The "Chinese 3A Light" "Black Myth: Wukong", which will be launched this summer, has been a hot topic for players for four years. The first real machine demonstration released on August 20, 2020 has already made players exclaim in amazement, and the public price of only 268 is also very conscientious. However, behind such an attractive price is the requirement of 130G disk space, and the lowest graphics card configuration must be RTX 3060, which can only achieve low ray tracing + 1080P medium quality effect; and if you want to get the top gaming experience, the highest configuration is conservatively priced at around 12,000 yuan.

The high hardware operating cost discourages many players who also want to experience this game, but what if you can play this game smoothly without spending so much money? The existence of cloud games makes this possibility a reality. When asked which gaming platforms "Black Myth: Wukong" is going to be launched on, the official reply said "PC+PS5+Xbox Series XIS, and support for cloud gaming platforms that can run smoothly is not ruled out." It can be seen that multi-channel distribution has become a competitive strategy in the current game market.

However, the development of traditional Internet cloud gaming service platforms has encountered certain bottlenecks in both technical implementation and business scenarios, from being highly expected to being a face-saving project for major game companies. However, as technologies such as 5G, blockchain, and AI become more mature, the difficulties faced by cloud gaming will usher in a turning point.

The dilemma of traditional cloud gaming

"The future game console will no longer be a physical box, and the server will be your platform," said Phil Harrison, then vice president of Google, at the 2019 GDC Game Developers Conference, where Google launched the click-to-play cloud gaming platform "Stadia."

At that time, Google was considered the company with the most hope to run the cloud gaming business model. Since then, the wave of cloud gaming has risen one after another. Many major game companies at home and abroad have joined the market and competed for layout, hoping that cloud gaming can enter users' living rooms and bedrooms as soon as possible.

But three years later, Google shut down Stadia. Despite having a massive user base and content-level guarantees, Stadia did not deliver a perfect answer in terms of technology. Not only is there a rare 4K mode, but there are also frequent delays and frame drops. Only the user experience of the game, which is also located in the Los Angeles Bay Area and adjacent to Google's headquarters, is acceptable. In addition, Stadia's business model has also been criticized by users-it is called "subscription", but it is actually "buyout". After paying the membership fee, most games still require separate payment to experience.

Not only Stadia, but also cloud gaming platforms have experienced multiple waves of cooling down from 2020 to 2023 due to the pressure of balancing revenue and expenditure, user scale and consumption habits, as well as issues such as content copyright and platform distribution effects. Domestic companies such as Caiji Games, Youzu Network, and Gray Cloud Games have all shut down their cloud gaming platforms.

Through cases such as Stadia, we can see that the traditional Internet cloud gaming business faces many difficulties. The first is the latency problem. To provide a smooth, low-latency gaming experience in cloud gaming, it requires not only continuous technological advancement, but also the construction of a large number of data centers around the world. Ideally, GPU servers should be located within 50 kilometers of users. To achieve global coverage means that more than 50,000 data centers are needed, which places extremely high demands on infrastructure construction, which not only costs a huge amount of money, but also faces multiple technical and operational challenges.

Most importantly, the traditional cloud gaming business model that currently relies mainly on membership subscriptions and charging by duration is not sustainable and has profitability problems. The membership subscription system requires a large user base to achieve a balance between income and expenditure, while the charging by duration model may make users sensitive to costs and lead to user churn. Many platforms have also launched free play time to attract users to pay, but such a model is also a challenge for operations.

In addition, these cloud gaming platforms also cause a waste of server resources. Gamers' active time is usually concentrated in the evening, which is also the peak period of server usage, while in other time periods, the server is often idle.

How to break the situation?

The basic operation path of cloud gaming is "player input, server processing, return to the player's screen". In theory, even if the network speed reaches the speed of light, it cannot eliminate the input delay caused by this time difference. Nvidia CEO Huang Renxun believes that "cloud gaming can never be as good as PC" - delay is the main reason.

Traditional centralized cloud gaming platforms have to purchase a large number of machines to solve this problem, but the coverage is still limited, and the cost is huge, and the payback period is far away. In the context of imperfect infrastructure, blockchain may provide a solution suitable for cloud gaming at the moment: by connecting miners to the network and providing incentives to form a bilateral network of miners and users, cloud gaming solution providers no longer need to centrally deploy nodes, but outsource node costs to miners, greatly reducing operating costs.

Based on this concept, the decentralized AI cloud gaming protocol DeepLink has created a DePIN network that provides two cloud gaming modes. One mode is that miners from all over the world place GPU servers in IDC centers and promise to pledge a certain amount of digital currency and long-term stable services. Since miners pledge digital currency, they will also work hard to maintain the stability and reliability of the server to protect their digital assets.

The second mode is that the DeepLink cloud gaming platform allows individuals to temporarily share their home computers with other users, and users can stop sharing at any time after use. This model also requires individuals to pledge a certain amount of digital currency. Its advantage is that the sharer can set the price by himself, making this service relatively affordable.

Compared with traditional cloud games, DeepLink's distributed blockchain technology will enable cloud gaming platforms to have more than 100,000 data centers and more than 10 million GPU server nodes.

