For all their mesmerizing graphics and adrenaline fueled gameplay, it might come as a surprise to non-gamers that many of today’s most popular computer games are bogged down by downtime (I should know – I spent the better part of 1999 mining virtual ore in Ultima Online to become a master blacksmith, and enjoyed about 10 minutes of it). MMOs like World of Warcraft see epic battles punctuated by hours of wandering mostly empty wilderness, while FPS games often punish gamers for dying by making them sit out and watch their comrades go at it until the beginning of the next round.
Today GotGame is giving these gamers something to do during these bouts of boredom. The company has released Rogue, a web browser based on WebKit and Adobe’s AIR platform that integrates directly into most of today’s popular gamer, allowing users to swap between their game and the web with a single hotkey. Gamers will be able to check their Email, listen to Pandora, watch Hulu videos, or casually browse the web at their leisure, jumping back into the game within seconds whenever they need to (the browser supports opacity, so it’s easy to tell when you need to swap your attention).
It’s possible to accomplish similar multitasking by placing games in ‘Windowed’ mode (which doesn’t make them take up the full screen), but this makes games prone to crashing and poor performance. Conversely GotGame says that Rogue should run perfectly fine with most games, and should only slightly affect performance (though the effect will increase significantly if you watch Flash-based movies like Hulu).
While it may seem counterintuitive to non-gamers, GotGame Rogue is a great idea – I would have loved to have had it during my gaming years (instead I was forced to sit a TV next to my computer monitor). Provided the app is as stable as GotGame claims, it will probably do very well. Other players in this space include Xfire, which offers an in-game application for socializing with other gamers.
That looks pretty sweet.
This capability was available since the mid-1990s with ATI multimedia graphics cards. You could have a video source as your desktop wallpaper since 1996 or in a little window. GotGame has made it more integrated since the ’90s, as ATI were like outsiders to MS Windows then.
Wow, this is going to revolutionize how I play WoW.
Oh god. I’m a sucker for multitasking and I just wet myself. Installing now.
Jason, thanks for the article.
We created a customized version of the browser for TechCrunch that can be downloaded at rogue.gotgame.com/techcrunch. It should be available for download by 2pm PST.
Enjoy the Rogue Beta! Win
WoW. This is too awesome for words.
Finally something to keep me company while farming mats. Heck yes.
Seems people never heard of playing a game in windowed mode.
Maybe I should read the article before leaving a comment, though I dont agree with it making games unstable.
“a web browser based on WebKit and Adobe’s AIR platform that integrates directly into most of today’s popular gamers”
Hmmm…is this some kind of new cyborg technology that I’m not aware of?
Should it be integrate into games?
About time, flight paths can finally be more than bathroom breaks.
woo hoo! no more alt tabbing to look stuff up!
OMG EPICNESS!!!!!!
Great! Just what my wife needs to hear…I now have something to do “in between” dying and getting back in the action other than taking out the garbage.
-Robb
http://www.retrevo.com
Robb,
I think you need to buy her a gift or send flowers while you are in-game and she’ll never speak ill of your game playing again, haha.
or http://www.wine.com – great selections for Thanksgiving!
Congrats to the GotGame crew on the release! They make some really awesome products for gamers!
I love this, it’s just something that needed to be done, and it’s done wonderfully. Who knew watching Family Guy, browsing the net, and playing WoW all at once could work so well?
Who’s that handsome guy with the red beard?
Check out that Sword. Its huge!
Awesome! Hooray for multitasking! Finally, something that caters to my “gaming A.D.D.!”
Keep killing it guys! You are on the right path!
I never really thought, “needs more internet” while playing WoW…but with a really easy option available, my needs might change. I could at least use it to look up WoW-speak I haven’t learned yet. WTB WoW dictionary?
Imagine the possibilities!
That is awesome… but how are they monetizing? Big Ass Spash Ad’s lol?
I’d imagine the same way that all browser makes money.
We will be monetizing through shared search revenue with Google.
Will you be monetizing the web component of GotGame as well as a normal content site would or will it become more of a distribution point for Rogue?
Who wants to bet that 80% of these comments are Got Game staff members.
