FADE IN:

INT. TWITCH HQ – EVENING

A fledgling Twitch streamer is preparing for a date with their regular audience. Twitch HQ notices them about to start broadcasting and decides to intervene.

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Streaming is big business. During peak usage times in the US of A, Netflix and Twitch.tv are two of the largest sources of internet traffic, as people across the country watch films, TV shows (or are they just ‘shows’ now, without the ‘TV’?), live esports and other game streams. Little wonder then that Twitch is the target of a takeover, with multiple suitors, including Microsoft, already rebuffed according to sources who have spoken to The Verge and Variety. Numerous reports place Google in pole position, with a billion dollars on the table.

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Remember OnLive? The service aimed to provide streaming videogames to the world, but fell foul of confusing pricing, slow internet connections and the apparent mismanagement. The company never really shut down, avoiding bankruptcy by being bought and re-created under a new company with new management and the same name. That means it’s continued to quietly work away, providing the same service to its remaining subscribers while working on something new.

I went and saw that something new last Friday, and I’ve been messing around with its beta this week. I’ll have proper impressions later in the week, but the news: OnLive is still a subscription based streaming service for games, but it’s now pitching itself in part as a partner service to Steam. You can link your OnLive and Steam accounts, and if you own a game on Steam and that game is available through OnLive, you’ll have instant access to it within OnLive. That means you can play your Steam games while travelling without an install process or a powerful computer in your travel bag.
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