As expected for some time now, Google has decided to call it quits on their cloud gaming service Stadia. This was announced in a blog post today.
Written up by Phil Harrison, the Vice President and General Manager at Stadia, the post mentions how "it hasn't gained the traction with users that we expected so we’ve made the difficult decision to begin winding down our Stadia streaming service".
The wildest part about this, is that they're going to be refunding all Stadia hardware purchases made through the main Google Store and they will also be refunding all game and add-on content purchases made through the Stadia store. Harrison said they expect to have finished up the majority of refunds by Mid-January, 2023. They will not be refunding any Stadia Pro subscriptions though, only the full purchases. More info on the process here but it seems like it's not ready yet.
Players will still be able to access and play games on Stadia through until January 18, 2023.
In the post Harrison mention how the "underlying technology platform that powers Stadia has been proven at scale and transcends gaming" and they see "opportunities to apply this technology across other parts of Google like YouTube, Google Play, and our Augmented Reality (AR) efforts — as well as make it available to our industry partners" so it seems they will continue to offer it to others to use.
This is a pretty huge defeat for Google to give up and refund wholly like this. With the likes of GeForce NOW, Xbox Cloud and Amazon Luna — the business model that Google had with you needing to buy full-price games was pretty much doomed.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Quoting: Whitewolfe80People didn't actually have to pay a monthly fee for Stadia; it's just Google's terrible marketing made it look like they did.Quoting: pbI got to play games like *and* get a refund afterwards? How not to love Stadia, really?
There's also a TAKEAWAY option to download your saves and (hopefully) use them in the versions purchased from steam etc. Won't always work (I don't have much hopes for Hitman 3 as it uses online sync and cross-platform is not supported), but Cyberpunk should work and many others as well. It's bittersweet as I liked Stadia but it is what it is.
Okay help me out here not being douchy why did you like a service where you have to pay to get the hardware pay to be a member then actually buy the game with craptastic prices
Quoting: elmapulso what happens to exclusives like guilty?
You mean Gylt, right? I guess it's better to complete it while it still works, just in case.
I played it during a free week but didn't manage to finish.
I wonder if they will refund purchases made between today and the shutdown date.
[edit] ok, so the store is now closed. Quite obvious really, as people would 100% exploit it if the above was the case.
Last edited by pb on 29 September 2022 at 11:13 pm UTC
It's kind of comforting actually, because they clearly jettisoned "don't be evil" a long time ago and want to be bastards like Facebook or early Microsoft, so if they're going to be like that I'm glad they're pretty crap at it.
Last edited by Purple Library Guy on 29 September 2022 at 11:04 pm UTC
Looking forward to Amazon Luna, but I don't have any higher hopes anymore...
Quoting: AsciiWolfConsidering how crappy GeForce NOW is, this is really bad news.
Yeah, Stadia's tech was far superior to GFN. Problably because Linux vs Windows, hehe
Anyway, all hope in Valve for the long term, as usual.
My little son was playing with friends on a regular basis on our TV...
Yeah, I'll miss Stadia. RIP.
Last edited by Corben on 29 September 2022 at 11:09 pm UTC
So those of you who never tried Stadia but have a google account and chrome - you can go and see what we're about to lose. You don't have to like it, but it's still good to know.
TheRiddick Sep 29, 2022
Instead of offering a better service for customers they just gonna shut it all down... typical!
Quoting: ertuquequeI'm actually happy Stadia is dead... The whole concept of streaming games is inherently discriminatory to the majority of the world, which doesn't have good Internet connection. At least 2 entire continents are out of this business because of this.so? the most well sold video game console, sold 157 millions of units, in a world with
6~7 billion, i would say, most people didnt had access to one either, and not all of then due to the lack of interest.
no platform was ever universal, that is not an excuse to not give an option.
maybe in a few regions consoles are too expensive, but streaming isnt or the other way arround.
Quoting: ertuquequeAlso, the idea of paying for a videogame that after some time is not going to be available... nope, not for me. That's another reason why I don't like Netflix and all these streaming services. I want to HAVE what I pay for, locally.that i have to agree with, but i dont see how having less options would be a good thing.
the solution here should be google giving an fallback option.
make an client to downlod the games you own on pc/mac/linux in case you want to play offline, or give away steam keys, hell even they said that the most played game ever was their dinossaur chrome game, i guesses that was an hint they were planing something for offline consumers...
now that we have less options, its more likely that the ones we have may move to a cloud only future.
to be fair, the fact that the cloud only service died might send then the message.
pleasereadthemanual Sep 30, 2022
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