Home Gaming Why the Xbox One cloud is useless for us… for now

Why the Xbox One cloud is useless for us… for now

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Microsoft has been very vocal about how the cloud is going to add a ton of power to their Xbox One console and that as things roll out we will see the benefit of the cloud. One of these benefits is that they are offering cut price server hosting for multiplayer games using their Azure platform.

What this means is that a game like TitanFall no longer has to rely on player servers and can have a ton of dedicated servers, up to 300 000 is their marketing number, dotted around the planet to make sure that gamers have the very best experience.

But this isn’t good news for people who don’t live in North America or Western Europe as you can see from this map of where the Azure data centres are placed.

Azure Servers

So this map is pretty easy to read, if you are in the green countries your online connection to an Azure datacentre is pretty much guaranteed to be under 100ms, the yellow ones are reachable under 100ms but can be up to 200ms.

The black countries are over 200ms. Now lets take a moment to look at how incredibly far away the closest Azure datacentre is to South Africa.

Now let’s go back to the multiplayer only title, TitanFall, which has been confirmed to be utilising the extensive Azure datacentre network and that will be released in just 2 months. Panicking yet?

Thankfully there is an open beta for TitanFall on the way so we can test this out properly and hopefully our connection is better as we do have some pretty thick pipes between South Africa and Europe so it may well still be playable.

There are rumours that Microsoft are planning a local datacentre to cater for Africa and if that is the case the Xbox One could well become the best multiplayer experience to have locally. Maybe that is why we aren’t getting the console until October 2014 locally?

But hey don’t feel too bad, all those South Africans that fled to Perth are now living in the middle of a desert and also don’t have access to first world datacentres, so there’s that.

Always makes me giggle

Last Updated: January 30, 2014

39 Comments

  1. oVg 60fps > 30fps

    January 30, 2014 at 10:03

    Its Africa. Who needs clouds? We have bore holes.

    Reply

    • oVg 60fps > 30fps

      January 30, 2014 at 10:12

      SEE?

      Reply

      • oVg 60fps > 30fps

        January 30, 2014 at 10:14

        and gold mines

        Reply

        • Rikus

          January 30, 2014 at 11:44

          Hopefully the Xbone won’t be available in gold. With all this talk about the cloud, I can just imagine the golden shower jokes.

          Reply

          • oVg 60fps > 30fps

            January 30, 2014 at 11:46

            The Boner is enough.

            WHY THE FCUK DID THEY NOT CALL IT THE “INFINITE” 8 ?

            Just shows you that the casuals come first.

          • Rikus

            January 30, 2014 at 11:49

            I also quite liked the “Infinite”/”Infinity” idea, but I guess they should probably call their last Xbox that. I mean, what do they call the Xbox after the “Infinity”? The “Infinity+1” or the “Infinity 2”?

          • oVg 60fps > 30fps

            January 30, 2014 at 11:57

            Infinity and beyond

          • Rikus

            January 30, 2014 at 11:58

            That is actually a good idea!

    • Hammersteyn

      January 30, 2014 at 10:18

      I guess the XBOX won’t be raining on the PS4s parade until October.

      Reply

      • oVg 60fps > 30fps

        January 30, 2014 at 10:20

        It took SONY 5 years to catch up to the 1 year early head start set by the 360.
        How the tables have turned.

        Reply

        • RinceThis2014

          January 30, 2014 at 10:26

          And you would think they would learn…

          Reply

          • Hammersteyn

            January 30, 2014 at 10:27

            I don’t trust clouds with to much power

          • oVg 60fps > 30fps

            January 30, 2014 at 10:29

            acid pee

          • oVg 60fps > 30fps

            January 30, 2014 at 10:31

            So much so that SONY released the console to West before the Eastern.
            We have already come to the conclusion that America know they cant win the Japanese or European market. So I do not blame them for making America their main demographic.

