Could the Face of the Gaming Industry be Changing?

I recently came across a website(by getting an add on Twitter from them, actually) called OnLive. Thinking it was just another website that provided flash games or an iphone app developer, I was somewhat hesitant to click on it. My curiosity got the best of me though, and what I found inside piqued my interest ten fold.

The OnLive service is described by them to be “The Future of Video Games.” Heard that before, right? But these guys might have something here, and whether or not it will actually take to the masses, or if it is a good thing or bad, the OnLive service has the potential to change the gaming industry as we know it.

According to their not-so-fleshed-out FAQ section, they describe their service as follows: “OnLive is Games on Demand. Play the hottest current titles instantly on your TV, PC or Mac through your broadband Internet connection. Access OnLive from your PC or Mac via a small browser plug-in, or from your TV via the OnLive MicroConsole™.

Basically in real life talk it means you have the ability to buy a game completely online and own it, bypassing not only the physical copy, but the game system entirely. Even better, want to play Bioshock but don’t have an Xbox360 or a high end gaming PC? You can with this service. What makes this different from other game on demand services such as GOG.com or gametap.com(which are awesome and I highly recommend checking out) is that with those services, there is no way to play your games on your TV in such a user friendly manner. OnLive has something called a “Micro Console TV Adapter” that will allow you to play all the games you bought or rented on your TV in high definition as well as on your computer. The point they are trying to hammer home is that with their service, you do not need any kind of high end hardware to experience gaming like it is suppose to be experienced. It even comes with a sweet looking controller that kind of scares me with all of its crazy buttons.

The other strong point I see with this service is the ability to take your entire game catalog and system with you wherever you go, and fit it inside of a backpack. As long as you can connect to an internet connection, you are good to game. This combined with being able to just play your games right on your laptop, people like me who travel consistently would never be far from their library.

To good to be true? Maybe. The OnLive service is still in Beta testing at the moment but is planning on launching very soon. With big name sponsors and major coverage all over the interweb, it seems like this could change everything we know about how the game industry works. A make or break of the OnLive service for me would be pricing, and since they haven’t released details about how much it will cost or really how they will go about offering the service, only time will tell if it will take. Regardless, it still makes me extremely excited to see a growth in ideas of how to get games installed in a bigger base of people by utilizing today’s technology. Even if it ends up crashing and burning, at least they are trying something new.