Thoughts on Cloud Gaming

In the last few years, some companies have been pushing a thing called cloud gaming. On paper, this is a way for people that can't afford high-end gaming hardware to access more demanding games via internet streaming.

In reality, it has lots of issues. Bad internet infrastructure and performance aside, this thing will become the nightmare of every archivist should it become successful.

I have personally never played any cloud-based games, but the implications of this technology is very concerning.

Cloud-based gaming is pretty much like using Teamviewer or Anydesk. What you possess is a client that can connect to a server that stream the game back to you. The client is able to listen to your input so that you can play the game.

What is so concerning about this technology is that it is the ultimate form of DRM. You do not own the game. All you have is a license to play a reflection of it.

The games' files are not your computer or console. They are on some distant server you do not have access to. One day, those servers will shut down, meaning you will lose access to that game.

As the writing of this, all cloud games I am aware of are ports of existing ones. As an alternative platform, it's not a big concern. That being said, things will get ugly when some games will release as cloud-only.

Archiving these games will be impossible. While game footage of a game will be able to be recorded, the actual game executable will be lost if the game gets delisted or if the servers holding the executable shut down.

Another problem is that corporations have full control over the access to the game. This means they can at any time revoke your license to play the game. They could also change the pricing of the game on the fly.

A potential scenario that I foresee is a player paying to get access to X game. Then at a later date, they could "update" the price and forcing you to pay an extra fee to access to play the game you already "bought".

While it is true that most modern non-cloud games also have a revokable license or some form of DRM, as long as you still have the executable and it's files, there should theoretically be a way to restore the game (unless it's an online-only game, such as an MMORPG).

You simply don't have this option with cloud gaming. It is truly the stuff of nightmares for archivists.

I hope that it disappears, but I have feeling that the worst is yet to come...

Written by manpaint on 23 August 2022.