Google Stadia's Biggest Exclusive GYLT Is Coming to PS5, PS4

You know, after all these years, I still don't even know what Google Stadia was.

@bpomber To clarify what Sammy said, it was a cloud streaming platform from Google that had 2 key business model flaws that killed it very quickly:

You had to pay a monthly subscription for access to the full resolution when streaming.

You had to buy your games full retail same as on console, there were no subscription games, and you could only play them on their cloud platform at full quality with a subscription and could only shop in their store (like console.)

Needless to say it didn't last long. In contrast, nVidia's GeForce Now similarly has you buy retail games, but they're normal PC games from Steam, EGS, GoG, so you can take your games with you to local hardware or any other PC-based hosted cloud system, and/or price compare between stores, etc.

@get2sammyb @NEStalgia So what were the games streamed on? Did Google have it's own device that exclusively streamed Stadia games?

I sure hope that streaming isn't the future of video games. I don't like having to rely on internet connectivity and using bandwidth to play a game. Not to mention the decreased performance of a streamed game versus a downloaded game.

I didnt gel that well with RIME when it finally came out. So I wasn that intrigued by this when it was Stadia Exclusive. I'd give it a shot though after FF XVI.

@bpomber the friends we made along the way.

Speaking seriously, I once read about some folks here in Belarus who set out and invested big sums into building cottages outside Minsk so they could "just drive to work and otherwise live closer to nature, like many people in the civilized west do". Private initiatives for the most part, they kinda overlooked the part where said "civilized west" would tend to the necessary infrastructure from gas and water to communications before building anything, so they ended up with big houses that looked nice but weren't exactly fun to live in.

This is what Stadia and cloud gaming for the most part is to me. A fancy option that, unlike many other gaming schticks, heavily and almost DEBILITATINGLY relies on third party infrastructure to the extent few other projects in the industry do. We might get there in 5-10-15 years, but in this day and age Stadia had all the success odds of a gas station opened circa 1800. ¯(ツ)/¯

@bpomber There was a Stadia controller you had to buy, but that was it, everything else was streamed via browser/android app.

Cloud itself isn't actually bad. PS Now was a bit iffy, IDK if it's improved with the Plus change. xCloud is actually good, has hiccups still that are clearly on their end (and it's still in beta technically), but it's very good much of the time. Stadia was actually one of the best in terms of performance. Many reported Cyberpunk was way better on Stadia than any console near launch. GeForce Now is actually very good as well. GF Now is less about "streaming service" and more like you're "renting a $3500+ PC for a low price in the cloud."

Cloud depends heavily on your local internet infrastructure and to a degree how close you are to a particular vendor's data center. That's the main weakness about it now.

However, I wouldn't knock it without really trying it though. I use xCloud all the time and used to use Now sometimes. At least with current xCloud when it's not bogged down, playing most games doesn't really feel much different to playing on console, with the exception of occasional video artifacting. The tech is really almost there.

For now but for reliability reasons and the varied business models in play it can't replace console play, but it's a fine supplement that as it matures I think does have the potential to replace consoles. Some may not like the dependency on external factors, but if we look at "always online" Diablo 4, Redfall, etc....as that becomes more normal, there's really no difference there in terms of depending on outside servers.

Looks interesting. Stadia came in way too hot. If it started to build up now and just kept it subscription based it could have been a different story. Now it's basically Microsoft's market for the taking and they will be the big players in 10-15 years time when consoles and discs are collectors items. It's why the CMA said no to that unspeakable deal, Sony are way behind and need time to catch up on cloud.

Whilst I understand you not wanting Microsoft to be the leading cloud innovators, @Darylb88, someone has to do it. Sony being behind right now, should not be a reason why Microsoft cannot. Just as with the Game Pass, Sony were way behind. Now? Not so much. If Sony see a market opening and the likes of Microsoft starting to pull away, you can be absolutely certain Sony will do something about it! There will always be a market leader, just as the PlayStation is right now, and just because it is not the horse you are backing, doesn't mean that they should be hobbled because of it, especially when it's a very long, slow race, and no-one knows what the final destination will be, or how significant a role it will actually fulfil. If Sony were to invest heavily into the Cloud, and it fails, just as Stadia did, it will hurt them, much more than it would the likes of Microsoft...

