Google has announced that it will be officially calling time on its Stadia project in January of next year. The tech giant’s ambitious cloud gaming service was launched in March 2019 and simply hasn’t managed to draw the attention of consumers to the degree Google had anticipated. The news comes after the reveal of Stadia being “deprioritised” earlier this year.
While it’s hard to argue that Google dominates a huge chunk of the internet, it’s evident that the tech giant hasn’t managed to hold its own alongside the biggest players in the gaming industry. Stadia was Google’s answer to cloud gaming and despite its best intentions, Google never quite managed to attract the audiences to its gaming service that it expected to. Vice President and General Manager Phil Harrison posted a new update on Google’s official blog to share the news of the platform’s closure. “While Stadia’s approach to streaming games for consumers was built on a strong technology foundation,” he explains, “it hasn’t gained the traction with users that we expected so we’ve made the difficult decision to begin winding down our Stadia streaming service.”
For those dedicated players who are still actively using Stadia’s platform, there are some silver linings in today’s announcement. Harrison has revealed that all those who’ve bought Stadia hardware and purchased games and content through the platform will receive refunds for their purchases. “We’re grateful to the dedicated Stadia players that have been with us from the start,” the update explains. “We will be refunding all Stadia hardware purchases made through the Google Store, and all game and add-on content purchases made through the Stadia store. Players will continue to have access to their games library and play through January 18, 2023 so they can complete final play sessions. We expect to have the majority of refunds completed by mid-January, 2023.”
Consumers who wish to find out more details about the refund process should check out the Stadia Help Center, where more information should be available. Stadia also shut down its internal game development studios back in February this year, so things haven’t been looking good for the service for some time.
While it’s evident that Google’s shutdown of Stadia is an admission of the project’s relative failure, it doesn’t look as though Google is ready to abandon its love of gaming any time soon. Harrison’s update affirms the belief Google has in the technology that underpins Stadia, which he claims “has been proven at scale and transcends gaming.” It sounds as though the gaming tech they’ve developed will remain part of their arsenal and will continue to be implemented across Google’s other services, such as YouTube, Google Play, and its Augmented Reality (AR) projects.
In addition, the update reaffirms Google’s focus on the gaming industry, explaining that “we remain deeply committed to gaming, and we will continue to invest in new tools, technologies and platforms that power the success of developers, industry partners, cloud customers and creators.” This may be a goodbye to Stadia, but it probably won’t be the last that the gaming world hears from Google.
This is a developing story.
