This article is from WeChat public account: smart relativity (ID: aixdlun) , author: programming prodigal son, from the title figure: vision China

After Google released Stadia on November 19th, Microsoft immediately announced that its XGP-based cloud gaming platform xCloud plans to conduct a preview test in early December. After the basic prototype was proposed by G-cluster of Finland 20 years ago, Cloud games appear more and more times in our field of vision. The storms of overseas manufacturers have not subsided, and domestic manufacturers are also actively making arrangements.

Huawei officially released the cloud game management service platform on June 17th at the Global Game Conference. On November 26, 2019, the first internal test of the “5G Sesame” cloud game platform under Chengdu Leadworld Network Technology Co., Ltd.

In addition, many domestic game companies such as Tencent and Netease are actively deploying cloud games. For a while, cloud games seemed to be the next hot market outlet, and the grand occasion of “everyone is a cloud player” seems to be at hand.

We can’t help wondering how to play cloud games in the first year of 5G?

1. Cloud games and their ambiguous play experience


The original starting point of cloud games is to reduce the player ’s hardware investment by only feeding the game screen through cloud streaming on the game. “Junk hardware can also experience top-notch masterpieces” is the goal of a cloud game vendor. For example, the general manager of the domestic manufacturer Shanghai Dalong Information Technology mentioned in the interview that “cloud games allow users to play terminal games on mobile phones, which can help users save money.”

But from this point of view, cloud games still have a long way to go. 80% of the gaming experience in Stadia can be close to normal, and the remaining 20% ​​of the time there is a frame freeze, which is a fatal point for the game. Many other castrations in order to adapt to the network situation, such as fake 4k screens, insufficient game content, etc., are due to the limitations of small water pipes.

According to Accenture ’s “Network Readiness Survey Report”, less than 40% of respondents have overall ability on their network. span> and bandwidth (38%) are “very satisfied”. Half or less of respondents have (43%) , security (50%) and reliability 2. Mobile or mainframe: Where does cloud gaming really matter?


The cloud game market will not directly impact the existing game market structure. The second key reason is that the core users’ playing habits are highly stable.


For console and PC gamers, although there is still a large gap between the experience of using cloud games and the experience of traditional game hardware, writing about game types can also attract the attention of some hardcore players. For example, Sony’s PSNOW, a streaming game subscription platform, allows players to experience the games of the PS3 generation that have passed away on the PC, satisfying the nostalgia of some hardcore players.

But fundamentally, Heavyweight works and mobile mobile games on the host and PC The two different tracks currently on the road, not only do players have a chain of contempt, from < strong> There are big differences in gameplay and ecology, and the habits of different groups of players have very high stability.


Mobile gameplay is mainly fragmented, lightweight, and non-heavy. Mobile users are not inclined to pursue hard-core gamers’ image quality and gameplay details. Social, topical, and casual herding effects are very typical in this group of players. And for lightweight players on the mobile end, the host and heavy PC are often rejected by these players due to higher learning costs.

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Picture: Complex contempt chain in domestic game circle

5G + Game ≠ 5G + Cloud Game


The theory of intelligent relativity believes that the core problem of cloud games currently is not when the network infrastructure that can support cloud games can be popularized. It is the question of what players will play with cloud games when the bandwidth of cloud games is sufficient .


From the current insufficient experience of cloud games, we can define it as early adopter black technology.

Many people may not know that Nintendo has released a virtual device, virtual boy, in 80 years. After the release, it quickly died because of a bad experience. Although 30 years after the development of VR technology, there are already HTC vive and PSVR. For mass production equipment, the product characteristics of the early adopter black technology still have not been shaken off.

In this context, whether the future of cloud games on the console side can attract new and old players still depends more on the traditional gameplay—the richness of the game ecosystem, the stable cooperative relationship with game producers, and players. Community building, etc. After all, there are so many layers involved in games, and it’s not a single gimmick that totally relies on the cloud to save hardware costs. Lightweight players are not interested in masterpieces with high hardware configuration, and the hardware cost is actually not an obstacle for core and semi-core players. After all, the price of a game console is only the price of a low-end mobile phone .

Slightly inferring from the previous point, platform-based gameplay will still be mainstream on cloud games on the host and PC, and the first-mover advantage of the old game platform will be more competitive. Steam has not yet made clear on cloud games. The trend is likely to be based on considerations of the existing game industry ecology.

Steam is a typical product of the WEB2.0 era. It is a mode of user registration, online purchase and download of virtual products, and supporting community content such as player reviews, self-funded games, and player game appreciation. The situation of the rivers and lakes has also fundamentally improved the player’s experience in genuine games. After Steam entered China, the number of genuine Chinese users increased from 14 million in 2017 to 30 million in 2018.

Google is more like a cloud service provider. Stadia has been criticized for having a long way to go for the gaming experience and the platform ’s blank game ecosystem. Even the long-term maintenance of the best Sony in the exclusive ecosystem, the trend of multi-platform game registration by manufacturers has not been fully realized. Blocking while onlytext-remarks “label =” Remarks “> This article is from the WeChat public account: Smart Relativity (ID: aixdlun) , of: programming Joe