Facebook is the latest tech company joining the market of cloud gaming. The company has introduced cloud games to its existing app and several games are already up to play. Facebook’s cloud gaming service is available for the desktop web and Android.
Unlike other cloud gaming services, Facebook isn’t asking you to purchase a subscription or buy a controller. You can just visit the cloud gaming section on Facebook’s website or app, select a game, and start playing.
“We’re doing free-to-play games, we’re doing games that are latency-tolerant, at least to start,” says Jason Rubin, Facebook’s vice president of play. “We’re not promising 4K, 60fps, so you pay us $6.99 per month. We’re not trying to get you to buy a piece of hardware, like a controller.”
Some of the games Facebook confirms are Asphalt 9: Legends by Gameloft; Mobile Legends: Adventure by Moonton; PGA TOUR Golf Shootout by Concrete Software, Inc.; Solitaire: Arthur’s Tale by Qublix Games; and WWE SuperCard by 2K Games. In coming weeks, the company will also add more games.
Facebook has been offering games for a long time and some gaming companies even made a fortune using Facebook gaming. From Flash-based hits like FarmVille, now the company has HTML5 games. The same section will add games you can stream from Facebook’s cloud servers. It is worth noting that Facebook Facebook acquired a Spanish cloud gaming service PlayGiga last year. This new
Facebook is also introducing Player Names and gaming-themed Avatars for players. The Play name will be used for gaming activities. Game developers can also enable cross-play between the downloaded version of their game and the cloud version on Facebook.
Facebook’s approach to cloud gaming seems different and more profitable for the company. If you play Asphalt 9 on Facebook and later decide to install the app, using Facebook login will give you all progress you already made on Facebook gaming. Surely it will encourage users to start using Facebook login on the app. Facebook already lets people go live while playing games. Several gamers stream their live gameplay on Twitch. Now when people will start playing some of the popular games on Facebook cloud gaming, there could be an easy way to go live.
The primary focus is on free-to-play games. So, the company is not trying to run after exclusive titles. It is just making available those games that are already free and popular among users. You can either start playing new games here or try those games that you already play.
For now, the company is rolling out cloud gaming in the US across a handful of states in America, including California, Texas, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Delaware, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Washington, D.C., Virginia and West Virginia. The company will scale the cloud gaming in coming months. Af the time when the company hasn’t launched the service in the US properly, we cannot guess when it could launch cloud gaming to India.
Facebook has confirmed that the company isn’t launching cloud games on iOS because of Apple’s new cloud games policy. The company suggests iOS users try mobile browsers if they want.
