The evolution of the videogame medium has allowed us with the last generations to switch to the use of graphically superlative products, often extremely photorealistic up to appear even real for the largest productions. In addition to an upstream work on the part of the developers, a lot of resources are needed to manage these screen projections, guaranteed by graphics cards is cards video, built into processors or purchased separately. The latest generation game consoles all offer an environment suited to the needs of today's video games, but many devices are in backward condition and do not allow the use of titles that are difficult to manage. We are talking, for example, of smartphones and obsolete PCs: it is precisely to the aid of the latter that GeForce NOW It shows up.
It is a service created and managed by NVIDIA, historical manufacturer of graphic cards for many years, which has decided to invest in the sector of Cloud Gaming. After a beta lasting about 5 years, the company has finally released its streaming service, offering users the possibility to access it through a free package or with a subscription of € 5,49 per month, which offer various functionalities. Let's find out more about it in the next few lines!
Thanks to Cloud Gaming, any device becomes perfect for gaming
What is GeForce NOW?
You may never have heard of Cloud Gaming, currently available thanks to services such as Google Stadia and, indeed, GeForce NOW. It consists in the possibility of rent an extremely powerful virtual PC, located in another part of the world, which will offer you its computing power to be able to play video games without the use of resources by your hardware, if not obviously the need to view what appears on the screen. In this way, all devices, smartphones and rather old or very low-end PCs will be able to allow you to play video games in almost any title. Luckily, currently GeForce NOW supports virtually all devices, passing from Android a iOS o MacOS, and obviously offers all its features on NVIDIA Shield.
However, in order to guarantee you a gaming experience comparable to the traditional one, you will need to have a slightly performing internet connection. The transmission that arrives on the screens must have a good quality, and the commands given from your station to any other part of the world must not have excessive delays, under penalty of transforming the video game into an extremely frustrating experience. Fortunately, GeForce NOW has improved a lot in recent years and with a connection speed of 15 Mbit per second you can get a great experience in 1280 × 720 (HD), while another 10 Mbit per second will only be needed for 1920 × 1080 (Full HD). Obviously we are talking about stable connections, which in the event that they offer higher figures can significantly improve your experience by reducing graphic artifacts and input lag to the bone, in order to guarantee you a more fluid and visually satisfying gameplay.
Everyone at stake
We can guarantee that, respecting the requirements of the service, you will enjoy an optimal experience on each device, with also some interesting features. In fact, the premium package offers the possibility to enjoy the Ray Tracing where this is obviously present in the title you are playing, and well 6 hours of uninterrupted gameplay without the need to participate in boring queues. The free package, on the other hand, almost works more as a test for the application, because it will allow you to play only one hour at a time and it will often require long queues for the same, which will be repeated for further sessions following the first. By purchasing the subscription, you can obtain a decisive saving compared to traditional hardware, going in any case to interface with an experience without any doubt comparable to what can be found with the latter, but opening your possibilities to many less powerful devices and portable devices.
The differences, however, are clearly present, even if these have been decidedly flattened in the last period. While the on-screen image quality is satisfying, 3840x2160 (4K) resolution has not yet been implemented e the catalog of games results for some factors to be reviewed. Let's be clear, the virtual library appears really expanded and includes works of all kinds, but there are many developers who in recent weeks have decided to remove their titles from it. Fortunately, contrary to what we saw with Google Stadia, you will have the opportunity to enjoy many free-to-play games without the need to make any purchases, and you can instead play paid titles through your libraries of Steam and Epic Games Store, thus obtaining benefits from the discounts and free titles that the aforementioned platforms offer.
The future of gaming?
Despite some flaws still present, GeForce NOW is the best Cloud Gaming service currently available
Summing up, we can say that GeForce NOW inevitably deviates from traditional gaming, obviously losing quality and requiring stable connections to play. However, the service opens its doors to almost anyone, also because the bandwidth requests are not excessive at all, and it is therefore allowed to each player to interface their favorite titles with almost all devices, incurring negligible costs in exchange for optimal quality. It is still possible to improve the situation by implementing further experiences within the catalog and adding resolutions higher than Full HD, but the improvements applied to NVIDIA's infrastructures show how in reality the evolution of streaming gaming has now arrived, thanks to GeForce NOW: what today can be considered as the best Cloud Gaming service.
