xStream - Gaming on Demand

xStream - Gaming on Demand, submitted by Crusader. Duke Nukem for download? According to a recent article on Shack News, gaming non-entity "xStream" has been chosen by the brain trust at 3D Realms to provide delivery infrastructure for downloadable versions of the upcoming title "Duke Nukem Forever". This bold move by Take 2 and 3D Realms signals that the companies are ready to enter the dawning age of digital software delivery and want to do it while chugging a Mountain Dew and snowboarding off the back of a cheetah. This ain't your grandaddy's software sales paradigm!

Game xStream™ is the first streaming on-demand service for playing graphic-intensive video games online. By using advanced, patent-pending game distribution and streaming methodologies, Game xStream can reach millions of users at once without any limitations on size or type of game. Its intelligent streaming does not download the same parts of the game each time the player changes levels - saving cache and storage space. Gamers can also save a game, retaining character and level advancements, and all modifications made during previous sessions online.

Aside from having a site with a hideous logo and a stunning lack of actual content to deliver, xStream seems primed to blow away Valve's Steam and other similar services. You may think that Steam is too well established, but take a look at the xStream delivery model:

As you can see xStream takes the imaginary idea of Duke Nukem Forever and using the power of high-tech thought bubbles it implants the game into the sleeping head of one of eight surviving fans of the Duke Nukem franchise. This fan will wake up in the morning having lived the dream of playing Duke Nukem Forever. The rest of us will be damned to shuffle into stores year after year paying no attention to the lack of Duke Nukem Forever boxes showing up on shelves.

– Zack "Geist Editor" Parsons (@sexyfacts4u)