By the looks of it – I’d say almost 90% of these guys are gotgame staffers. I’ve been using PLAYXPERT since the inner circle days. It works great and it has loads of widgets for various apps in-game. Plus, it works on PunkBuster games because it’s not hacking the exe like gotgame and xfire do…
Uh, Playxpert doesn’t work in vista at all. And XP 64 bit is a no go as well…
This will save me much yelling and swearing from when I’m having to switch back and forth between FAQ sites and the games that I’m stuck on.
what’s that catchy tune in there?
A Fantastic Band out of Philadelphia called Downtown Harvest. the song is Killer Queen Bee
http://www.mysp...downtownharvest
and it is also on iTunes.
This is genius!! GotGame… you are my new Heroes.
this is the wave of the future!
No longer will grinding for gold or exp. in WoW be endless hours of mind numbing tedious boredom.
GJ GG!
This is truly a revolutionary gaming idea. Bravo to the guys at GotGame. Keep on crushing it!
I like the idea of having the faq page directly on the game.
wait wait wait….porn and WoW at the same time? freakin sweet
This is great. GotGame rules.
Looks like an okay app … but who told you that windowed mode decreased performance and caused crashing? Windowed mode is almost always more stable than full screen.
I always found windowed mode to be annoying and buggy, but it has been a few years.
Kinda depends on what your doing while playing, but yeah I’ve experienced it. I play ffxi windowed mode, the game actually says it too that window mode is less stable when you check the window mode box.
“Kinda depends on what [you're] doing…”
COME ON!
I apologize for not checking ev’ry word for typo.
windowed mode does use more resources but most decent computer made within the last 5 years won’t show a noticeable difference.
Very clever. Great idea.
I like it, What is next?
TRY NAVIGAYA.COM !!!!!!!!!
Not as cool (graphically), not as thought-out or integrated, copy-cat color scheme, and the name… let’s not even go there. GotGame is a much better comprehensive brand. Better luck next time.
What is this????
That’s VERY dangerous
Amazing!!
this is pretty sweet…. grinding is going to be so much more endurable now!
Taco Bell stock shoots through the roof!
This is amazing for PC gamers. Its a great way to stay connected in all aspects of online game play and website surfing. Very cool GotGame!
I’m loving Rogue so far.
i can play Wow and watch videos at the very same time! Long time coming man!
Oh btw
Check out http://www.jobstaxi.com
New Jobs. CauseForce. Strands. Carbine Studios. NCsoft.
Sweet, its about high time isnt it?
http://www.anonweb.eu.tc
how can I get it? where to download?
http://rogue.gotgame.com
enjoy!
…or you can get dual-screens
2x 24 inch Widescreen LCD 1650 x 1080 
Love it!
I used to enjoy all kinds of computer games and tried a lot of them. Of course due to my talent to get bored very quickly I never finished them. So, after a while instead of playing them I started to keep myself informed on news, latest games publishings and all the stuff related to games. Now I can find all the games news and reviews on PC District.com.
Rogue rocks !!!!!!!! this is sweet.
definitely a must for all online gamers. whats not to like?
Xfire has this too, just not enabled for anything but Guild Wars right now. It works in others, though, if you modify your xfire_games.ini file.
Works with YouTube, as well, which Rogue has issues with.
“just not enabled for anything but Guild Wars right now.”
hmmmm
I haven’t had any issues with YouTube.
allright, i just downloaded this and i have been about 20 minutes trying to find out how the hell to use this. Theres no way to customize it, dont know what key to press so it bring it up in-game, no FAQ, no nothing. It is an awesome concept but as of now im not liking it too much.
Check out the Faq if you have questions. http://rogue.go...q.php#supported
F11 – mouse control
f12 – toggle it up, toggle it down
f9 and f10 – transparency up and down
Bottom right of browser buttons:
Video-optimizes browser for viewing video
Web- optimizes for web reading
Game- Optimizes for best performance w/o hitting f12 to toggle it off.
Toggling off stops the refresh rate completely for Rogue and there is then zero effect on your game. I use this to bring in and out the Wow armory, auction house and game guides.