With roughly a month until its official debut in the U.S., OnLive has announced its cloud-based gaming service will also be launching in the United Kingdom through a partnership with telecom firm BT. As part of the deal, BT will have exclusive rights to bundle the OnLive service into their broadband offerings, in addition to taking a 2.6% stake in the San Francisco-based company. Gamers will still be able to order the gaming service directly from OnLive and use it with any U.K. Internet service provider, as the BT exclusivity part only applies to bundle deals.


Exactly when OnLive will be launching overseas wasn't mentioned, but trials have reportedly been conducted since 2009. In the U.S. a commercial roll out is expected on June 17, where users will pay $14.95 for a subscription that doesn't include the price of the games themselves. Thus far, publishers Electronic Arts, Ubisoft, 2K Games, THQ and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment have revealed they will make their titles available on the service.

The idea behind OnLive is that people will get high-frame-rate, no-lag performance out of most games, regardless of the hardware powering their computer. Standard-definition games will reportedly require a 1.5Mb/s connection, while 1080p high-definition gaming at 60 frames should be available sometime in 2011 and will require 5Mb/s.