Google Stadia, the late 2019 streaming platform that promised to revolutionize gaming by allowing users to stream games without owning a powerful PC or console, is changing course, leaving the gaming business and will now offer the its platform directly to game publishers in addition to offering Stadia Pro to the public.
The company is announcing the news today, But Kotaku Last week he started hearing rumors from sources close to Stadia that Google’s service was heading towards a major change. A source in the gaming industry has been explained Kotaku that Google was canceling several projects, basically any game slated for release beyond a specific 2021 window, even though they believed games close to launch were still coming out. Today he provides some clarifications.
Google will close its two gaming studios, located in Montreal and Los Angeles. Neither of them had released a game yet. This closure will affect about 150 developers, a source familiar with Stadia’s operations said. The company says it will try to find those new developer roles on Google.
Jade Raymond, the veteran producer who helped build Assassin’s Creed for Ubisoft and went to EA a few years ago before leaving to run game creation at Stadia, is leaving the company, according to Google.
Google will continue to operate the Stadia gaming service and the $ 10 monthly Stadia Pro service. It is unclear how many exclusive games, if any, will still reach the service, although the company has indicated that it can still sign new games and provide more third-party versions. on the platform. However, many will find a reduction in the plan to run Stadia as a bona fide competitor for console platforms.
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The company plans to start offering its Stadia technology to publishers, opening up the possibility for Stadia to become the streaming technology of other video game companies. Google’s head of Stadia operations, Phil Harrison, a longtime console executive, will focus on finding these new partnerships.
“WI see an important opportunity to work with partners looking for a gaming solution based on Stadia’s advanced technical infrastructure and platform tools, ”Harrison wrote in a blog post today. “We believe this is the best way to build Stadia into a long-term sustainable business that will help grow the industry. “
Google initially offered Stadia in a $ 129 Founder’s Edition package, which included a custom controller, a Chromecast Ultra (used to stream games from Google’s servers to a TV), and three months of Stadia Pro, a service of subscription that granted access to certain games.
Google promoted some exciting features, including the ability to allow players to pass control of a live Stadia game live and share game states, but many of them they were not available at launch and remained in testing phases.
The best moments of the service may have been when its third-party ports showed the strength of the cloud gaming model, in which a game can work well on almost any device with a screen and a strong internet connection. Ubisoft games such as Assassin’s Creed Odyssey it worked well at Stadia. Destiny 2Stadia support allows players in this game to fall into an additional game or mission from their phone or laptop when they are away from the usual game material. When Cyberpunk 2077 hesitated in everything else in December, it worked pretty well at Stadia.
However, without offering a service of everything that could be played or offering exclusive games for assassins, Stadia struggled to get his foot in the door. Meanwhile, Microsoft increased its xCloud cloud gaming service as part of the Game Pass Ultimate package, and Stadia was becoming less and less attractive to the type of hardcore gamer who can create a new gaming service.
Apparently, Google built for the future with the creation of first-hand studios and a leadership team made up of studio heads and creative directors, but those efforts were not enough to avoid the fate many people feared when they heard this Google initiative: that it would lose support from within before it got enough time to realize its potential.
Stadia is not quite finished. Stadia technology could still be successful. According to many accounts, Stadia has fantastic games. But as a game creator, it looks like Google has packed it. He said a source familiar with Stadia’s own operations, citing that of another technology giant. widely advertising failure to create video games: “Google was a terrible place to make games. Imagine Amazon, but with few resources.