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Xcloud preview impressions

AnotherDayAnotherDollar

The Fallen
Oct 31, 2017
5,632
As someone who travels a lot this is right up my alley. Highly interested.

Questions:

1) Does it work with Fire HD? iPad? If so is there an accessory that I can use with the Xbox controller to connect to the tablet for a good playing experience? Similar to what's connected to the phone in the main picture in the OP. Can we actually buy those dongle things?
2) Will Scarlett games also stream or no word on that yet?
3) Will OG XBox and 360 games stream? Specifically, if I had to pick one game or two, KOTOR?
 
Irrotational

Irrotational

Prophet of Truth
Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,137
This made me chuckle :)

I just got the invite last night. I gave borderlands 2 a shot this morning in "bad" conditions. Glasgow airport on a 4g partial strength connection.

The game was...just about playable. I got in and made progress through an easy side mission. I wouldn't want to attempt "hard" content on it.

Overall I was actually impressed that it with how well it held up under bad circumstances.

Interestingly, the console I was streaming from thought it was 9 p.m. rather than the 6 a.m. it is in my local time.

I *think* that's west coast us time!?
 
Irrotational

Irrotational

Prophet of Truth
Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,137
SpartyCrunch said:
Just a bug in the preview :-)

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Ah interesting, cheers!

I've been trying it out today and it was actually kind of playable on my standard 4g connection. Weirdly though, at home on WiFi tonight it's pretty bad. A flatmate is streaming but the connection should be good enough to support two video streams down (and send my button pressed up).

I need to do some more testing over the next few days. The setup and app etc is super slick. I just need the UK to significantly improve its internet infrastructure...
 
cyrribrae

cyrribrae

Chicken Chaser
Member
Jan 21, 2019
12,723
Irrotational said:
Ah interesting, cheers!

I've been trying it out today and it was actually kind of playable on my standard 4g connection. Weirdly though, at home on WiFi tonight it's pretty bad. A flatmate is streaming but the connection should be good enough to support two video streams down (and send my button pressed up).

I need to do some more testing over the next few days. The setup and app etc is super slick. I just need the UK to significantly improve its internet infrastructure...
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Yea, surprisingly playable is the operative term. I've found it can be a bit up and down. It's somewhat sensitive to any wiggles in my internet set up. One playthrough everything works and another I just have to wait it out. But, personally, hasn't really bothered me unless it's an extended period. I'm already used to console streaming to my Win10 PC and that can occasionally cut out for no reason as well. Plus, there's latency from the bluetooth controller (at least I haven't had to go through any weird apps to get mine to work haha) and from restreaming through a chromecast for funsies. The fact that I can still play an action games (albeit ones that don't require pinpoint accuracy - the way I like it ;) haha) is pretty awesome.
 
Irrotational

Irrotational

Prophet of Truth
Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,137
OK a bit more of a summary of my impressions

1. Glasgow airport - 4g (three network)
Video streaming was fine and latency seemed ok. I only got to test it for around 10 minutes on Pyuo Pyuo.

2. London city - 4G (three network)
As above

3. East london home 2.4ghz wifi - someone else streaming films
Really bad - after 10-15 minutes of trying to run the connection it settled down enough for me to complete the first level of ACE combat. Text was tiny and lots of artifacting and dropped connections in the cutscenes. Generally button latency seemed fine, but definitely there.

4. East london home 2.4 wifi - sole use
Still had a couple of video drops, but button press latency was tolerable. Managed to get to the first boss in Bloodstained....didn't really fancy trtying to beat the boss on that connection though.

Anyone with good reflexes, or used to gaming at 144Ghz refresh rates, is going to have a bad time...but I think I could reliably complete levels fo games on "easy" or "normal" difficulty with this tech.

Having it as an optional add-on to my existing hardware and software is amazing...buying this tech as a standalone product would be a very tough sell.
 
Footos22

Footos22

Member
Oct 25, 2017
3,771
Trying it now on my phone. With a PS4 controller Was awful to start. Then realised I was on 2.5ghz.

I'm on 350mb virgin media

As soon as I changed was night and day.

I'm a believer. It's so good.

Tried halo 5 on 2.5ghz (was me not knowing) was lag central same for Forza 4

Changed it. Got through intro of Forza flawlessly.

Killer instinct had a bit of input lag but was certainly playable cos of the way you do combos.

F1 2019 blew me away how responsive it was.

Then back to halo 5 and I am now 100% on board. Just wow.

Rip stadia
 
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ProLogY

Banned
May 19, 2018
62
Irrotational said:
OK a bit more of a summary of my impressions

1. Glasgow airport - 4g (three network)
Video streaming was fine and latency seemed ok. I only got to test it for around 10 minutes on Pyuo Pyuo.

