There are still several details about the Stadia platform and it's inner workings that make discussing it's future a bit of guessing game.
Let's focus on a particular segment, online competitive gaming and its nemesis, the inherent latency of the platform. We are not talking about Esports, that's another beast. We are just talking about games that have an online competitive component.
A fighting game example:
Let's take Street Fighter 5.
- Without considering controllers and monitors, the game itself has about 4.5 frames of lag.
- The game's servers do matchmaking but the connections while playing a match are peer to peer (iirc), with whatever added latency that might entail.
Let's imagine a scenario where Capcom develops Street Fighter 6 for the Stadia Platform where the 2 previous points are developed differently:
- The game itself has a target delay of as close to 0 as possible.
- The game's servers do matchmaking, but when you are matched, you and the other player are connected to the same machine inside Stadia, basically playing an offline match, online.
Since the streaming platforms have an average delay of 5 frames, could this be a solution?
A first person shooter example:
Let's take Overwatch:
- Let's say the average player has a communication delay of 25-70ms while talking to the server during play (1.5 - 4.2 frames delay).
- Enthusiast players usually have higher/uncapped (140fps+) frame-rates for the smoothest tracking of targets possible.
In this case, is there even any technological approach to bridge the gap between the experience the players are used to and the constraints of the platform?
Is the console competitive gaming experience, the most Stadia can aspire to provide? If that?
Is competitive gaming as we know it locked outside the platform or is it dependent on a leapfrog advancement in network technology?
Let's focus on a particular segment, online competitive gaming and its nemesis, the inherent latency of the platform. We are not talking about Esports, that's another beast. We are just talking about games that have an online competitive component.
A fighting game example:
Let's take Street Fighter 5.
- Without considering controllers and monitors, the game itself has about 4.5 frames of lag.
- The game's servers do matchmaking but the connections while playing a match are peer to peer (iirc), with whatever added latency that might entail.
Let's imagine a scenario where Capcom develops Street Fighter 6 for the Stadia Platform where the 2 previous points are developed differently:
- The game itself has a target delay of as close to 0 as possible.
- The game's servers do matchmaking, but when you are matched, you and the other player are connected to the same machine inside Stadia, basically playing an offline match, online.
Since the streaming platforms have an average delay of 5 frames, could this be a solution?
A first person shooter example:
Let's take Overwatch:
- Let's say the average player has a communication delay of 25-70ms while talking to the server during play (1.5 - 4.2 frames delay).
- Enthusiast players usually have higher/uncapped (140fps+) frame-rates for the smoothest tracking of targets possible.
In this case, is there even any technological approach to bridge the gap between the experience the players are used to and the constraints of the platform?
Is the console competitive gaming experience, the most Stadia can aspire to provide? If that?
Is competitive gaming as we know it locked outside the platform or is it dependent on a leapfrog advancement in network technology?
