Cloud-based gaming services and fans will soon be welcoming a new member and competitor to the fold. Sony has just revealed at CES 2014 that its own PlayStation Now game streaming service will be arriving in the US later this year.
PlayStation Now is based on game streaming technology from Gaikai, which Sony purchased in 2012. Gaikai was among the key players in the cloud-based gaming arena, which includes OnLive, GameStop and NVIDIA GRID. With PlayStation Now, subscribers will be able to select from a variety of popular games and classic hits from Sony’s PlayStation 3 library, which will then be instantly streamed to a number of supported devices.
That list of devices is, for the time being, quite short. Unsurprisingly, PlayStation Now will first be coming to the latest PlayStation 4 console as well as the PlayStation 3. Later on, the PlayStation Vita will also be supported. Sony’s 2014 US lineup of BRAVIA TVs will also be making the cut. And at an unspecified date in the future, other Internet-enabled devices, such as smartphones and tablets, can be used for gaming as well. Given Sony’s support for Android, it isn’t hard to imagine PlayStation Now becoming available on this platform as well, at least for its Xperia devices.
Before you get too excited though, PlayStation Now won’t be launching all at once. It will first be available in the US in beta at the end of January, with a full launch scheduled sometime in summer. Release in Europe and other PAL territories are, unfortunately, still unknown due to technical hurdles that still need to be addressed.
SOURCE: Sony
