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Samsung partnering with Gaikai for cloud gaming service

Samsung partnering with Gaikai for cloud gaming service

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Samsung has announced that it will partner with Gaikai to incorporate cloud-based gaming into its smart TVs.

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Samsung Gaikai
Samsung Gaikai

Cloud gaming services are a natural fit for smart TVs, and now two of the top TV manufacturers will be competing to see who can implement it best. Samsung has just announced a partnership with streaming game service Gaikai. "Samsung Cloud Gaming" will be available to users of Samsung's 2012 LED 7000 line or anything better; they'll be able to see the tool from the TV hub and demo or purchase games to play. Cloud Gaming will begin accepting beta users "soon" in the US, though we're not sure when the service will launch or what kind of selection will be available. While talking with us earlier, Gaikai executive David Perry touted Samsung's position as a leading manufacturer, saying that "there isn't a bigger deal to do in cloud gaming."

This news comes only hours after LG announced its own partnership with Gaikai competitor OnLive. LG is working with Gaikai too, though — at CES, it pledged to include Gaikai in its core smart TV platform, though we haven't seen anything since then. This means that while LG and Samsung will be racing to develop the best integrated gaming system, they could also be negotiating with Gaikai for its services, and Gaikai and OnLive may be competing for LG's platform. We've had mixed results with LG's Gaikai streaming so far, so we'll wait to see if all this competition spurs cloud gaming forward.