2. London city - 4G (three network)
As above

3. East london home 2.4ghz wifi - someone else streaming films
Really bad - after 10-15 minutes of trying to run the connection it settled down enough for me to complete the first level of ACE combat. Text was tiny and lots of artifacting and dropped connections in the cutscenes. Generally button latency seemed fine, but definitely there.

4. East london home 2.4 wifi - sole use
Still had a couple of video drops, but button press latency was tolerable. Managed to get to the first boss in Bloodstained....didn't really fancy trtying to beat the boss on that connection though.

Anyone with good reflexes, or used to gaming at 144Ghz refresh rates, is going to have a bad time...but I think I could reliably complete levels fo games on "easy" or "normal" difficulty with this tech.

Having it as an optional add-on to my existing hardware and software is amazing...buying this tech as a standalone product would be a very tough sell.
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Honestly I'm shocked it even runs at all on 2.4ghz wifi.. Game streaming performace will improve for you dramatically if you connect to a 5ghz signal.
 
speedomodel

speedomodel

Member
Oct 27, 2017
3,166
I played about 30 minutes of Mark of the Ninja the other night on my home WiFi. Felt good, played very well. There was a small section where the game lagged out and stuttered for a few seconds which resulted in me getting killed, but it restarted at checkpoint and no issues from there on.

Wifi is 100mbps down 65mbps up. Will probably try out some other games this weekend.
 
Irrotational

Irrotational

Prophet of Truth
Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,137
ProLogY MilesQ I hardly use wi-fi for anything so I had no idea 5 jiggly Hertz was so much better.

My phone is just auto connecting at 2.4, the router does 5ghz too. I'll try forcing 5ghz only and see what happens.
 

ProLogY

Banned
May 19, 2018
62
Irrotational said:
ProLogY MilesQ I hardly use wi-fi for anything so I had no idea 5 jiggly Hertz was so much better.

My phone is just auto connecting at 2.4, the router does 5ghz too. I'll try forcing 5ghz only and see what happens.
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Good! It's a lower latency connection so you should use it whenever possible on your WiFi enabled devices. Let us know what it's like on the 5ghz connection!
 
LavaBadger

LavaBadger

Member
Nov 14, 2017
4,988
Haven't played a lot of games with it, but not super impressed with how xCloud feels. Bloodstained and Rad were playable, but there was a clear latency difference. I certainly wouldn't choose to play that way, but it's impressive that it works at all.

Was a lot more impressed with console streaming, but Steam has been doing that will for some time, so I shouldn't be surprised.

I'm 100/100 on FiOS. Anything other than 5ghz works like total garbage. Literally just picked up a WiFi mesh for this purpose.
 
Mesoian

Mesoian

▲ Legend ▲
Member
Oct 28, 2017
26,432
So I just played some KI using this.

And it felt PRETTY GOOD.

That's, by far, the most impressive thing I've felt thus far.

I also played some Darksiders 3 and that felt terrible because the visual and audio queues don't match the new button press timing now that there's latency. Makes the defensive aspect of combat feel bad.
 
MattB

MattB

Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
2,902
Just got in and tested gears 5. Ran smooth! Controls are a bit laggy but nothing too crazy.
 
Governergrimm

Governergrimm

Member
Jun 25, 2019
6,537
Finally got in, tried a little Halo 5, and west of dead. West of dead wouldn't load and Halo worked pretty well. Was surprised that Halo felt like 60 fps for the most part. Some lag for sure but nothing that effected my already bad fps skills. Overall really impressed with what I tried.
 
Theswweet

Theswweet

RPG Site
Verified
Oct 25, 2017
6,405
California
Tried DMCV on public wifi (with like 20+ other folks on the connection) and quite frankly I'm shocked how well it fared. MS is gonna win the streaming wars.
 
SatoAilDarko

SatoAilDarko

Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,824
Can you currently stream any game you own from you home console?

Also it appears most of the phone clips for the controller are the same exact Chinese one with a steal clip in the back. Anybody have the same or different clip and can share thoughts on it? Gonna have to open an Xbox One S controller I bought for Bluetooth. Still using the older controller before that one.

Thanks for any information.

Got invited today but the app won't work on my six year-old Galaxy Note 3. If they was a full-in field for Other I definitely entered the Note 3. Anyway I applied because I'm definitely buying a new phone this Black Friday.
 

Deleted member 8860

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 26, 2017
6,525
Played a bit of Bloodstained and Tekken on my Pixel 3a with an XBO controller clipped on. Honestly, the screen is just too small for these games, but the input latency was pretty tolerable. Maybe when it comes to iOS I'll give it another shot on my iPad.

