OnLive announces $10 a month unlimited game streaming

December 2, 2010 By Jeffrey Van Camp

OnLive, the streaming video game microconsole, is launching a new unlimited game streaming service for $9.99 a month. It will launch with 14 games.

It seems like $7.99 – $9.99 is the magic price for streaming content these days. Both Netflix (movies) and Hulu (TV) recently announced unlimited plans for $7.99 and now OnLive, their video game equivalent, is offering unlimited use of its service for a monthly fee of $9.99.

The service, named OnLive PlayPack, has 14 games at the moment, including Prince of Persia, Lego Batman, Fear 2, and World of Goo. These games can be played for free with a subscription. Other titles, like Batman: Arkham Asylum, Borderlands, Assassin’s Creed II, and Unreal Tournament III are available for 3-5 day rentals and full purchase. All OnLive gamesystem users have free access to the PlayPack service until it leaves beta on Jan. 14, 2011.

“People love flat-rate plans for instant-play media, so it’s exciting to introduce this offering to the video game market for the first time,” said Steve Perlman, founder and CEO of OnLive. “With PlayPass games priced from $3.99 to $49.99, along with the new $9.99/mo PlayPack plan, OnLive’s growing library of games will suit any budget and any type of gamer, from casual to hardcore.”

Subscribing and streaming

Until it was cancelled in October, OnLive “required” a $15 monthly subscription on top of the price of games. This new plan represents a change in strategy. Some gamers will probably opt for the unlimited subscription, while others will choose to rent or own select games.

OnLive is different from other consoles because it streams all games from remote servers, much like Netflix streams a movie from the Internet. Instead of having a lot of local processing power and a DVD drive, games are served via the net, making the system very affordable ($99 with a controller and free game) and compact. Unfortunately, it requires a very stable, high speed Internet connection. No one wants to lag out during a game of Unreal Tournament.

Showing 7 comments

iKnowledge at 9:22pm 2nd December 2010 Onlive is gay...
Fineprint at 8:15pm 2nd December 2010 You should read before you go writing an aritcle. "All OnLive users have free access to the PlayPack service until it leaves beta on Jan. 14, 2011." No they don't. All Onlive GAMESYSTEM owners have access to it. If you pony up $99 for the system you have access. If you use their system via your PC, you don't get the beta.
1. @JeffreyVC at 11:38pm 2nd December 2010 I did read, but thank you for the correction.
DetroitJake at 7:43pm 2nd December 2010 Novel concept, but I don't see it working. A little lag in a movie bugs me MUCH less than lag in the heat of passion of gaming. I would be totally ticked if I spent hours trying to beat some level then flopped an almost successful attempt due to lag. If you want to be successful at this, find a way to store full featured games on hard drives right on the console. The user can license the game for 5 or 10 per month. Or even better. The user pays nickels by the hour for the licence to play the game. The ONLY thing that bothers me about PS3 / XB360 is that: 1) I can't save entire games on my hard drive. I'm way to lazy to put a disk in the box. Its 2011. I want to grab my controller and go. I want to pick my game from a menu on screen and play. Not fumble through unsightly disk cases. 2) I don't mind paying $60 for a game provided I love it and I know I will invest that much time in it. Demos are a huge step in the right direction. But not all games post demos. 3) And following from Item 2, I would be willing to pay 5 or 10 dollars for a game that is less interesting if I only wanted to play it for a few hours, but might never be willing to pay $60 for it. All of which leads back to why paying for temporary licencing for games that are downloaded from the net to a harddrive of a powerful console is what OnLive should be doing. Good Luck guys.
1. goldflowpoints at 7:54pm 2nd December 2010 Sounds like a good idea you have. How big would the hard drive need to be to accommodate 10 high quality games?
cyphi1 at 7:23pm 2nd December 2010 I agree
Martin Alessi at 6:25pm 2nd December 2010 This model is doomed to fail because of lack of physical media that can compete with PS3's 54GB blu-ray and the fact you need a stable 5Mbps internet connection to play and have a decent experience. Neat concept but premature to think they will compete with PS3 and Xbox 360 or the next generation which will soon follow.