General Streaming and Non-Steam Games Reports

[Tanweth, the Coffin Crusher]

Host Specs:
Windows 8.1 64-bit
Intel Core i5-2400 (Sandy Bridge), quad core
AMD Radeon 7850 2 GB
8 GB DDR3 RAM @1600Mhz
1920x1080

Local Specs:
Linux Mint 16 "Petra" 64-bit
Intel Celeron 1017U (Ivy Bridge), dual core
Intel HD 2500 Graphics
4 GB DDR3 Ram @1600Mhz
1366x768

Streaming Dishonored, Path of Exile, and Grim Dawn seemed to work quite wonderfully (with only brief testing thus far). Dishonored also successfully worked with my Xbox 360 Controller.

I found that automatic settings worked perfectly if I connected via wired. If I connected via wireless (at a 100% reported signal), then the display latency was too high to be comfortable. If I switched bandwidth to the lowest setting (5 Mbits/sec), then latency was low enough that it played smoothly. Limiting the framerate did not seem to have an effect on latency. There were visible compression artifacts on the video at this bandwidth, but the quality was still reasonably comfortable. I also found that, even when on wired, regardless of what the framerate limit was set to, it seemed to level out at 30 FPS for the transmission (at least that is what the F6 output at the bottom of the screen reported).

I also attempted to run Thief Gold and Oblivion (both installed as non-Steam games). Oblivion did not run at all, the connection simply timed out. It also did not open on my host computer. Thief Gold did not time out and my local computer did enter full screen mode, but the screen remained black. It did open successfully (with video) on my host computer. Both games also successfully hooked into the Steam Community In-Game service when launched directly on the host. Both games are modded, so a fresh unmodded installation of either may work.

Thank you for the feature! The opportunity to sit in a lounge chair and turn my dinky pathetic laptop into a virtual gaming laptop is quite enjoyable. Both because it allows me to overcome the low specs, and it allows me to overcome Linux compatibility issues. :)

[SmithNeo]

I tried on my Macbook Pro to stream StarCraft 2 from my Windows 7 PC over wifi and it was a horrible crash. Other games (Steam Games) worked well.

[Tanweth, the Coffin Crusher]

I did just attempt to stream Neverwinter Nights 2 from my desktop as a non-Steam game, and that worked quite well.

[Tig Ol' Bitties]

Deus Ex: Human Revolution worked well after limiting my bandwidth to 5mbps, turning off VSync and limiting resolution to 720p.

[aro]

Windows 8.1 host and Xubuntu 13.04 client.

I tried Starcraft 2 and Fallout (the original). SC2 just wouldn't connect to host at all and wouldn't even launch the game on the host. Fallout launched and streamed the video/audio, but no input was accepted from the client. I could see input made at the host though.

[SmithNeo]

I am wondering if the issue with Starcraft is related to it having its own launcher.

[Tanweth, the Coffin Crusher]

Upon further testing, I did find the following issues:

1. While streaming Dishonored (I have yet to see the issue in other games, though I haven't tested others as much), sometimes the game stops recognizing my W key, and both Esc and Tab seem to return me to the desktop (like Alt+Tab). Sometimes Esc brings up the Start screen rather than returning me to the desktop. While pressing different buttons in-game for a bit, normal functionality seems to return, and it returns if I restart the game.

2. When streaming Grim Dawn in Windowed Full Screen mode, it sometimes displays at 1024x768 resolution. Re-applying the Video settings in the game sets it back to my native desktop resolution.

3. While streaming is normally smooth and high quality on my wired connection, it does fairly frequently stutter. Usually this takes the form of the latency spiking for 5-20 seconds. At this point, the F6 debug OSD shows the flags "Slow decode" or "Slow game" or both, and the FPS drops from about 30 to 18-20. This occurs on all games that I have tested.

[Tanweth, the Coffin Crusher]

Some more updates:

1. Limiting my bandwidth to 10 Mbs/sec on wired seems to eliminate the stutter issue that I was experiencing when it ran at ~15 Mbs/sec (under the Automatic setting).

2. Sometimes my mouse cursor seems to suddenly hurl itself toward the bottom left corner for a couple of seconds while streaming. It can be quite inconvenient as you can imagine. :P