        • melodicmizery

          January 30, 2014 at 10:48

          prob because all the extra stuff packed in the ps3 with the 4 usb ports, sd card, etc. the ps4 is like a empty shell almost. it have no multi out, no power switch in the back. all those little parts add up. thats what i hate about ps4 though is its lack of components compared to ps3. i used the main shutoff switch alot and multi out for my surround sound and sd card slot and all 4 usb slots. grrrr

          Reply

    • RinceThis2014

      January 30, 2014 at 10:19

      BWAHAHAHA

      Reply

    • B4d R0b0t

      January 30, 2014 at 11:25

      The rate of attrition of indie game developers using Azure is very high right now, the lack of server clusters evenly distributed across the world added with high costs is turning Azure into a very unsustainable platform to develop and host games on. Never-mind the costs to small and big businesses. Here is a funny video for you http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORSMALT35Vk

      Reply

      • B4d R0b0t

        January 30, 2014 at 11:35

        rad

        Reply

        • oVg 60fps > 30fps

          January 30, 2014 at 11:42

          radical dude

          Reply

    • Warren Lombard

      January 30, 2014 at 11:37

      Your comment needs more likes!

      Reply

      • Rikus

        January 30, 2014 at 11:40

        Your wish is my command! *Likes*

        Reply

  2. Admiral Chief in Vegas

    January 30, 2014 at 10:19

    WHY did you have to use THOSE colours?

    Reply

    • oVg 60fps > 30fps

      January 30, 2014 at 10:21

      lol

      Reply

  3. Jarrod Lane

    January 30, 2014 at 10:20

    Will the 360 and PC also be using the Azure servers or only the X0?

    Reply

  4. VampyricSquirrel Monk

    January 30, 2014 at 10:38

    Tried and tested… 2mbps line to WoW or SWTOR servers = 200-300ms latency depending on time of day and amount of people playing on the line.

    Had 4 people on WoW the other night and latency was at a happy 230ms for all players… that’s better than my old 4mbps line… makes sense? nope it doesn’t!

    Reply

    • Rags

      January 30, 2014 at 10:54

      Latency is not dependent on line speed. So probably better routing with your new line. 🙂

      Reply

      • VampyricSquirrel Monk

        January 30, 2014 at 13:37

        Yeah… but it’s also line quality etc… but I’m liking the routing at the moment… don’t mind 200-250ms… feels normal compared to what I was abused with.

        Reply

    • Weanerdog

      January 30, 2014 at 10:58

      I get 180 ms to 230 ms to WOT Europe when telkom’s not hating. Tried Quake live the other night and was getting 160-180ms on European games. So should be playable.

      Reply

      • Rags

        January 30, 2014 at 13:58

        Why not play on the South African servers? Or just testing?

        Reply

  5. Laby

    January 30, 2014 at 10:39

    Please that’s a lame excuse I have been owning noobs with even 300ms latency.

    Reply

  6. melodicmizery

    January 30, 2014 at 10:45

    didnt africa get there consoles earlier this month or december alot later then other countrys. or was that just ps4. im guessing due to pretty much nobody there being able to afford one and them getting everything later it doesnt really matter. my friend in greece cant even afford a new console there 4 times more there in price and everyone is poor and the internet is like 1m for everyone

    Reply

    • oVg 60fps > 30fps

      January 30, 2014 at 11:04

      Try Brazil. Those poor buggers have to pay 3x the normal price.
      Gaming is a luxury, they are now taking the hobby to a new level of luxury… just no games.

      Reply

  7. HvR

    January 30, 2014 at 11:05

    So for the best Xbox experience in Africa you have to move to Algeria and go live in the northern parts of the Sahara desert. Well probably still better than staying in Gauteng.

    Reply

  8. B4d R0b0t

    January 30, 2014 at 11:21

    Just the same as all the other MS Cloud Products. Even Office365 (the flagship product next to Azure) is seriously lacking in it’s cloud distribution. At one stage we where going to connect to the DC in Israel…..of all places.

    Reply

  9. DrKiller

    January 30, 2014 at 11:32

    Sounds fine to me.. DOTA on the EU West servers are anyway 150ping, so its not that bad.

    Reply

  10. Rikus

    January 30, 2014 at 11:33

    Dont’ worry Xbox fans! The cloud will solve this cloud uselessness. The cloud will add datacenters worldwide to give the power of the cloud to the world! All hail the cloud!

    Reply

    • That Tall Ork Norm

      January 30, 2014 at 15:48

      Cloudy with a chance of Error 37.

      Reply

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