Google's Stadia Problem

I've used Stadia off and on for about a year now, both in a big city with fiber connection and out in the rural midwest with a decent cable connection. When it works well, it feels like magic. The latency is so small, you can't tell the difference between it and a game running on a local device. When you get a connection hick-up, it's bad, lots of artifacting, losing control, huge input lag.

The tech is amazing IMHO, thinking back to type of gaming I was doing back in the 80s. Gaming has come a long way.

I think its biggest problem is being associated with Google. They have built up a bad rep and I think gamers like sticking to platforms they trust and see being around for the long-term. Why invest in building a library that might not be around in a few years? I personally don't think they'll shut down the service but I'm not surprised that a lot of people have those worries.

HN thread on Stadia from earlier this month: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25992664

Without some serious way to draw in players, you're never going to acquire, and more importantly, keep them.

Google should have kept leaning into the idea that Stadia could support the highest settings on any game at any resolution the user wants (bandwidth notwithstanding), and made it work reliably for any game on the platform. It's really the only thing I can find attractive about this or any other game streaming service. We definitely shouldn't be seeing a class-action lawsuit because you don't know how to communicate resolution limitations to your customers: https://9to5google.com/2021/02/18/stadia-4k-lawsuit-class-ac...

They should also have performed some customer goodwill beforehand. Maybe support a product or two for longer. I remember as soon as Stadia came out, nearly every mention included the phrase "but how long until Google cancels it?" Why would you think launching a product everybody is sure is going to be killed simply because that's what you always do is a good idea? I was a daily user of many of the products they killed, and I definitely don't want my game purchases to evaporate the same way.

The biggest problem I see now is that Stadia is still Google. Andrew Spinks' (Terraria developer) experience with being locked out of his personal Gmail, YouTube, Docs, and Play Purchases (which include movies, books, and games) should demonstrate why this should be a frightening prospect for someone using any of these services. If you're reported by some players online, you could lose access to all Google services. Or, in Spinks' case, simply doing nothing at all to warrant a platform-wide ban and never being able to appeal the process. No thanks; that sounds like a nightmare waiting to happen.

As for other platforms, Microsoft knows how to keep players, and they already have hardware in lots of homes. They can leverage a lot of existing goodwill. Amazon might have a chance since they seem to be playing the long game, but they also have their own platform that hasn't quite pissed everyone off yet. Certainly, killing off their own internal development team doesn't really do them any favors if they're trying to fool people into thinking this is an actual long-term strategy.

Gamestop should buy Stadia.

Stadia just doesn't make sense. it's only a matter of time until Google ends it completely.

Assuming they give the controller kit for free, Stadia costs $10/month, so in 4 years you'd have paid $480, almost the same as a new console. plus, the price of the console likely isn't an issue if you can afford buying a couple of games that cost $60 each.

then you have the latency problem in Stadia and the fact that you can't really play it from everywhere (even though it's in the cloud); you still need the chromecast, right? they might as well beef up the chromecast and make it a regular console. the newest chromecast already can play android games I think.