Da-Chief
04-21-2008, 10:10
http://i.dslr.net/urls/92/9392.gif (http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/GameRail-Closes-Up-Shop-93738)
You may recall our coverage of a company by the name of Gamerail, who promised to reduce gaming latency (lag) for an extra monthly fee, provided your ISP partnered with them. Via the use of a few routing shortcuts (using the Broadwing and XO networks), the company charged gamers $11.99 a month for optimized routing. Last year several of our users participated in the beta and stress tests, and offered their very mixed opinions (http://www.corpsman.com/forum/remark,17774303~days=9999) of both the system and the shiny, orange GUI.
Several beta participants told us they saw little actual benefit, and the idea of paying for decent routing annoyed many. Promises were made by Gamerail about expanding the network and new ISP partnerships. Employees occasionally stopped by our forums (http://www.corpsman.com/forum/r18743949-GameRailCharter) to hype their product as a solution for customers of crappy ISPs in uncompetitive areas:If you don't have an option for ISPs in your area, and the one you have is unwilling to fix a problem, is oversold, or any other of many reasons for bad performance, GameRail may be able to help.
Or not. Late last week Gamerail posted an announcement to their website (http://www.gamerail.com/) saying they were closing up shop:It is with deep regret to announce that the GameRail network has been discontinued at this time. Thank you to the gamers who have participated in the GameRail trial and support of its development as we worked to solve the issues of latency and network quality and their impact on gaming. We believe that latency and network quality will continue to affect the gaming experience and while we are still believers in the GameRail concept, the market does not appear to be ready to support a standalone network for gaming at this time.
In other words, the company couldn't strike additional ISP partnership deals, and consumers didn't feel like a slight bump in latency was worth $12, particularly if their ISP already provided decent routing.
read comment(s) (http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/GameRail-Closes-Up-Shop-93738)
More...
You may recall our coverage of a company by the name of Gamerail, who promised to reduce gaming latency (lag) for an extra monthly fee, provided your ISP partnered with them. Via the use of a few routing shortcuts (using the Broadwing and XO networks), the company charged gamers $11.99 a month for optimized routing. Last year several of our users participated in the beta and stress tests, and offered their very mixed opinions (http://www.corpsman.com/forum/remark,17774303~days=9999) of both the system and the shiny, orange GUI.
Several beta participants told us they saw little actual benefit, and the idea of paying for decent routing annoyed many. Promises were made by Gamerail about expanding the network and new ISP partnerships. Employees occasionally stopped by our forums (http://www.corpsman.com/forum/r18743949-GameRailCharter) to hype their product as a solution for customers of crappy ISPs in uncompetitive areas:If you don't have an option for ISPs in your area, and the one you have is unwilling to fix a problem, is oversold, or any other of many reasons for bad performance, GameRail may be able to help.
Or not. Late last week Gamerail posted an announcement to their website (http://www.gamerail.com/) saying they were closing up shop:It is with deep regret to announce that the GameRail network has been discontinued at this time. Thank you to the gamers who have participated in the GameRail trial and support of its development as we worked to solve the issues of latency and network quality and their impact on gaming. We believe that latency and network quality will continue to affect the gaming experience and while we are still believers in the GameRail concept, the market does not appear to be ready to support a standalone network for gaming at this time.
In other words, the company couldn't strike additional ISP partnership deals, and consumers didn't feel like a slight bump in latency was worth $12, particularly if their ISP already provided decent routing.
read comment(s) (http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/GameRail-Closes-Up-Shop-93738)
More...