Google has announced it will close the cloud gaming platform service Stadia which in November 2019 was touted as a “Netflix for games” when it launched, it allows players to stream games online from a device such as a phone or tablet without owning a computer or console and as such the graphical settings being at max, relying only on a stable connection and bandwidth of the player.
The service will now come to an end on 18 January 2023 because of a lack of “traction” with gamers. Google has promised refunds to players who purchased its Stadia controller, as well as any games or add-on content. It said it estimates those refunds will be completed by mid-January.
This is good news for the gaming industry and games development industry as a whole in that the limitations posed by such a platform took away from the very essence of video gaming, that is, not having access to the software in question, inability to apply “mods” to the games, essentially in a bubble that is defined by the platform provider such as google in this case with no control over it. There are still other alternatives to Stadia such as amazon’s Luna service.
