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Playcast aiming for Q1 2013 US launch of cloud-gaming service
We haven't had much reason to discuss Playcast Media recently, with the Israel-based outfit failing to beat OnLive to the cloud-gaming market back in 2009. As of now, the Playcast Media service is live in Portugal, France and South Korea, but the company is set to launch its platform in the United States early next year.So what is Playcast? It's a cloud gaming service streaming through set-top boxes, tablets, smartphones and PCs – basically, anything that can run Android 4.0 and higher.%Gallery-172889%
Playcast Media nabs support from big name publishers, aims to bring STB gaming to US
GDC is winding down here in San Francisco, but Playcast Media is hoping to snag its 15 minutes by announcing new partnerships with Atari, Capcom, Codemasters and THQ (to name a few) for use in its "console-free games-on-demand" service. 'Course, streaming games in through a set-top-box is nothing new, but few operators in the States offer such a thing with any real substance behind it. Playcast's solution enables titles to be pushed through existing cable and telco STBs, and we're told that the US market is next in line to get gifted. We're not given any significant details beyond that, but we're pretty jazzed about big name publishers signing on to finally give this distribution method a bit of credence. Now, if only this Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8300HD shipped with a SIXAXIS controller, we'd be golden.
Playcast hoping to beat OnLive to the game streaming punch
We're still not comfortable with the magical technoworkings that apparently allow OnLive to summon games from the ether -- to think that other companies have the engineering prowess to pull it off is terrifying. According to a recent press release, a startup company named Playcast Media has teamed up with an Israeli cable network called Hot to stream "PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 quality games," straight to Israel's set-top cable boxes. The service is in beta now -- in Q1 2010, it'll rollout over all of Israel. It's expected to hit "major markets" in the US, Asia and Europe later that year.That's a lot of heady claims from a service we know so little about. Fortunately, an Israeli tech journalist named Denis Vitchevsky got a chance to check out the service, and came off with an optimistic impression. He says the technology is "somewhat similar to OnLive," and that the demo he witnessed "worked quite well." He claims Playcast has signed agreements with a few publishers, and is promising a huge library at launch. For now, the service is offering PC ports -- but no M rated games just yet, due to a lack of parental control features.We're trying to get more info on the service, but as you might imagine, it takes a while for emails to zip between here and Israel.
