Here's what to do with Stadia

Published on February 8, 2021 By Frogboy In PC Gaming

Google's streaming game platform, Stadia, has been having a rough time this past year.

From Take 2's CEO publicly calling them out to the recent Terraria debacle coming right after Google's decision to close their first-party studios, it's not looking too promising for Stadia these days.

The tech Stadia is run on is good. We were deeply involved during the Yeti project and were very impressed with the potential. We ported our engine over to Yeti and were ready to move our games to it. The reason we haven't is a different subject and likely related to why there is relatively little content for Stadia today.

So what could Google do to turn it around?

First, kill Stadia. The whole business unit. Fold it into YouTube and call it YouTube Gaming or something.

Second, integrate streaming and YouTube Gaming so that someone streaming a game on YouTube could easily let someone just start playing that game right then and there if it's there.

Third, make YouTube Gaming part of the YouTube premium subscription. You pay for that and you get access to all the games on the platform while your subscription lives.

Fourth, quit targeting high frame rate console games so much. Focus on the games that people like to watch streaming (or games like them). I don't want to play Cyberpunk on a Chromebook. But I'd love to play a game like Galactic Civilizations, Crusader Kings, Civilization, RPGs, classic games (run via emulation), etc. I'd just go to Games.YouTube.com or something and type in the game I want to play and start playing it.

Fifth, beef up your creator support. Google has no clue how to compete. Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo treat their developer communities relatively well. They need to step up their game on supporting their creators if they want any serious enterprise to rely on them for their livelihoods.

Comments

satoru1

on Feb 08, 2021

quoting post

First, kill Stadia. The whole business unit. Fold it into YouTube and call it YouTube Gaming or something.

They had a thing called YT Gaming which they killed.

https://www.androidpolice.com/2018/09/18/youtube-gaming-standalone-app-shut-march-2019-features-migrate-main-app/

Mostly just yanking your chain, but yeah not a lot of naming options available given that history?

Second, integrate streaming and YouTube Gaming so that someone streaming a game on YouTube could easily let someone just start playing that game right then and there if it's there.

This kinda feels like how Stadia doesn't really know how to leverage it platform, despite claiming that was going to be a thing? There should be a button an YT video for "HEY do you like this game? Play it on YT Gaming Pro! Click here!" and presto you're instantly playing. Didn't they promise this or just like even super rudimentary YT integration as part of the launch hype? Feels like they're falling down on the only good leverage they have. There doesnt seem to be a lot of focus, and they seemed to have wasted all of 2020 doing almost nothing on that front.

The seems similar to how Amazon seems to have literally no idea how to leverage Twitch. Why isnt there a "BUY THIS GAME ON AMAZON" button or something? You'd think that would be easy?

Not that Reddit is a great benchmark, but most of them (they are insane I admit) want mega AAA titles. Given the amount of money Stadia is throwing into a fire, they're likely targeting AAA titles to get potentially the best broad appeal for their service. This strategy doesn't seem to be working though.

While ironically Twitch streamers are eying the 'greener' pastures of YouTube streaming, almost all YT creators literally hate YT itself. Its basically everyone trying to decide which platform they want to be punched in the face by repeatedly. I doubt given how Google is treating the terrara dev, that somehow they're gonna magically start treating their creators well given they already don't do this at all even with moderately large YT channels.

The reason we haven't is a different subject and likely related to why there is relatively little content for Stadia today.

This is 'interesting' though I assume you'll probably never be able to talk about due to NDAs the size of a small library

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