I had hoped that the games would start up instantly and have minimal load times, but it feels like a stock console experience, unfortunately.
 
Pazusama

Pazusama

Member
Jun 2, 2018
97
Liverpool
Honestly, I don't get how you people can play fighting games or shooter with it, latency sucks balls and I got I tested it using a 350mbit fiber connection in 5ghz wifi. :\
And yet, why offering cloud gaming of the console versions of this game when you can make people play those same games, with better settings, in their pc versions? Tekken 7 is ATROCIOUS on Xbox One :\ and has never been patched.
 

Genio88

Banned
Jun 4, 2018
964
The 4G experience is not accurate since we don't know what speed and ping were, should have done a speedtest before trying it out, i'm only interested in the streaming services to play games on mobile and tablet since i already have a gaming PC and console at home, so i hope they will improve over 4g and 5g in the future
 
OP
OP
Anthony Hopkins

Anthony Hopkins

Banned
Feb 10, 2018
17,534
emag said:
Played a bit of Bloodstained and Tekken on my Pixel 3a with an XBO controller clipped on. Honestly, the screen is just too small for these games, but the input latency was pretty tolerable. Maybe when it comes to iOS I'll give it another shot on my iPad.

I had hoped that the games would start up instantly and have minimal load times, but it feels like a stock console experience, unfortunately.
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I think the only way for less load times is for games to be already loaded and being played by an AI
 

Deleted member 8860

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 26, 2017
6,525
Anthony Hopkins said:
I think the only way for less load times is for games to be already loaded and being played by an AI
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Microsoft could be running these games via virtual machines and save states backed by high end hardware including fast storage, which is the kind of thing that happens in the enterprise world for remote software. But at the moment it feels like these are just racks of stock consoles with console constraints.
 
OP
OP
Anthony Hopkins

Anthony Hopkins

Banned
Feb 10, 2018
17,534
emag said:
Microsoft could be running these games via virtual machines and save states backed by high end hardware including fast storage, which is the kind of thing that happens in the enterprise world for remote software. But at the moment it feels like these are just racks of stock consoles with console constraints.
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Yes they are, MS showed a video of it.
 
jalkerway

jalkerway

Member
Oct 27, 2017
273
I'm pretty impressed so far. Popped into a few different games and a) steaming quality is pretty decent and b) input lag is noticeable in a way that a crappy lcd tv would be, but not anywhere near unplayable.
Pixel 2 XL, WiFi connection on Time Warner err... Spectrum internet, in northern New England. I also tested cell connection (Google Fi) and it looked and played pretty much the same in my small test. Used about 100MB of data in less than 5 minutes, so maybe comparable to the Stadia reports so far.
 
scabobbs

scabobbs

Member
Oct 28, 2017
2,103
Pretty excited to hear impressions from those with 5G. When 5G is widespread this stuff is going to be amazing.
 
RadioJoNES

RadioJoNES

Prophet of Truth - One Winged Slayer
Avenger
Oct 25, 2017
1,877
Streams look good but there's the slightest bit of input delay.
 
refusi0n1

refusi0n1

Member
Oct 27, 2017
5,901
Got an invite and had some time to test it out on my OnePlus 5. Got up and running pretty quickly. Played through my wifi at home (couldn't do mobile data since i have crap reception) played the gears 5 tutorial. Had some lag or momentum issues but was impressed, I thought the app and performance would be a lot worse. One instance where there was a stutter but otherwise smooth.
 
DvdGzz

DvdGzz

Banned
Mar 21, 2018
3,580
MS sending out the invites left and right. Anyway, I am in and it's glorious. Tested on Pixel 3 over wifi. First thing I had to do after encountering issues was go buy a router from this decade. 2.4ghz doesn't cut it for Xcloud. I could play it and it was fine sometimes but mostly terribad. Upgraded to 5ghz and it has been smooth sailing for the 30 min I got to try it before having to leave for the gym at least. Tekken 7 and Darksiders 3 played great. There is something pretty special about scrolling through 50 games that I never had to download and just pressing play.
 
DvdGzz

DvdGzz

Banned
Mar 21, 2018
3,580
SatoAilDarko said:
Thank you.
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Wait, I just read the first page, someone said you can switch between Xcloud and console streaming.

Vasto said:
There is an icon at the top left of your phone screen. Tap on that icon to switch between cloud and console.
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Thanks, Vasto, I had no idea.


c0de said:
For those participating, is queuing a problem like it is with PSNow?
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I didn't know that was a thing, I didn't have to.
 
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