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When buying a game on Stadia is the same price as buying it on other platforms but with the downside of a total loss of control or ability to play offline it be

When buying a game on Stadia is the same price as buying it on other platforms but with the downside of a total loss of control or ability to play offline it becomes less attractive.

Dylan16807 7y ago
"Same price" if you already have a solid computer with a multi-hundred-dollar GPU.
- Lio 7y ago
  How does Stadia compared with a used PS4 and second hand copy of a game that you can trade in again afterwards? Also how does it compared price wise to a brand new but leased console? It’s going to have to be pretty cheap to be competitive I think.
  - paulmd 7y ago
    I'll go a step farther, it only makes sense as part of a "PS Now" like service, where you pay a monthly fee and you get access to a catalog of games. Nobody is paying for locked-in games that only run on Stadia given Google's track record of goldfish-like attentions span on these projects. If you are just renting hardware then you need to run a local Steam cache (this exists), and allow players to use their existing game catalog. This is basically the "GeForce Now" model. And yes, you may note that I am referencing other game streaming services. Google is late to this party, and they have nothing unique to offer, nor a particularly compelling business model, nor the trust of their userbase. Stadia is DOA. If Google wants it to be not-DOA with their current business model, nothing short of a guarantee that if they fold within the next 10 years then they will issue a full and unconditional refund is going to do it. Nobody is going to pay full price for locked-in games on a platform with a track record like Google's.
  - SmirkingRevenge 7y ago
    Sure, if you are the kind of person to sell and buy used games, that will probably be pretty cheap. But that's becoming more niche by the day, even without Stadia. Most game sales are digital downloads from a storefront.
    - Lio 7y ago
      That would imply that the purchasers of these games are not price sensitive and would negate the implied price advantage of Stadia.
      - SmirkingRevenge 7y ago
        I have an experienced software engineer's salary, few expenses, and yet... the cost of a whole console to simply play a couple of exclusives (when the vast majority of games are available cross platform and you already own another console or pc) is still too high, even though it doesn't hurt much financially, overall. It isn't an impulse purchase. And it makes you feel like a mark/sucker if you go for it - ~$400 for a video game or two or three is a rip off. And these days, they all have a subscription service you need to buy if you want multiplayer or game updates. At the same time, I never feel compelled to penny pinch by selling/buying used games. And I like to keep them, as I'm sure many other people do. Time, effort and inconvenience is involved with used buying and selling, and for many of us, that offsets the value of actual dollar savings.
- ukyrgf 7y ago
  You don't need a "multi-hundred-dollar GPU" to play modern games. I built my first computer 15 years ago for $500 using a $120 GPU. 10 years ago I upgraded it with a $120 GPU. 4 years ago I upgraded that with a $120 GPU. It should support VR, but I imagine when that tech has matured I'll want to pick up another $120 GPU.
  - Dylan16807 7y ago
    > You don't need a "multi-hundred-dollar GPU" to play modern games. If you want the equivalent visual quality of the service, I don't think a 4 year old $120 GPU is enough. Maybe you don't care about the game settings, but I was going for apples to apples.
    - mrguyorama 7y ago
      If you read the article and the attached twitter threads, stadia's streamed content is not of high visual fidelity.
      - Dylan16807 7y ago
        Being worse than an Xbox One _X_ doesn't mean you could run it on an old cheap GPU. Also the PC version of Stadia seems extra broken compared to the chromecast version right now, and there's a tweet in there saying it looks a lot better on chromecast.
  - taneq 7y ago
    You're not "running modern games" at any kind of acceptable frame rate and quality on a 15 year old CPU. And you absolutely aren't running VR on a 15 year old CPU even if you have a 4 year old GPU that technically fits within the minimum requirements.
    - bathtub365 7y ago
      You likely aren’t running VR on Stadia, either, as it doesn’t support VR.

When buying a game on Stadia is the same price as buying it on other platforms but with the downside of a total loss of control or ability to play offline it becomes less attractive.

Dylan16807 7y ago

"Same price" if you already have a solid computer with a multi-hundred-dollar GPU.

Lio 7y ago
How does Stadia compared with a used PS4 and second hand copy of a game that you can trade in again afterwards? Also how does it compared price wise to a brand new but leased console? It’s going to have to be pretty cheap to be competitive I think.
- paulmd 7y ago
  I'll go a step farther, it only makes sense as part of a "PS Now" like service, where you pay a monthly fee and you get access to a catalog of games. Nobody is paying for locked-in games that only run on Stadia given Google's track record of goldfish-like attentions span on these projects. If you are just renting hardware then you need to run a local Steam cache (this exists), and allow players to use their existing game catalog. This is basically the "GeForce Now" model. And yes, you may note that I am referencing other game streaming services. Google is late to this party, and they have nothing unique to offer, nor a particularly compelling business model, nor the trust of their userbase. Stadia is DOA. If Google wants it to be not-DOA with their current business model, nothing short of a guarantee that if they fold within the next 10 years then they will issue a full and unconditional refund is going to do it. Nobody is going to pay full price for locked-in games on a platform with a track record like Google's.
- SmirkingRevenge 7y ago
  Sure, if you are the kind of person to sell and buy used games, that will probably be pretty cheap. But that's becoming more niche by the day, even without Stadia. Most game sales are digital downloads from a storefront.
  - Lio 7y ago
    That would imply that the purchasers of these games are not price sensitive and would negate the implied price advantage of Stadia.
    - SmirkingRevenge 7y ago
      I have an experienced software engineer's salary, few expenses, and yet... the cost of a whole console to simply play a couple of exclusives (when the vast majority of games are available cross platform and you already own another console or pc) is still too high, even though it doesn't hurt much financially, overall. It isn't an impulse purchase. And it makes you feel like a mark/sucker if you go for it - ~$400 for a video game or two or three is a rip off. And these days, they all have a subscription service you need to buy if you want multiplayer or game updates. At the same time, I never feel compelled to penny pinch by selling/buying used games. And I like to keep them, as I'm sure many other people do. Time, effort and inconvenience is involved with used buying and selling, and for many of us, that offsets the value of actual dollar savings.
ukyrgf 7y ago
You don't need a "multi-hundred-dollar GPU" to play modern games. I built my first computer 15 years ago for $500 using a $120 GPU. 10 years ago I upgraded it with a $120 GPU. 4 years ago I upgraded that with a $120 GPU. It should support VR, but I imagine when that tech has matured I'll want to pick up another $120 GPU.
- Dylan16807 7y ago
  > You don't need a "multi-hundred-dollar GPU" to play modern games. If you want the equivalent visual quality of the service, I don't think a 4 year old $120 GPU is enough. Maybe you don't care about the game settings, but I was going for apples to apples.
  - mrguyorama 7y ago
    If you read the article and the attached twitter threads, stadia's streamed content is not of high visual fidelity.
    - Dylan16807 7y ago
      Being worse than an Xbox One _X_ doesn't mean you could run it on an old cheap GPU. Also the PC version of Stadia seems extra broken compared to the chromecast version right now, and there's a tweet in there saying it looks a lot better on chromecast.
- taneq 7y ago
  You're not "running modern games" at any kind of acceptable frame rate and quality on a 15 year old CPU. And you absolutely aren't running VR on a 15 year old CPU even if you have a 4 year old GPU that technically fits within the minimum requirements.
  - bathtub365 7y ago
    You likely aren’t running VR on Stadia, either, as it doesn’t support VR.