Confirmed: play as you download.

http://www.engadget.com/2013/07/16/xbox-one-play-as-you-download/?utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_campaign=Engadget

Just like the PS4 you can start playing a game as it installs from the disk or from online.

Meaning you can go to a friends and start down loadin one of your digital games and start playing right away.

Has either mentioned what I assume is the obvious answer of it ll be hard to play online while downloading it because of bandwidth use?

So basically this is the exact same as saying you can play your entire game library at a friends place (if they're digital)?

I guess having the disc version would just mean you can take the disc over so it's all the same thing. Waiting until next July is going to be the worst thing ever..

@connerthekewlkid: that's supposedly. What the cloud is supposed to do. But I assume they have some kinda tricky magic.

For the disk I assume it means your playin off the disk

@xyzygy: you can start playing as soon as you start downloading.

@connerthekewlkid: Answered for me in the first paragraph of the article.

Once the required data -– a fraction of the entire game -– is on their hard drive, they can jump into the action while the rest of the game finishes downloading in the background,

Thus if it's like Blizzard's method, there are 4 stages: 1) unplayable 2) playable, 3) optimal, 4) complete. So if the game code and basic assets for level 1 are isolated into a 500 MB chunk (like a demo), once you get all of that you can start.

I think it's only the Gaikai streaming partnership that put the idea in people's heads of play-while-you-download is instant on...

Bandwidth shouldn't matter at all for single player games, and not very much for multiplayer, seeing as how Blizzard seems to be the pioneer of this with their online games. This feature being universally available is more incentive for developers to keep their net code efficient.

How is it possible to launch and play a game that is downloading/installing?

If it were playable it wouldn't be installing..

@jouseldelka: Vertical slice. "from allowing games to be installed in segments"

@the_laughing_man: My quote from your linked article trumps your non-quote. ;)

Reading the article helps, guys.

I think it's using some of that cloud power.

'VIRTUALLY UNLIMITED POWER OF THE CLOUD" (emphasis mine)

I rather wait for the whole game to download before playing, but it could take along time.

They should pack in a tiny arcade game to play while you're waiting for your current download to become playable (fuck off Namco, this is all mine.)

You've gotta admire and also despise the guy at Namco who thought of trademarking that.

My internet is too shitty to take advantage of it but I'm happy it's there.

Excellent, this functionality with Starcraft II and Diablo III has been much preferable to waiting for a full install. Make no mistake though guys, the only way you could play instantly while installing would be from the disc. For digital purchases this would function similar to The Last of Us. Download a portion of the early game assets, start playing while it downloads the rest of the game that you won't see straight away. The article lays it out really clearly.

This is defintiely not a click download start playing sort of feature. Good to know the parity is there though.

If this requires the Power of the Cloud, apparently other console makers possess such majicks as well.

Ah, shit yea!

With the average internet speed being as low as it is, some people are going to be pissed off when they reach the end of what they can play before they've downloaded the next bit.

I am more excited for the Disk version of this.

So when the singleplayer slice downloads, you get to play it while the multiplayer slice downloads?

It's not making sense to me, usually the big chunk of the files is for singleplayer and it all consists of the sound effects, cutscenes and so forth, which all need to work together.

I guess the slices are numbered and are downloaded based on their order in the game. So the first few cutscenes and game weapons download, and you play with those until later chapters' assets are downloaded.

Sounds cool. And tricky and subject to a lot of crashing and problems, too!

@jouseldelka: xbox 360 games right now do not install. Installs only happen on the ps3.

The PS4 seems to be fixing that with the ways the system is built. Should download and just run without an install.

Developers just need to build their games to download in that way. It's definitely possible, but it should be a requirement on the platform level. Every developer should be forced to make their games playable as you download and as you install directly from the disc. Haven't heard anything about ps4 allowing full disc installs the way the 360 and xbox one do. They need to have that.

Glad it's there but it seemed obvious that it would be.

I'm almost positive that this was already announced over a month ago. Nice touch though. My internet is atrociously slow and I've been buying more digital games lately due to some decent sales. Good to see this is confirmed.

I hope the new Metal Gear will have Snake smoking that cigarette again as the game begins to download and install and then after 5% the alert noise will sound with an exclamation mark over his head and he'll throw the cigarette down, turn around and you'll actually be IN the game.

I think it would work very similar to say metal gear solid 4 in how each section had to be installed. I would guess games will have sections broken up so when section one or two is done you can play the game while the rest downloads.

@jouseldelka: It installs the stuff you need at the start of the game and then fills in the rest of the installation as it downloads in the background. You won't be able to play as soon as you start downloading - you'll still have to wait for a certain amount of the game to download. The actual 'gameplay' part of a game doesn't account for much of the installation size though, so -depending on the type of game- you shouldn't have to download that much before you can start playing.

The Metaboli service on PC has worked like this for years. It shouldn't really be that difficult to pull off, just a case of making sure the game isn't requesting any assets which aren't available yet, and having everything download in the right order. Obviously this is a lot easier to pull off with a linear game than with an open-world game.

Segmented installing. Did you ever play Metal Gear Solid 4? They had you install game data like 5 times once for each ACT of the game. So essentially something like that.

These systems continue to approach identical.

Can't decide between an Emperor Palpatine gif, or a Cloud Strife gif. Meh. :)

Yes. Again.... linked article in first post:

Microsoft also teased today's news in its original Xbox One announcement PR: "Unleashing the virtually unlimited power of the cloud makes everything more convenient and accessible, from allowing games to be installed in segments so that gameplay can start quickly to updates downloading in the background."

Ok?