Platform: Other Consoles

Industry News/Commentary

Developer: Amazon

Release Date: Unknown, but the rumor mill is running at full speed…

By Malefico

I did something this morning that I’ve rarely (never) done before in my life. I was looking for fodder for a gaming PC article (haven’t written one of those in a while) and Googled “pc gaming news”. And what popped up? Brand new articles ruminating on the nature of a possible new Amazon product.

Sources at Amazon are alluding to the possibility of a game system that will consist of a controller and a “console” about as large as Google’s Chromecast, or slightly larger than your average USB flash drive. The device, which as yet doesn’t even have an official codename, would deliver entertainment content by streaming cloud-based games to users. Early boasts by the online retail giant indicate the system could deliver “top-tier” PC game content at 30 FPS.

Industry journalists got their first peek at the controller last week. As you can see by the image below the controller is laid out in fairly familiar fashion, though to me it looks a bit unwieldy. It includes some recognizable controls for delivery of multimedia content on the lower portion of the case. Aside from pics, very little info is available on the accessory.

The announcement is creating some buzz on industry news sites, and rightfully so. If Amazon can create a system with a tiny form factor and the right capabilities, they could have another sales success story like the Kindle products. But color me pessimistic, because I can think of a laundry list of problems for such a device.

Since 99% of the info online is purely speculative, I’m going to jump into the fray. I figure my uninformed guesses are as good as the next writer’s, so here goes.

First, let’s talk about the chops a box needs to play games as opposed to video/music content. It’s a well-known fact that you can use almost any PC as a home theater hub; the main requirements are that it be relatively small and that it runs quietly. Even substandard integrated graphics like Intel’s HD 2000 or 4000 series setups will work fine in an HTPC. The same cannot be said for gaming. You need a little more oomph to play PC games, and will usually have to invest in a video card, etc. to play the kinds of games you enjoy at decent resolution and frame rates.

The Chromecast is your average size dongle

The point here is that Chromecast does an OK job with streaming content, but it has its little issues, mostly due to changing availability of network bandwidth- both Google’s and its customers’. Take those problems and multiply them for a similarly-sized device that’s supposed to keep up with the comparatively unpredictable hardware demands of gaming, compounded by network traffic surges, etc. Look at Microsoft and Sony. They both have highly successful platforms with millions of users. They’ve been doing this sort of thing for a while now and they still have problems from time to time. And their hardware is much faster. For the Amazon device to reliably perform as advertised, I would think it would need to be larger, about the size of Raspberry Pi or Roku.

As you can see, a Roku unit is somewhat smaller than a CD case

Next, let’s poke some gentle fun at Amazon’s assertions about quality of content and performance. When I hear terms like “top-tier”, I’m taken back in time to a simpler time when a young nerd ran around the local fair playing rigged games of chance. Do you remember the prizes on the top shelf of the booth? Sure, the knock-off Bart Simpson plush looked a lot better than the stuff on the bottom shelf – plastic vampire fangs, Chinese finger puzzles, and spider rings – but it was still cheap crap. See where I’m going with this? The referenced games will be top-tier compared to what, catching a ball in a cup?

Next, the frame rate claim. I’m thinking there needs to be an “up to” somewhere in the statement about 30 FPS. Given the diminutive dimensions and therefore petite performance potential of the proposed condongle, plus the vagaries of available bandwidth on both ends of the connection… yeah, “up to” seems to be called for. Then again, the advertising and marketing laws in the U.S. are laughably lax, so maybe 30 FPS will work just fine in print, but not so well in practice.

And I hate to push further into the realm of “who is getting paid to come up with this shit?”, but we can look back on a number of console failures that brought companies down in the past. And in many cases these were not little start-ups. The video game industry has seen some former titans reduced to almost nothing. Here’s the thing. When Amazon introduced the Kindle, they had a device that targeted a very specific market, and specialized in something other mobile devices at the time did not. With the condongle contrivance, they are trying to enter a hardware market that’s saturated at every level, and mostly with hardware that seems to be superior to the proposed device.

An industry journalist hypothesized that a successful launch of Amazon’s product would, “conceivably allow the system to compete directly with Xbox and PlayStation consoles”. I don’t want to make fun of this writer, but I do have to take issue with the unqualified nature of the statement. Condongle vs. PS4 or Xbox One? The competition would be of the same nature as a confrontation between a garage sale 10-speed and a Hayabusa or ZX-14. The beater bicycle would hold its own in the “same number of wheels” category; in the quarter-mile, not so much. A diagnosed asthmatic with Multiple Sclerosis and no MMA training would have a better chance of walking in off the street and knocking out Cain Velasquez. Hell, your average smart phone will probably be able to hold its own against the condongle. I’m fairly certain there are no emergency meetings being called at Microsoft or Sony to deal with this new “threat”.

What’s going on with corporations these days? When I first read these articles, my suspicions that the Big Two are planting moles in other companies to spearhead these insane campaigns once again resurfaced. Either corporate moles or straight-up mind control, something is going on. I’ve rarely taken less pleasure in thinking I’m right than when I made some valid, and in retrospect prophetic points about Steam’s Machines and OS.

Is it a good idea? Well, it would be if current technology could support it. I’m not saying it’s impossible to construct a device that delivers on the early  rumors, I’m just saying it’s probably improbable. Early prediction: Amazon’s dubious foray into the console industry will be no less ill-advised, and unfortunately for them no more successful than Steam’s effort.

But then, I’m just a cantankerous old prick who’s been proven correct from time to time.