Nvidia: “Next generation of consoles will be the last”

Cloud gaming to obsolete traditional console in coming years

Chris KempSeptember 22, 2012

GM of the Cloud Gaming division over at Nvidia Phil Eisler believes this next generation of consoles will be the last ones we see.

“They say this is the last console, and I am certainly a believer in that,” he said. “The last one is almost 10 years old now in terms of the technology. As we go through time, the good thing about cloud gaming is it’s going to get better every year. One of the reasons we’re investing in it is we see that there are some issues today, but they’re all solvable and they’re all moving in the right direction.

“Bandwidth is going up. The cost of server rooms is going down. We’re bringing latency down. The experience will just get better and better every year, to the point where I think it will become the predominant way that people play games.”

Most people’s sticking point on cloud gaming services is latency – can the cloud provide a smooth, lag-free experience. According to Eisler, the technology is almost at a point where latency is even lower than the average console game today.

“The average gamer playing on an Xbox today with a standard television is probably experiencing 150 to 200 milliseconds of latency, and that’s what they’re used to playing with every day,” he said.

“People worry about the network latency, but actually, in the whole pipeline, it’s the smallest piece. Our monitors that we work with today are under 10 milliseconds of latency. We think that, working with smart TV manufacturers, we’ll be able to cut that time down. It’s going to be possible very shortly to have a cloud-rendered experience that has lower latency than the current console plus standard television experience.”

The benefits of cloud gaming are obvious, and with 5+ years to hone the technology, Eisler’s prophecy may become reality.