DeepLink's core technical team members come from first-class companies including Cisco, Intel, Nvidia, Huawei, etc., and have been engaged in the cloud gaming industry since 2011. As a decentralized AI cloud gaming protocol, DeepLink has remote control software and cloud gaming platforms that focus on games. In addition, it also provides cloud Internet cafes, cloud XR and other products. Its core is to provide users with high-quality, low-latency cloud gaming experience technology through blockchain.

Through AI, blockchain and streaming technology, DeepLink supports 1ms ultra-low latency, 8K high resolution, 240fps high refresh rate, 24 hours of non-stop, and can achieve unparalleled user cloud gaming experience, and maintains technological leadership in many fields such as AI super-resolution, network connection, video encoding and decoding, and network fluctuation optimization.

The two core functions of DeepLink are remote control and cloud gaming. The remote control function enables users to remotely control their PCs, mobile devices, and other devices, allowing them to use the same software on different devices. The cloud gaming function allows users to play smooth games through cloud servers without purchasing expensive gaming equipment. For cloud Internet cafes and cloud e-sports, DeepLink's software can also be used to host game events or use large GPU servers without relying on local computer systems.

Deeplink is currently available on mobile phones and PCs

In addition, DeepLink has launched a cloud gaming all-in-one machine, marking a leap forward in gaming hardware. Developed by HKC Group, the device features a high frame rate refresh rate, providing a seamless experience for e-sports games. The upcoming cloud gaming handheld console is based on DeepLink's ultra-low latency rendering technology and is an affordable alternative to traditional handheld consoles. By connecting to a cloud GPU server for real-time game rendering, the cost of the handheld console is reduced by 70%.

Traditional games need to run on specific consoles or devices, which limits players' cross-platform gaming experience. DeepLink's cloud gaming technology streams games to players' devices in real time, allowing them to play on any device that supports cloud gaming, which to some extent solves the cost of gaming from the player's perspective.

The decentralized nature of the DeepLink protocol means that there is no centralized server that manages the transmission of game data. Game data is processed by multiple GPU nodes through the distributed network of the cloud gaming platform. The decentralized structure provides higher reliability and fault tolerance, while also reducing dependence on a single server, which in turn solves the problems of traditional cloud games that cannot be expanded on a large scale and latency from the server perspective. The cloud gaming function also uses advanced streaming and AI rendering technology to provide high-quality, low-power services.

A business model that everyone is happy with

When users rent GPUs in the DeepLink network to play games, they need to pay the GPU provider the DeepLink protocol native token DLC. GPUs are provided by miners around the world, which constitutes a decentralized physical infrastructure. Any user who has a DeepLink node can play high-performance games remotely and seamlessly. There are no restrictions on game downloads in any country, and there is no need to download games on the App Store, which helps GameFi game developers expand their business and user base.

Currently, DeepLink has 533,000 users around the world, with a market size expected to exceed 50 million units. It is compatible with all Windows 3A games and provides high-end game mining machines, through which players can obtain DLC tokens. DeepLink will also launch a cloud virtual phone, where players can open more than 10 mobile GameFi game windows, allowing players to play multiple games at the same time and generate more income.

Users can pay DLC to DeepLink software to obtain cloud game time, rent Internet cafe equipment, or purchase shared game time to play games online with good friends. For commercial users, the DeepLink protocol charges a 20-30% DLC commission from each cloud game transaction.

Compared to traditional cloud gaming solutions, DeepLink’s advantage lies in its decentralized nature. It is 80% cheaper than traditional cloud gaming solutions, and DeepLink’s cloud gaming price is only 20% of traditional cloud gaming platforms.

DeepLink also supports cloud PC mode, providing thousands of games, which is richer than the game resources of GeForce Now and Xbox Game Pass. DeepLink protocol technology also supports cloud Internet cafes and cloud e-sports hotels, which GeForce Now and Xbox Game Pass cannot provide.

Through DeepLink, players can also earn money in the game, but the most important thing is that DeepLink runs game services through distributed GPU nodes, so users can play games anytime, anywhere without having to buy expensive gaming equipment.

Written at the end

The imagination space of cloud gaming lies in the fact that removing the dependence on equipment means that more users of mid- and low-end devices will become players of large games. The sales volume of game consoles is estimated to reach 50 million units in 2022, while the shipment volume of smartphones is expected to be 1.27 billion units. The gap is the potential maximum user increase. It is estimated that the cloud gaming market will reach US$20.93 billion by 2030, with a compound annual growth rate of 45.5%

Through its unique distributed architecture, DeepLink can provide a higher reliability and low-latency gaming experience, far exceeding traditional cloud gaming platforms. This not only solves the problem of server resource waste, but also allows more players to enjoy high-quality games at a lower cost.

In the future, with the further development of 5G, blockchain and AI technologies, the business model of cloud gaming will become more sustainable and profitable, and the user experience will continue to improve. DeepLink's innovation and technological advantages will lead the cloud gaming industry into a new era, allowing every player to play top games on any device.

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