The UK boss of Xbox has labelled streaming technology in games as "limited" - as the firm prepares to go head-to-head with OnLive's Cloud-based system.
Neil Thompson told The Independent today that there was "a way to go" before Triple-A titles could be streamed without any technical disruption - and hinted that Microsoft would be at the forefront when they can.
OnLive claims that its micro-console will allow gamers to play disc-less, streaming versions of the latest games without any lag. The system is due to launch early this year.
"There's limited technology to allow certain game types to be streamed," said Thompson.
"There are lots of 'snacking' games online on our own Xbox Live Arcade today - and I think that area will grow in time.
"But there's a way to go for a full capacity game to be streamed and for that experience to be as rich [as it is on disc] today. It will probably happen. But it's not as close as lot of people would have you believe."
He added: ""Whatever happens in the future, we'll be in the mix and active participants."
Single Player titles are going to be difficult to get right but what about muliplayer titles that need to get data to and from players, back to servers, analyse the code, send it back to the players and also render the rest of the game?
Streaming PC games that were coded for Keyboard and Mouse to be used on a gamepad?
No exclusives, no gaming if your ISP goes down for half an hour?
Crappy connections due to a: General slow connections, Poorly configured routers, ISP filtering high bandwidth traffic
I doubt this will work anytime soon for the UK. Korean players linked via Fibre in large skyscrappers averaging 100mbs connections may have a better chance.
It's been said by experts in digital compression, including the people responsible for the HD streaming tech introduced to YouTube last year, this cannot work.
The experts say that to deliver the experience these guys are promising they would have to have 10 years of advancement on everyone else.
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