Nvidia Project Shield demo streams Borderlands 2 from PC

Shawn Knight

Posts: 15,256   +192
Staff member

Despite the fact that we don’t know a ton of information about Nvidia’s upcoming Project Shield handheld at this point, the company is once again teasing gamers with the unit’s capabilities. A recent demo on Nvidia’s blog shows the portable gamer streaming Borderlands 2 from a GeForce-equipped PC.

Nvidia says Project Shield will soon redefine what it means to go “Away From Keyboard” thanks to the unit’s streaming capabilities. In the aforementioned demo, Nvidia utilized a Falcon Tiki PC equipped with a GeForce GTX 680 graphics card that allowed them to run the game with the graphics settings maxed out.

The video is the first in a weekly series known as PC Mondays that will showcase how easy it is to bring your favorite PC games to the handheld. In the video, an Nvidia rep opened project shield and pressed a single button to activate the display. From there, he fired up the Shield app and navigated to the PC connection tab, selected the Falcon Tiki PC then connected to Steam.

Within Steam, he is able to launch Broderlands 2 which of course initiates the title on the desktop in the background. The gaming experience admittedly looks great on Project Shield with high frame rates and real-time physics. Essentially the only difference is that you are playing on a smaller screen with joystick controls. Furthermore, the speakers built into Project Shield are designed with PC gaming in mind meaning they are distortion-free and sound larger than they actually are.

Thus far, the Tegra 4-powered Nvidia handheld looks extremely impressive but we will wait for key information like pricing, release date and an actual review before making any final judgments.

Permalink to story.

 
I don't like small screens or using Joysticks. They aren't nearly as responsive or accurate as a gaming mouse. And am I missing something or does this device require a powerful PC to feed its source from? Can this device run these games at these settings by itself? If it can't whats the point of this product?
So I can sit on my couch and hold a tiny device into the air while my PC does all the work?
Not trying to be cynical, just curious.
 
I'm not sure of this thing myself but rest assured if it's Nvidia's pet project it' gonna be worth paying attention to.
 
Got a psp?

Go and download pspdisp for free, does everything this does but 5 years ago.
 
Just the KVM software is quite brilliant. The integration with the Desktop PC is very smooth looking and hopefully no fuss to setup. If one has to go about setting dedicated IP's and constant port forwarding and bla bla then it would fail. But if it's seemless and plug and play it could be huge. Especially for console use like the Steam console which will hopefully extend to home theatre use. it will be an awesome controller.
One more thing they need to do. If you step away from the network, the computer end should know to sync the save games to the cloud, the device could then download it and you could continue where you left off, on the train on the way to work.
 
Pretty darn good if you want to turn your PC into a console. I personally don`t see why would anyone want that.
 
I don't like small screens or using Joysticks. They aren't nearly as responsive or accurate as a gaming mouse. And am I missing something or does this device require a powerful PC to feed its source from? Can this device run these games at these settings by itself? If it can't whats the point of this product?
So I can sit on my couch and hold a tiny device into the air while my PC does all the work?
Not trying to be cynical, just curious.

It's for when you're playing a game and then suddenly all that junk food and soda catches up to you and you need to do a number 2. Some people can't detach long enough to even do that so they can now bring the game with them. Watch this for reference - http://www.southparkstudios.com/full-episodes/s10e08-make-love-not-warcraft 18 minutes in FYI
 
It's cool, but I can see any practical use in my life for this. Maybe playing BF3 from my bed to the dismay of my wife.

What I want to do is play the games when I'm away from my house at the frame rate he is getting.
 
Why goto the toilet and game? when you can bring the toilet to you? Mooom Barfroom!! Hole in the chair plus bucket ftw! money saved.
 
Does it use a form of miracast which has sync back? good to see there is atleast no lag between the pc and the console
 
The thing I want most is to have it as a relay between my PC and my HD TV...

