The good news first. OnLive is offering a free 2 weeks trail of their cloud gaming service to anyone with a computer and an internet connection (no credit card required). The bad news, should you decided to take them up on their offer, prepare to hate your internet service provider (ISP).

OnLIve’s on-demand gaming service runs over the internet from state-of-the-art game data centers. Controller actions and game play are replayed through your internet connection, thus eating up your bandwidth like a summa-ma-bitch.

Impressions thus far

I’ve signed up and had the opportunity to try the service on 3 different ISP packages, and only 1 of the 3 worked. The one that worked was my own home connection, as I have the highest upgraded service package from Rogers designed for gaming. The other two connection I tried using the service on all lagged out and I couldn’t even start a game without a connection error message coming up. OnLive recommends making sure your WiFi download connection speed is consistently above 3 Mbps (and ideally above 5 Mbps). You can test your speed here. Mine was running at 15 mbps ATOT.

OnLive does offer a pretty good play pack of games to try out if you are able to sustain connection, they include:

One cool feature OnLive offers is “The Arena”, a place where you can watch other players play their games live. And free replayable demos on every game in the library with no install necessary doesn’t suck either. The regular service will set you back $9.99 a month, but it includes unlimited gameplay from OnLive’s growing game library.

The service has its goods and bads. When it works, it works well and can be quit enjoyable. The negatives are, if your a PC gamer, you probably have no interest in playing these gams at 1280×720 (from my experience it’s actually closer to 640 x 480), when you could just buy them and play on your own machine at 1900×1080. Which leads me to the other drawback of OnLive. You don’t actually own any of the games through the service. Which means, if they go tits up, you are SOL and left with no physical copy of the games you’ve been playing. If they go, the games go.

OnLive is available for PC and Mac. It’s free and if you have a solid connection, I’d at the very least take them up on their 2 week trial.

For more DLC info and news be sure to follow me on Twitter @The_GeekJock

Related articles

• OnLive Play For Free Offer Available For Two More Weeks (cinemablend.com)
• OnLive’s PlayBack free beta now open to all users through January 31 (news.bigdownload.com)
• OnLive Playback game catalog free to all users through Jan. 31 (joystiq.com)
• OnLive’s Playback Beta Open to All Users Free of Charge Until January 31st (slashgear.com)
• OnLive MicroConsole starts shipping; monthly flat rate pricing starts January 15 (news.bigdownload.com)

Single-Game Purchase Grants Access To All Current Content And Features Within Award-winning Shooter MMO

Hi-Rez Studios announced this weekend that Global Agenda will now be 100% subscription free. Grazie mille Hi-Rez. Purchasers of Global Agenda will be able to enjoy the games full content, including all current Player-vs-Player combat, Player-vs-Environment solo and co-op content, and Agency-vs-Agency seasons, without a monthly subscription payment now or in the future. If gamers wish to receive future content updates, they will be delivered via optional paid expansions. The first major expansion, Sandstorm, will be included for free to the entire Global Agenda community.

To celebrate the awesomeness of things being free, the game is being offered for 33% off on Steam from now through July 5, as part of Steam’s Summer Sale. To purchase, visit http://store.steampowered.com/app/17020/

“Hi-Rez Studios is committed to delivering the best value in PC gaming”, said Todd Harris, Global Agenda Executive Producer. “In addition to all of the game’s initial launch content, we are bundling nearly 6 months worth of post-release content and features and including that within the single-purchase game. One purchase of Global Agenda let’s you experience this content forever with no subscription.”

Global Agenda is a massively-multiplayer online third-person shooter video game from Hi-Rez Studios in Atlanta. Built using the Unreal Engine 3, it went live on February 1, 2010. The game allows players to create and customize multiple agent characters, complementing FPS skills with accessable RPG-style progression. Players can co-op with friends online, compete fast-paced multiplayer matches, and conquer persistent territory with player-formed groups called agencies.

The large summer expansion, titled Sandstorm, was unveiled at E3 two weeks ago. Sandstorm adds weapon variation and loot, bigger badder, and dear we say epic weapons across every class and a brand new Open Zone area complete with quests and new missions. However, according to developers, you will have to grind to receive these new epic weapons. The first phase of Sandstorm was released in early June 2010, with the remaining phase to be released later this summer.

• Try For Free – Players can download Global Agenda and play until level 15 with no payment or credit card required.
• Buy Once – A single purchase enables you to play forever. Progress thru 50 character levels, access hundreds of weapons, and experience all current content and gametypes on our worldwide, hosted servers with no subscription required.
• Play What Suits You – Global Agenda offers a wide range of content including solo and co-op PvE, Mercenary PvP, Agency-vs-Agency, Arena PvP and more.

For more information, visit www.globalagendagame.com

About Hi-Rez Studios
Hi-Rez Studios, Inc. was established in 2005 to create exceptional online interactive entertainment and is located just outside of Atlanta, Georgia. For more information, visit www.hirezstudios.com.

Twitter: You can follow me on twitter @slash_NERDGASM