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Rumor: Google Stadia May Be Getting Shut Down

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Re: Rumor: Google Stadia May Be Getting Shut Down

#41

Post by londons_explore »

Ken_At_EM wrote: post #24
thesuperbigfrog wrote: post #15

"there'd be no license transfer of any sort, which means that any purchases made on Stadia would effectively be nullified as the service closes down." It lasted less than three years and will leave players with nothing to show. This is what people were predicting when Stadia lauched and part of the reason why it had poor adoption.

It is highly unethical to take away copies of the game that players had to pay full price for. Stadia owes them a retail copy of the games they purchased.

I suspect they'll just refund all users that complain.

Adoption of stadia was sufficiently small that Google will pay the full refund cost just to prevent PR damage or lawsuit losses (and take the loss themselves, because the game developer isn't going to want to give a refund).

Re: Rumor: Google Stadia May Be Getting Shut Down

#42

Post by bluescrn »

borissk wrote: post #27

If they do, Google should refund all hardware and game purchases.

There should probably be more regulations to protect both the users and the environment from hardware that becomes e-waste the moment a cloud service shuts down.

But as for the software side, it's pretty much down to users to realise they they don't 'own' any digital content unless it's completely DRM free and not reliant on somebody else's servers. Stadia was always high-risk and quite likely to fail, but how many years can you guarantee that something like Steam or iTunes will remain up for?

(And even if the servers remain up for many decades to come, you could potentially lose access to all your 'purchases' for other reasons... perhaps your near-future social credit score will drop below the required threshold for continued access?)

Re: Rumor: Google Stadia May Be Getting Shut Down

#43

Post by londons_explore »

rustqt6 wrote: post #21
game-of-throws wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does Google usually fire people when they shut down a service? I thought they were transferred internally to help build the next messaging app.

Or transferred to the strategy department to decide what the next in thing is so they can build multiple versions of it, seeing as they are now bored of messaging.

Nah - they're only taking a temporary break from messaging apps... They'll be back at it in a year or two.

Re: Rumor: Google Stadia May Be Getting Shut Down

#44

Post by seper8 »

I've recently tried XBOX Game Pass. Don't have a console anymore, just bought a wireless controller and hooked my laptop up to my TV. Was pleasantly surprised by the performance! Thought delay would be far larger but it was very playable for most games, not so much for things like FPS games.

Re: Rumor: Google Stadia May Be Getting Shut Down

#46

Post by wrayjustin »

petercooper wrote: post #6

I avoided checking Stadia out in the first place as I thought they'd end up shutting it down after prior experiences. This seems a difficult branding loop to break, but does them no favors.

It really doesn't! The common responses you hear in these types of threads include "I didn't even try it; because I knew it would get killed." And of course, this results in lower turnout, and eventual death of the offering. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy at this point.

So what's Google to even do?

* They could burn money and keep the offering afloat to "prove" they are serious (seems to be the case with Stadia).

* They can pivot/transition the offering (see Google Glass).

* Or they can use new offerings for R&D (and in some cases, like that of Stadia, be paid for that R&D), and then fold that technology/data somewhere else (see Wave) - this seems like the path most taken.

If we remember Google's core competencies, the revolving door of offerings as feeder into their larger services makes sense on paper, but I do agree that it's hurting consumer confidence and there is a hidden cost to that.

Re: Rumor: Google Stadia May Be Getting Shut Down

#47

Post by nickthegreek »

thesuperbigfrog wrote: post #15

"there'd be no license transfer of any sort, which means that any purchases made on Stadia would effectively be nullified as the service closes down." It lasted less than three years and will leave players with nothing to show. This is what people were predicting when Stadia lauched and part of the reason why it had poor adoption.

I pre-ordered a game on stadia over a year ago. Somehow I had a feeling the sevice wouldnt be around once the game came out.

Re: Rumor: Google Stadia May Be Getting Shut Down

#48

Post by dougmwne »

OrangeMonkey wrote: post #2

Three sure bets in life: * Death * Taxes * Google shutting down services Admittedly, google stadia was kind of a joke since the beginning, but I feel for consumers who buy into googles promises and even a bit for the google engineers who may be out of work soon.

You know, in this case I don’t think Stadia was a joke. I think it was a completely sincere effort to compete with a new kind of “console” in the game industry. They had hired a gaming industry executive to lead the effort, started several in-house game dev projects, and starting negotiating streaming exclusives with many studios (much to the annoyance of people who owned games on GeForce Now who had them removed). I even encountered paid social media marketer trying to generate hype for the service.

But like everything Google these days, they made some poor initial choices, didn’t take in any customer feedback, dug in instead of pivoting, then slashed and burned when it failed to become a billion dollar business overnight.

Hope they sell the tech off to Sony or Microsoft which is actually capable of building sustainable consumer products.

Re: Rumor: Google Stadia May Be Getting Shut Down

#50

Post by [deleted] »

dougmwne wrote: post #48
OrangeMonkey wrote: post #2

Three sure bets in life: * Death * Taxes * Google shutting down services Admittedly, google stadia was kind of a joke since the beginning, but I feel for consumers who buy into googles promises and even a bit for the google engineers who may be out of work soon.

You know, in this case I don’t think Stadia was a joke. I think it was a completely sincere effort to compete with a new kind of “console” in the game industry. They had hired a gaming industry executive to lead the effort, started several in-house game dev projects, and starting negotiating streaming exclusives with many studios (much to the annoyance of people who owned games on GeForce Now who had them removed). I…

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