you like locally. You're only updating a local mesh and vector field.

sweetie

photofinish wrote: »

Right now Xbox One is struggling on Multi-platform games delivering lower res and lower frames per second.

Microsoft has said when they launch the Cloud proper it will multiply the power of the console by four.

I think they are talking rubbish to try and mask that fact they released and underpowered console.

Am I wrong does anybody else thing this magic cloud is going to transform the Xbox One and the world of gaming?

First a Wii u is dead thread, then this Xbone one, when are you starting the PS4 version?

Shiminay

Well, we all know how well so called cloud based processing worked out for Sim City...

Cloud computing for dedicated servers? Well big woop, that's the sort of thing cloud computing was built for.

photofinish

sweetie wrote: »

First a Wii u is dead thread, then this Xbone one, when are you starting the PS4 version?

To be honest I had lost a lot of interest in gaming until I got GTA V.

I have jumped back into gaming with this new generation.

This is the board to discuss such things.

Overheal

I could see the technology used to affect things that are not player driven. As others said, you could have cloud-driven weather systems. A server could tell the trees in the game to sway in a particular direction as the wind changes, or drive the "idle" behavior of AI within the game - done poorly for simcity, but frankly there is no reason to assume it won't improve with time, everything else does. The more tasks you can offload from the console, the better of course. Realistically any data you don't need within say 1000ms can be pushed to the cloud, like static shadow calculation for time of day in the game, etc. - in a racing game, you could also use the cloud to say, use the driver's lap data to recalculate the road conditions of the track after they have driven through it. Particularly in off-road, say you do a pretty nasty drift on your first lap, that will then have an immediate repercussion on the condition of that section for the remainder of the race. For that matter the server can govern the things that games don't normally store in memory indefinitely, like loot/debris/corpses/bullet-damage and something like that, honestly, can definitely give the games engine a performance lift.

marco_polo

Think overheal is near spot on there, it just doesn't seem like it can have any use when it comes to real time fps performance but on the other hand it seems custom designed for remembering things like that chair you knocked over 50 hours ago in Skyrim (And load of othe much more clever applications but that all I can think of, creativity is not a strong point:)).

JustAddWater

Retr0gamer wrote: »

The game has to send information to the server, the server has to build up that info from packets then process it, convert the output to packets, send that to the machine which then converts the packets back to usable information. The lag behind that means there's no way it could really be used for rendering in fast paced games.

The same could be said for anything online. super hd streaming of movies on netflix for example, works excellent

The word your looking for is buffering

3rdDegree

Do you think the cloud will allow Tomb Raider to run at the same fps as it does on the PS4? I think not. I'd say it's all BS.

Magill

Overheal wrote: »

I could see the technology used to affect things that are not player driven. As others said, you could have cloud-driven weather systems. A server could tell the trees in the game to sway in a particular direction as the wind changes, or drive the "idle" behavior of AI within the game - done poorly for simcity, but frankly there is no reason to assume it won't improve with time, everything else does. The more tasks you can offload from the console, the better of course. Realistically any data you don't need within say 1000ms can be pushed to the cloud, like static shadow calculation for time of day in the game, etc. - in a racing game, you could also use the cloud to say, use the driver's lap data to recalculate the road conditions of the track after they have driven through it. Particularly in off-road, say you do a pretty nasty drift on your first lap, that will then have an immediate repercussion on the condition of that section for the remainder of the race. For that matter the server can govern the things that games don't normally store in memory indefinitely, like loot/debris/corpses/bullet-damage and something like that, honestly, can definitely give the games engine a performance lift.

But surely its all going to be very limited by datarates and bandwidth ? Its not like your streaming a compressed video feed of the data that you get with Playstation Now. The memory bandwidth available on xbox one is like 70,000mb/s and considering that the average broadband speed in the developed world is only 8MB/s (1mb/s of actual throughput), surely its not realistic to expect noticeable gains from using the cloud to process data ?

And i mean, who would actually want a game to hog up all their bandwidth anyway ? You wouldn't beable to use it in online games because your latency would make the game unplayable !

Maybe i've missed something important tho.

3rdDegree

Do you think the cloud will allow Tomb Raider to run at the same fps as it does on the PS4? I think not. I'd say it's all BS.

Taylor365

Excuse my ignorance if I'm out right wrong. I don't tend to read up the hype surrounding consoles.

The cloud is used for playing saved games anywhere (aka your saved game can be played at your house, your mates, the pub if you login to their box.) Anything else is bullsh*t. (I PRESUME )

It could handle sending the smallest of data that doesn't require real-time response but using it for actual processing is going backwards. Why even buy an xbox one if the processing is offshored? Original xbox could play the same games if that was the case.

Processing in the cloud is slower than processing on the machine. This is the reason OnLive isn't dominating the gaming industry.

Icyseanfitz

a load of balderdash

Cuddlesworth

Taylor365 wrote: »

It could handle sending the smallest of data that doesn't require real-time response but using it for actual processing is going backwards. Why even buy an xbox one if the processing is offshored? Original xbox could play the same games if that was the case.

Onlive is quite good, latency is a problem with twitch games. If onlive had a datacenter in Dublin with direct links to the ISP's here I doubt most people would notice.

Taylor365 wrote: »

Processing in the cloud is slower than processing on the machine. This is the reason OnLive isn't dominating the gaming industry.

No, its not. The cloud is a marketing term for shared resources which when done right can lead to lower costs. For the games industry it could make a huge difference to the way resources are used. If the xbox had enough players for 1000 active servers, it could have 1000 active servers. If it needs a ramp up to 10,000 active servers, it can.

