The PlayStation 4’s much hyped online streaming and Cloud computing service Gaikai will apparently be releasing in Q3 2014 for the North America. Though a European release date is rumoured for 2015, Sony’s Andrew House is still unsure about the same.
In conversation with Eurogamer, House stated that, “We’re on track to have a commercial service up and running in the US first within 2014. That remains the plan and we’re very much on track to reach that. But what’s important is to understand the full scope of what we’re trying to achieve and why we felt the Gaikai acquisition was important.
“Our goal is to be able to have a new form of game distribution streamed from the server side, initially to PS4 consoles then gradually moving that out to Vita. But eventually, the endgame is to have this available on a multitude of network-connected devices, essentially delivering a console-quality gaming experience on devices which are not innately capable of doing that.
“We think there’s a great opportunity to broaden the market, because you essentially remove the need to make the console purchase in order to have access to that experience. It may sound counter-intuitive, because, aren’t you replacing a business that is your bread and butter? But part of being an innovative company is being a pioneer in new forms of distribution of content, and we would like to be there first and take a leadership role.”
On the launch of Gaikai in Europe by 2015, House remarked, “I really can’t be specific on the European roll-out. It’s a brand new form of delivery. We need to prove out the technology, which we feel is good at its core, but we place – as I think is quite right – a real emphasis on delivering a quality experience for consumers.
“And that will be dependent to a degree on what the strength of broadband connection is going to be, and what our server deployment and infrastructure looks like. We’re hard at work on all of those fronts, but I’m not at a point right now where I can be specific about when our European fans are going to be able to enjoy that.”
Sony currently plans to offer backwards compatibility via Cloud streaming for PS3 games using Gaikai, with long-term plans meant to bring PlayStation titles to mobile platforms, Smart TVs, etc.