3 ms·

The sad part is, it was actually quite good. I used Stadia for more than a year, and very rarely had issues or perceptible input lag even on FPS games, on a mi

The sad part is, it was actually quite good. I used Stadia for more than a year, and very rarely had issues or perceptible input lag even on FPS games, on a middling internet connection. The problem was, everyone knew right from the get-go that Google would shut it down, and it was just a matter of "when". Without any up-front clarity on the refund policy, people like me weren't willing to spend much in their store on anything new; I basically paid for Destiny 2 expansions and that's it, everything else was free games from the monthly subscription. If they had said from day one that they guaranteed 5 years of lifespan before even thinking of re-evaluating and would refund any purchases in the event they had to cut that short, they would've got much more buy-in.

imiric 4y ago
You were probably very close to a Google datacenter, and had ideal network conditions. I've also seen many reports of high latency and input lag, so this wasn't the case for everyone. Either that, or you're just not susceptible to lag, or a drop in quality due to compression artifacts. Google probably had the best game streaming product on the market, but they can't work around physics. There are just too many variables involved that are out of their control in order to offer a consistent experience. When you consider everything that needs to happen between pressing a button to seeing a reaction on-screen, it truly is remarkable they could make the streaming experience enjoyable for many people. That said, Stadia's technical limitations weren't the only reason it failed. Like you mentioned, it had a confusing business model they never explained well. You could buy games at full price, and stream them for as long as you wanted, which is neither enticing nor sustainable. The Pro subscription plan only had a few games that rotated, when competing plans from PS and Xbox offered much better value. It just didn't make sense.

imiric 4y ago

You were probably very close to a Google datacenter, and had ideal network conditions. I've also seen many reports of high latency and input lag, so this wasn't the case for everyone. Either that, or you're just not susceptible to lag, or a drop in quality due to compression artifacts. Google probably had the best game streaming product on the market, but they can't work around physics. There are just too many variables involved that are out of their control in order to offer a consistent experience. When you consider everything that needs to happen between pressing a button to seeing a reaction on-screen, it truly is remarkable they could make the streaming experience enjoyable for many people. That said, Stadia's technical limitations weren't the only reason it failed. Like you mentioned, it had a confusing business model they never explained well. You could buy games at full price, and stream them for as long as you wanted, which is neither enticing nor sustainable. The Pro subscription plan only had a few games that rotated, when competing plans from PS and Xbox offered much better value. It just didn't make sense.