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Google is shutting down Stadia

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Re: Google is shutting down Stadia

#781

Post by sjs382 »

dougmwne wrote: post #198

I am more entertained by this than I should be. Back when Stadia launched I was in a Reddit thread saying that the blatant double-dip business model of subscriptions + purchase stunk and that I had no faith in Google to not shut this storefront down shortly. I was immediately roasted by a flock of obvious astroturfers telling me that this was an absolutely serious move by Google to dominate the console games market a…

> blatant double-dip business model of subscriptions + purchase stunk

FWIW, the subscription wasn't required. It just got you discounts on games, access to a rotating collection of "free" games, and 4k streaming (rather than 1080p you get without a subscription).

Their communication about all of this really sucked though, because most critics who didn't try Stadia (and even some who did) thought the subscription was required to use it at all.

Re: Google is shutting down Stadia

#782

Post by CPLNTN »

autoexec wrote: post #693

Everybody is talking about how terrible Google and their culture is, so I'll just put it out there that this is great news for gamers. Cloud-based gaming services are a terrible deal for gamers. Gamers shouldn't cede so much control to some 3rd party who will be watching over their shoulder and collecting every scrap of data on them and their friends while they play. We don't need our performance in games being used…

How is a terrible deal? I would literally need to spend at least a 1000 dollars for a gaming pc, and that is 4 years of GeForce now, without considering maintenance, the space, etc.

I’m playing cyberpunk 2077 max settings on a 2cm thick MacBook Pro, I don’t have a bulky pc to move every time I move, and most importantly, if I ever get bored I’ll simply stop paying instead of having a pc collecting dust

Re: Google is shutting down Stadia

#784

Post by cmrdporcupine »

jamesgeck0 wrote: post #367
solardev wrote: post #223

Google's product strategy.. Google: We're going to launch a fancy new product in an already-crowded field, not market it at all, and everyone will jump on board and love it! Everyone else: No way, it's a PITA to port to, and knowing Google, they're going to sunset it soon. Google: No we won't, we're fully dedicated to this thing Everyone else: No way, they haven't added meaningful features in years and they're going…

> Everyone else: No way, it's a PITA to port to, and knowing Google, they're going to sunset it soon. I’ve seen a few developers (Ryan Gordon, IIRC?) saying that the Stadia SDK was actually great. It was basically just a bog standard Vulkan/Linux environment with much fewer unpleasant surprises than consoles.

The whole stack was great. Google engineers worked their asses off on it. Very smart people throughout. The management was awful though.

In the 10 years I was at Google I never really had to face a "crunch" situation but there I was right before Christmas working til midnight on the very tiny bit of Stadia I had somehow been dragged into despite telling my manager I didn't want to be anywhere near it because it was radioactive (My rule learned the hard way was always stay away from the "hot" project at a company like Google. It just becomes a feeding frenzy of empire building and egos, and steady incremental contribution will get you nowhere.)

I had it much better than most though. If I recall: The original app setup (integrated into the existing Home app) was tossed at the last minute. The entire out of box process for the controller redone in the process. In literally the last few weeks before ship date.

The controller folks I knew were heroes. It's sad to see their hard work thrown away.

There's no way Stadia in its entire existence made enough revenue to cover the sheer number of SWE-hours put into it, especially the spent SWE-hours caused by last minute product changes; which nobody further up ever had to pay a consequence for.

Re: Google is shutting down Stadia

#786

Post by encryptluks2 »

dafelst wrote: post #518
ChildOfChaos wrote: post #488

Absolutely devastated about this. I love Stadia. I bought it for a friend last Christmas and we have been using it this year to play games together, she has a Macbook which cannot play a lot of PC games and the Stadia model works a lot better for us. Despite the lack of AAA titles, it had everything we wanted to play, we just started playing overcooked on it. Now I do not know what we will do. Geforce now will requir…

Though it does need a subscription, Xbox Game Pass plus their cloud gaming works very well, plus gives you a huge library of games to choose from.

Game Pass is horrible. It has to be the worst service I've ever used.

Re: Google is shutting down Stadia

#788

Post by foobiekr »

PaulHoule wrote: post #183

It was a mistake to get involved with game streaming to begin with. It was never about the players, it was "everybody else is developing a game streaming platform so we should too". In the last weeks there have been multiple streaming handhelds announce which leaves me wondering... "are there product managers who believe everything they see on TV?" Most of the fun of a portable game console is using it on the bus, as…

Stadia was quite clearly part of the commoditize-the-competition strategy, probably mostly aimed at Sony and Microsoft.

Re: Google is shutting down Stadia

#789

Post by potatolicious »

danielmarkbruce wrote: post #560
ren_engineer wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google needs to restructure their incentives before it wrecks the company. I have no doubt whoever launched Stadia got promoted and then bounced to a different product and didn't care about whether Stadia was a success long term. Google's ad money printer masks the rot underneath, Google is literally a meme at this point for shutting down products. No serious business or developer is going to trust them. If governmen…

I was at Google 2014-2018. It appeared that Larry & Sergey didn't understand incentives, despite otherwise being very smart guys. They just didn't seem to get it. At all. There were lots of smart, motivated people but the incentive structure was completely set up to reward launching products and moving on. Some of the Stadia folks were insanely good at playing the promo game. There was talk about the need to "land" r…

Agreed with this take. It's frustrating to see people in this thread pinning this on Sundar. I certainly think he could've done better as CEO, but the incentive structure and culture around products was baked in from Larry & Sergey's time.

I was around during the pivot to "landings" - which didn't actually make many practical differences. For the most part people simply redefined "landing" to "releasing a product"... which was also the definition of "launching" :)

Re: Google is shutting down Stadia

#790

Post by dougmwne »

sjs382 wrote: post #781
dougmwne wrote: post #198

I am more entertained by this than I should be. Back when Stadia launched I was in a Reddit thread saying that the blatant double-dip business model of subscriptions + purchase stunk and that I had no faith in Google to not shut this storefront down shortly. I was immediately roasted by a flock of obvious astroturfers telling me that this was an absolutely serious move by Google to dominate the console games market a…

> blatant double-dip business model of subscriptions + purchase stunk FWIW, the subscription wasn't required. It just got you discounts on games, access to a rotating collection of "free" games, and 4k streaming (rather than 1080p you get without a subscription). Their communication about all of this really sucked though, because most critics who didn't try Stadia (and even some who did) thought the subscription was…

I believe it was required for early adopters. Then they let you claim free games while a subscriber, but you lost access if you stopped. If you weren’t subscribing you could miss free claims. It was all very manipulative and low value.
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