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by blackwater 02/01/2021, 3:52pm PST |
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Google Shuts Down Stadia In-House Game Development
(Bloomberg) -- Google is no longer competing with PlayStation and the Xbox, announcing Monday that it’s shutting down the division of Stadia that was dedicated to making exclusive games.
“Given our focus on building on the proven technology of Stadia as well as deepening our business partnerships, we’ve decided that we will not be investing further in bringing exclusive content from our internal development team SG&E, beyond any near-term planned games,” Stadia vice president and general manager Phil Harrison said in a statement.
Now, rather than try to rival the video game industry’s big players, Stadia will partner with them. Harrison said the division will expand “our efforts to help game developers and publishers take advantage of our platform technology and deliver games directly to their players.” Stadia will continue to provide titles from other developers, but will no longer supplement them with its own slate of games as Google originally planned.
Stadia, which launched in November 2019, was an attempt from Alphabet Inc.’s Google to take on the video game console giants with a platform of its own. Unlike traditional consoles, Stadia allows users to play games on devices such as Android phones and Chromecast apps for TV, by funneling data directly from Google’s server clusters. The goal, Google said when it announced the service, was to reach well beyond the audience of traditional gamers and especially penetrate markets such as China and India, where many people cannot easily afford or access a pricey PlayStation from Sony Corp. or Microsoft Corp.’s Xbox.
Gaming news site Kotaku earlier reported the reorganization, saying that about 150 people will lose their jobs as part of the plans, which include shutting offices in Montreal and Los Angeles, although Google will try to place them elsewhere. “We’re committed to working with this talented team to find new roles and support them,” Harrison said in the statement.
Most players found that Stadia performed well, but the pricing model led to confusion. Rather than package games in a subscription service like Netflix or Xbox Game Pass, Stadia required players to buy individual titles. At launch, users also had to pay for a $130 package to get started. By many accounts the service has underperformed as a result. One former employee said Stadia’s initial sales were well below expectations. Google’s long-term strategy had been to invest in studios to develop games that could only be played on Stadia.
As part of the restructuring, veteran executive Jade Raymond, formerly of Electronic Arts Inc. and Ubisoft Entertainment SA, is leaving Google, Harrison said in the statement. |
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I'm sure Google Stadia will be great. NT by I like ads during games 03/20/2019, 6:34am PDT
I also think it will be great. NT by Guy Who Likes UI Changing Every 4 W 03/20/2019, 11:05am PDT
I just wish there was a game service that spied on me constantly by Guy Who Is About To Realize That Go 03/20/2019, 11:06am PDT
Serious analysis by Mysterio 03/20/2019, 11:09am PDT
How much of this hate is because Google is doing it? by Judge Berry 03/20/2019, 11:39am PDT
Re: Serious analysis by Wow, Caltrops. Just wow. 04/03/2019, 8:37pm PDT
Did this even work? by Mr. 3000 and his blob 07/29/2022, 7:33am PDT
Reset Era has a great discussion on this actually! by Mysterio 03/20/2019, 11:41am PDT
Discordapp.com log on this by Ice Cream Jonsey 03/20/2019, 1:56pm PDT
Let's check in on Stadia. by blackwater 03/01/2020, 12:46pm PST
It's good that there are consquences. by Oh 03/01/2020, 3:07pm PST
Google Stadia update: not dead yet, but starting to smell bad by blackwater 02/01/2021, 3:52pm PST
Re: Re: Google Stadia update: not dead yet, but starting to smell bad by blackwater 02/22/2021, 8:14pm PST
Google: now a worse 3rd party patch process than Microsoft? NT by semen stained ballpit 02/23/2021, 10:20am PST
The postmortem begins by laudablepuss 02/26/2021, 7:57pm PST
Ok, hear me out by Rafiki 02/26/2021, 11:26pm PST
Rumors are that they are going to completely kill it. by Mr. 3000 and his blob 07/29/2022, 7:38am PDT
Actually, Google completely backs Stadia. They know cancellations hurt G's image by blackwater 09/29/2022, 11:52am PDT
A few years ago, we haunted the digital airwaves with a very hard very loud sell NT by Today, no regrets and fuck you all 09/29/2022, 12:01pm PDT
At least they let their partners know in advance by blackwater 09/29/2022, 7:29pm PDT
Those devs lost out on reaching dozens of potential customers. NT by Brianna Wu 09/29/2022, 7:42pm PDT
OK Just one more post on Stadia and then I promise, I will let it go by blackwater 09/30/2022, 11:02am PDT
Looking back at Stadia by blackwater 12/24/2023, 9:06am PST
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