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If you're a fan of cloud gaming, you may want to take a little look into Netris. The developers say it's a GeForce NOW alternative, one you can self-host with it being open source. They're also keen to highlight some Stadia-like elements of it too.

Available to play in Chrome-based browsers, you don't have to self-host it as they will be offering it as a service you can pay for too. It does all this by linking up with your Steam account, and with their service using Linux behind the scenes it's also making use of Proton to run the games. Specifically, they say they're using GE-Proton / Proton-GE.

The service is heavily inspired by Stadia, but since it's open source and utilising Steam (along with self-hosting options), you're not going to lose anything as the games are yours. Although, self-hosting requires an NVIDIA GPU.

Features they offer from their website:

  • Social Sharing - Share your epic moments with the community. Post clips, screenshots, and live streams directly from your game session.
  • HD Streams - Experience games in stunning high definition with Real-Time Ray Tracing ensuring crisp visuals and vibrant colors.
  • Shareable Progress - Your progress is saved in the cloud, allowing you to share your game progress with friends with just a link.
  • Customizable Controls - Tailor your gaming experience to fit your play style, whether you're on a keyboard, gamepad, or touchscreen.
  • Steam Library Sharing - Grant access to your Steam library, so everyone on your team can join in on the fun without additional purchases.
  • Customizable Gaming Experience - Enhance and personalize your gaming experience with mods to suit your style or add new challenges.
  • Parental Controls - Keep gaming safe and fun for everyone. Set playtime limits and content restrictions to ensure a family-friendly environment.
  • Lowest Latency - Say goodbye to lag. Enhanced by QUIC, our optimized network infrastructure ensures your gaming sessions are smooth and responsive.
  • Multiplayer & Co-op - Connect with friends and gamers worldwide in Netris Parties. Dive into multiplayer battles or join forces in co-op adventures.

Certainly seems like an interesting attempt to mix-up the cloud gaming space. Early days for it yet though, but the idea is at least quite promising. They may have a bit of a fight on the naming though, since netris already exists elsewhere.

See more on the website and GitHub.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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15 comments
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jordicoma May 20
Interesting. When it suports firefox (with open standards) and radeon gpus I'll try.
Hopefully someone will make it, as is opensource.
Quoting: jordicomaInteresting. When it suports firefox (with open standards) and radeon gpus I'll try.
Hopefully someone will make it, as is opensource.

Same idea here.
It's a nice and awaited project from my side, the possibility to play all my Steam games anywhere, on any screen (TV, Pad etc...) by the Cloud.
There is GEforce Now but not all my STeam are available, only few.
Is it a non official Valve project? Like DXVK was?
Because Valve needs a fully cloud solution.
GOG launched in cloud gaming too with Amazon...


Last edited by legluondunet on 20 May 2024 at 11:39 am UTC
Eike May 20
View PC info
  • Supporter Plus
The name feels too near to that of a game I once heard of though...
johndoe86x May 20
I'm curious how this would compare to Sunshine + Moonlight.
psy-q May 20
Hm, Netris was an online Tetris game and there's still a variant of it around: https://playnetris.com/

And also the Netris project might not approve: https://www.netris.io/

Maybe they could've spent 35-38 seconds researching the name?
tohur May 20
Quoting: jordicomaInteresting. When it suports firefox (with open standards) and radeon gpus I'll try.
Hopefully someone will make it, as is opensource.

Pretty sure Firefox at least in the past has NOT supported all the standards that most these game streaming services use. its on firefox not these services as NONE of them support Firefox. want to be able to use Firefox hound them on their tracker to add the required features.
LoudTechie May 20
Quoting: tohur
Quoting: jordicomaInteresting. When it suports firefox (with open standards) and radeon gpus I'll try.
Hopefully someone will make it, as is opensource.

Pretty sure Firefox at least in the past has NOT supported all the standards that most these game streaming services use. its on firefox not these services as NONE of them support Firefox. want to be able to use Firefox hound them on their tracker to add the required features.
Quoting: tohur
Quoting: jordicomaInteresting. When it suports firefox (with open standards) and radeon gpus I'll try.
Hopefully someone will make it, as is opensource.

Pretty sure Firefox at least in the past has NOT supported all the standards that most these game streaming services use. its on firefox not these services as NONE of them support Firefox. want to be able to use Firefox hound them on their tracker to add the required features.

You would think so, but reading the reliant bug reports of the people who've decided to do just that I'm not convinced.
It does work if you spoof your useragent to Chrome.
It doesn't work on edge(which is popular and just a chromium fork)

Edge has all the functions of chrome except Widivine drm.
Firefox has widivine drm.
If it doesn't work there unless you spoof your user agent, they're actively sabotaging them.


Extra info:
I found a feature only supported by chrome that's very likely to be in use here.
WebRTC H264.
It is patented and closed source, so edge and firefox don't have direct access to it.
(edge could add it, but then they would have to develop their own implementation)
As such it's not standardized, so they have no more reason than "but chrome is doing it too" to support it
Both have have OpenWebRTC H264, but that isn't the same.
Firefox has since a little time a plugin for it, but that could've not yet come through by the developers who've just blocked all firefox for it.
Safari doesn't support it either, but Safari doesn't support anything.
It's one of the few ways to support streaming and open alternatives tend to have worse marketing, so it could be that they all implemented it this way.


I will finish this with my final advice.
Always spoof your user agent to the newest chrome. Much less support issues that way.


Last edited by LoudTechie on 20 May 2024 at 3:13 pm UTC
kokoko3k May 20
For what is worth, I use my self-developed/self-hosted alternative you may be interested in.

It is a bash script and carries everything over ssh, but requires x11 server and a linux client.

https://github.com/kokoko3k/ssh-rdp/

I always regret about the poor choice of the name tho
ToddL May 20
I like the idea and it's great that it'll let you play most of your Steam games compared to Geforce Now, which used to let you played every Steam game library you own in the early days before some publishers didn't allow it. Of course, the kernel anti-cheat games will always make it unplayable with this setup but at least this is better than nothing when it comes to cloud gaming.

It'd be nice if they allow other graphic cards besides Nvidia but I think they'll get this resolved sooner or later and I would like to try it someday when I build another gaming PC


Last edited by ToddL on 20 May 2024 at 4:25 pm UTC
Cyril May 20
https://github.com/netrisdotme/netris/issues/49#issuecomment-2119248645

Quoting: wanjohiryanHey @kevin-wijnen

Thank you for bringing up an important point regarding browser compatibility and the terminology we use in our documentation.

As of now, we primarily support Chromium-based browsers (such as Microsoft Edge, Google Chrome, Brave, etc.) due to their comprehensive support for certain web technologies essential to our project. Specifically, here are the compatibility challenges we face with other popular browsers:

Firefox: Unfortunately, Firefox does not support WebCodecs, which is critical for decoding audio and video on the client side in our application.
Safari: While Safari has limited support for WebCodecs, it lacks support for WebTransport altogether. We use WebTransport as a more efficient alternative to WebRTC and WebSocket for our needs.

We acknowledge the value in making our project as compatible as possible with a wider range of browsers and will update our README to clearly explain these compatibility issues.

And thank you for the correction regarding "Chromium"-based browsers - I did not know that :)

Can someone tell if it's legit or not?
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