From the store owner perspective streaming games from your hardware is much less profitable than selling or renting out games to players to run on their own hardware. Because of that I predict it will remain a niche forever.

@Fiendish-Beaver Oh I am very happy MS will be pushing Sony harder in that area as Sony's BOH infrastructure has always been poorer than all the front end stuff. I own all the consoles so I want maximum success and competition in all of them.

I thought this game looked interesting when it was announced, but not enough for me to get on Stadia.

@bpomber I haven't seen anybody mention Chromecast - certain Chromecast fobs could stream Stadia games, too. I got a "free" fob and controller that way, for trying it out for a month.

Their controller was interesting, too - it was primarily a wifi controller, with bluetooth on board only to help with syncing the wifi credentials, which meant it ONLY worked with Stadia. It was supposed to help with latency - one step fewer between the controller and the cloud. With Stadia dying, Google now (for a limited time) allows you to unlock those Stadia controllers to run over the bluetooth connection, so they can work with Android and some other devices.

It was just crazy expensive AND subject to all the issues with latency and bandwidth that every other streaming service has to deal with. Google had the resources to put servers near where people are, to help reduce that, but unless you were in an area with Google Fiber you still couldn't be sure how well it would work.

Too limited an audience and too expensive and SO proprietary (no cross-buying of games) killed it. Google didn't treat it like a loss-leader, the way Microsoft does with Game Pass.

68 on stadia. 83 on ps5 I can sense it now.

I wonder if they will make many updates or changes based on the reviews.

This is fantastic news this game looked fantastic.

@Darylb88 Yeah total ownership by big corp that's a great future.

@get2sammyb As a old man I have stock up on old games to be anti future proof when this happens. 🤣

At least it gets another life on the other platforms. I don't hate streaming but it isn't ideal. Besides marketing a physical box then 'use the power of our servers to stream to your phone, chromecast (not newer chromecasts though which was the sign besides the first party studio situation), your phone, web browser, use a mobile app to buy games besides our website which is really awkward but you'd have to do it anyway and the only physical things from us is our controller and the chromecast'.

So while Stadia was 'cool' in concept (I never used it nor cared) (I found the Xbox streaming to work well but it's not fun to do it) execution no, limited to Pixel devices at first also limited the phone audience the same way remote play for Vita did until it opened up later to Android/iPhone 2019 and recently.

I'm all for remote play to cast my console games to a handheld (Vita/PS TV or PS Vita TV), PC (I think unless only streaming I forget I've never used it I remember it mostly for PSNow side of things then if it offered remote play to PC), phones as of 2019 or another consoles (PS5 to PS4 remote play app).

Stadia ads you barely saw over the years. It's understandable but to most people probably confusing because other than a controller/chromecast it's not clear 'physical what you get' so if a store employee was asked 'do you have that Stadia in today' they'd look at you funny.

It 'made sense' but it's less clear what it was, the subscription/still pay for games was the issue PSNow had I feel why rent games and have a subscription. Gladly they changed it but who wants to have a subscription whether 4K or otherwise, get some free games sure but otherwise have less access to your games if it's offline. It's just not ideal.

I'm glad it's getting new life sure not Switch but PS/Xbox gamers I assume will enjoy an Indie game of it's sort but yeah physical or digital on platforms with better access not streamed and if the session is over and the servers are down no thanks.

At least refunds were given out but yeah studios had to rework things.

So you'd hope Luna doesn't and Amazon seems to be making the effort of oh were publishing, making and understanding the game industry more and more and providing options for studios to work with our server tech so they really want to compete with Microsoft here or other streaming platforms we rarely hear about but they are out there even if we never or barely do hear who they are, what their services are and what they offer.

At least I know with digital PlayStation games I know I can access them offline. Trophies not syncing sure but game playability offline is at least something.

@Flaming_Kaiser I wouldn't call it the future.

Something about this game name don't sit right with me, seems like a swear or sex word...

@KidRyan LRG will get them eventually.

@KidRyan I'm off to the forums on LRG games so many games have been released these even the ones you would never expect to see so im hopefull it will get there eventually.

@Darylb88 I still have a option atleast and if Sony goes full digital and Nintendo still offers me a option I will will jump ship in a heartbeat.