Some time ago I reported that you can also play non-Steam games via the Steam platform game streaming – via Remote Play. I would prefer native gaming, but sometimes it just doesn’t work – and so I use this solution to play Anno or Age of Empires, for example, when I have time, which is rarely the case.
If you don’t like Steam’s game streaming or you can’t get it to work, then there are alternatives, such as console streaming or cloud streaming – or other software like Moonlight or Sunshine. I stream games as I usually have a MacBook handy and a small mini PC that acts as a game server. I also tried Parsec, which I would like to briefly mention here, maybe some of you don’t know it.
Parsec is a cloud gaming and remote desktop streaming service that allows users to connect to a remote computer and play or work on it. Parsec uses technologies such as NVIDIA GPU acceleration and adaptive network compression, among others, to to enable a seamless and responsive gaming experienceregardless of network speed or latency.
The service supports both single-player and multi-player games, and users can use their own library of games on the remote computer or stream games from the cloud.
In my case, I install the software on the Windows computer and on the Mac. You can use the Parsec graphical interface to adjust various settings and finally start your server. At the other end, i.e. on the Mac, I log on to the other computer and do work or start games.
It is important to mention that Parsec is basically free, but there are also paid packages with added value. So far for me as a single player with games that are “not that wild” I haven’t had any issues with the free version so I thought I’d mention the software. The price overview and the functions of the free version can be found on this page. The server runs on Windows or the Mac if desired, these platforms also work as clients, but there are also Android and a Chrome extension. Parsec requires a user account and laudably offers to set up two-factor authentication right at the start.
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