78 TECH ADVISOR • FEBRUARY 2020FEATURE
I’ve been trying the Project xCloud beta off and on
for more than a week now. Keep in mind that Microsoft
is actually testing two betas at the moment: Xbox
Console Streaming, where you’re streaming games you
own from your Xbox to a mobile phone or tablet; and
Project xCloud, which takes a pre-selected batch of
four games and allows you to play them over a wireless
connection. I’ve tested only the latter, though the
former is now live for Xbox Insiders.Let’s pause to talk about lag
In both cases, a pleasurable gaming experience boils
down to one factor: latency, or the time it takes for
you to react to a given scene and input a controller
movement or button press, and for the game to
respond accordingly.
On a ‘local’ console or PC, that latency or lag is
almost nothing. Though some professional gamers
will use wired mice to minimize the lag that can occur
between the wireless connections on a PC, lag is rarely
noticeable on single-player games if you’re running on
an up-to-date machine. It becomes somewhat worse
if you’re playing a multiplayer match online, even if
you’re on a high-speed wired connection. OnLive, which
pioneered cloud gaming before flaming out, succeeded
technically but failed as a business operation.
It becomes even more pronounced if you’re playing
games remotely, over a wireless connection. Microsoft
implemented game streaming on Windows 10 in 2015,
where you could take a Windows PC and play games
streamed to it from a console elsewhere in your home,
over a wireless connection. (Xbox Console Streaming is78 TECH ADVISOR • FEBRUARY 2020FEATURE
I’ve been trying the Project xCloud beta off and on
for more than a week now. Keep in mind that Microsoft
is actually testing two betas at the moment: Xbox
Console Streaming, where you’re streaming games you
own from your Xbox to a mobile phone or tablet; and
Project xCloud, which takes a pre-selected batch of
four games and allows you to play them over a wireless
connection.I’vetestedonlythelatter,thoughthe
formeris now live for Xbox Insiders.Let’s pause to talk about lag
In both cases, a pleasurable gaming experience boils
down to one factor: latency, or the time it takes for
you to react to a given scene and input a controller
movementorbuttonpress,andforthegameto
respondaccordingly.
On a ‘local’ console or PC, that latency or lag is
almost nothing. Though some professional gamers
will use wired mice to minimize the lag that can occur
between the wireless connections on a PC, lag is rarely
noticeable on single-player games if you’re running on
an up-to-date machine. It becomes somewhat worse
if you’re playing a multiplayer match online, even if
you’re on a high-speed wired connection. OnLive, which
pioneered cloud gaming before flaming out, succeeded
technically but failed as a business operation.
It becomes even more pronounced if you’re playing
games remotely, over a wireless connection. Microsoft
implemented game streaming on Windows 10 in 2015,
where you could take a Windows PC and play games
streamed to it from a console elsewhere in your home,
over a wireless connection. (Xbox Console Streaming is