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.
Quoting: Cyrilhttps://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?
If by "legit" you mean is it true, then yes. Firefox only has partial support for the WebCodecs API, and only in their nightly builds as far as I can tell. The standard itself is still under heavy development.
Quoting: Cyrilhttps://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?
Validation.
Firefox has bad support for HEVC (H.265), due to patent reasons, which is the most popular "webcodec".
Safari is just a loser that doesn't support anything that isn't explicitly developed for it, because Apple doesn't want people to be able to use the web and leave their closed ecosystem, so missing WebTransport makes sense.
To make this work seamlessly for firefox they would have to switch to AV1 if they detect the firefox user agent.
Last edited by LoudTechie on 21 May 2024 at 8:23 am UTC
Quoting: LoudTechieValidation.
Firefox has bad support for HEVC (H.265), due to patent reasons, which is the most popular "webcodec".
H.265 is DOA and will remain so. Anyone with need for better codec that H.264 should be using AV1 today anyway.
Last edited by Shmerl on 21 May 2024 at 2:57 pm UTC
See more from me