The issue with cloud computing is latency. The Ideal setup of a datacenter is it running at 80% utilization 24/7. The reality is that most applications of cloud use require a level of back and forth exchange, that creates issues when there is a significant amount of time for those exchanges to take place. So the datacenters get used heavily maybe 8/5. If you can get other services to use this out of hours, you can push that up to 14/5 and start to make more money and reduce costs. I'm assuming thats what they are trying to do now.

Retr0gamer

The power of the cloud is this generations blast processing or emotion engine.

Otacon

TBH the company that has announced something cloud-related that I am genuinely excited about is Sony, with their PlayStation Now stuff.

CiDeRmAn

Retr0gamer wrote: »

The power of the cloud is this generations blast processing or emotion engine.

I was just about to post the same thing.
It sounds like bull and its going to bite MS in the backside when there's no demonstrable difference in performance between an online and offline Xbox One.

Taylor365

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

No, its not. The cloud is a marketing term for shared resources which when done right can lead to lower costs.

Is the cloud not virtual space managed by data centers?

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

The issue with cloud computing is latency.

What i had just said:

It could handle sending the smallest of data that doesn't require real-time response

Small data packets can be instant but anything of substantial size would take time.

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

The Ideal setup of a datacenter is it running at 80% utilization 24/7. The reality is that most applications of cloud use require a level of back and forth exchange, that creates issues when there is a significant amount of time for those exchanges to take place. So the datacenters get used heavily maybe 8/5. If you can get other services to use this out of hours, you can push that up to 14/5 and start to make more money and reduce costs. I'm assuming thats what they are trying to do now.

So more money for them, more latency for xbox owners?

beercr8te

The power of the cloud is just Microsoft's PR BS, it won't make a single difference in narrowing the large power difference between the xbone and ps4.

Cuddlesworth

Taylor365 wrote: »

Is the cloud not virtual space managed by data centers?

Cloud could be any number of IT services which are hosted in the most logical location for it, a datacenter. In networking, the symbol of a cloud is used to signify the Internet. This is because you know its there and how to get to it, but you have no control over it. Marketing people jumped on the symbol for anything related to shared services. And they can be quite distinct and varied.

Taylor365 wrote: »

What i had just said:
Small data packets can be instant but anything of substantial size would take time.

That's nothing to do with packet size and everything to do with bandwidth. Which Europe in Particular has in quite good quantity's. And games use f all bandwidth.

Taylor365 wrote: »

So more money for them, more latency for xbox owners?

More money for them, better services for you, less latency for you since Microsofts north Europe Azure datacenter is located in Dublin.

Chairman Meow

Anyone who knows anything about 'teh cloud' for real, knows that this is bull**** of the highest order.

Taylor365

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

More money for them, better services for you, less latency for you since Microsofts north Europe Azure datacenter is located in Dublin.

How can it be less latency than running the processes local?

Chairman Meow

Taylor365 wrote: »

How can it be less latency than running the processes local?

Exactly. This is what people fail to understand, even if the datacenter was next door to you, it would still generate more latency than doing it on the actual machine. No matter how good your connection is, if its going out to the internet, and back to your machine, it will always be slower than processing it locally. Claiming that they can offload CPU/GPU workload to the cloud is ****ing ridiculous

Cuddlesworth

Taylor365 wrote: »

How can it be less latency than running the processes local?

Considering the vast majority of games are multiplayer focused, I'm assuming that this is what they are really talking about.

You seem to be assuming that something that could be done local, would be done by a server somewhere. Thats not going to happen. The reason thats not going to happen, is that it add costs to Microsoft and removes cost from you, as well as making the service worse. Why would they do that? Its a huge investment in API's and servers for something that don't need to do.

I think your all taking this wrong. Microsoft has datacenters doing nothing during the evenings, from a business point of view it would cost them little to transition away from local hosting of multiplayer games to server hosting of games. You know, that thing that makes them better to play.

Wossack

Chairman Meow wrote: »

Exactly. This is what people fail to understand, even if the datacenter was next door to you, it would still generate more latency than doing it on the actual machine. No matter how good your connection is, if its going out to the internet, and back to your machine, it will always be slower than processing it locally. Claiming that they can offload CPU/GPU workload to the cloud is ****ing ridiculous

There is an aspect of truth to it though, but whether or not MS can actually deliver on it is another matter entirely..

For an example of it (taken to a bit of an extreme), theres a group of guys who play milsims called ShackTac, and on their huge arma2 games they've offloaded the AI processing (extremely CPU bound) from their dedicated server to another headless client:

http://www.pcgamer.com/2012/11/09/realism-theater-arma-2-cinder-city/


People have been snubbed by the SimCity fiasco, so rightfully suspect about it (the term 'cloud' is far too ambiguous anyway), but I do think there is a potential for it in some scenarios

astrofool

It will be used to add complexity to scenes, it won't be able to change a 60fps 720p segment to 1080p, that needs the local hardware, but within those resolutions/framerates, a lot of other complex items can happen.

It would only make a difference to framerates if it was the AI process that was sucking up all the CPU/GPU power for a scene due to having to calculate a small dataset in real time, rather than let the cloud process all possible outcomes before hand.

jenjenten

Lets face it....The Cloud is the only marketing tool they have left to sell the Xbox One.....i belive we'll see a kinectless SKU for Xmas 2014.

Genghiz Cohen

Plus, anything MS can do on Der Clowd, Sony can copy with a few months of work.