I want so bad to have my PC video and sound stream to my TV with a controller. If They can get that working, I will be most interested. If they can allow streaming PC while allowing second screen on the 5" to recreate Wii U like experience, that can open up new opportunities for developers and give something cool to the PC in an almost mainstream way.
 
Actually, we're all missing something here. What's the screen resolution on the handheld? I don't know of a single remote-desktop-like protocol that can deliver video and audio with lag acceptable for playing games.

I tried Splashtop Streamer (which is touted as being one of the best, giving ability to play games too) via a wireless N router, and it didn't deliver to my satisfaction.

Has NVIDIA come out with a new protocol? This could be good news if yes.
 
The thing I want most is to have it as a relay between my PC and my HD TV...

I want so bad to have my PC video and sound stream to my TV with a controller. If They can get that working, I will be most interested. If they can allow streaming PC while allowing second screen on the 5" to recreate Wii U like experience, that can open up new opportunities for developers and give something cool to the PC in an almost mainstream way.

And that's exactly what it does! Good, lord, does NOBODY here know what this thing does?

It not only can have your PC games streamed to the handheld, but you can then run the output from the handheld to your TV. Right now, it's via HDMI, but they've indicated that they want that to be wireless as well and are working on it.

Not only does it play your PC games, but it also plays Android games (duh). It also can act as an HTPC replacement/proxy. For me, this makes perfect sense as I have a nice gaming PC, but I don't have anything in the living room. I'd much rather get one of these so that I don't have to build an HTPC while at the same time getting the benefits of a powerful HTPC for a fraction of the cost, while also getting a mobile gaming console! Seriously, the implications/applications of this thing are myriad.
 
Actually, we're all missing something here. What's the screen resolution on the handheld? I don't know of a single remote-desktop-like protocol that can deliver video and audio with lag acceptable for playing games.
Indeed... really has to have minimal standard fps (20 - 30fps reasonable compromise?) and low input lag (<50ms? Got to be reasonable with a wireless tech and lower the standards a bit...) otherwise I can't see myself using it.
 
Indeed... really has to have minimal standard fps (20 - 30fps reasonable compromise?) and low input lag (<50ms? Got to be reasonable with a wireless tech and lower the standards a bit...) otherwise I can't see myself using it.
nah at least 40fps or everyone will have a sook about it
 
This seems like a perfect idea for me. I've got a nice gaming rig but I spend most of my time in the living room watching my daughter watch Dora. With this device I could play one of my AAA games without a laptop. This clearly isn't for everyone, but there's a lot of gamer dads who will love this.
 
People were playing consoles for years on PAL/NTSC. Baby steps first... it'll be usable at lower than 40fps...
depends if nvidia will try go mainstream with it. yes most hardcore gamers will put up with lower frames to improve the product but other people (mostly "I play COD and nothing else") will complain
 
depends if nvidia will try go mainstream with it. yes most hardcore gamers will put up with lower frames to improve the product but other people (mostly "I play COD and nothing else") will complain

Why would COD players complain about graphics quality? Or are you pulling my leg? :D
 
And that's exactly what it does! Good, lord, does NOBODY here know what this thing does?

It not only can have your PC games streamed to the handheld, but you can then run the output from the handheld to your TV. Right now, it's via HDMI, but they've indicated that they want that to be wireless as well and are working on it.

Not only does it play your PC games, but it also plays Android games (duh). It also can act as an HTPC replacement/proxy. For me, this makes perfect sense...

That is what I thought it did, but I did not see it working. I have not seen a single demo of that particular functionality working. I only have seen the play PC games remotely on Shield via the 5" screen.

Trust me I looked... if it is not working right, they could just as easily drop it off the feature set. I'm not biting until this feature is 100% and I would like to see it demoed - If they can get it working I'm sold.

I have looked into so many ways to get my PC on my HD TV remote from another room. I'm a super geek when it comes to having all sorts of computing devices around, but can not justify having more than one machine with that kind of horsepower in one household. :D
 
Back