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Honestly still missing Stadia so much. Not a heavy gamer, but Stadia was awesome for game nights with friends and also the play while someone watches along fea

Honestly still missing Stadia so much. Not a heavy gamer, but Stadia was awesome for game nights with friends and also the play while someone watches along feature was great. I'd always wanted to play Red Dead redemption 2 (which was on Stadia) but my PC can run it, so I bought it for my birthday, 110 gb download, had to install the epic launcher, then the rockstar launcher, then it complained about not being able to verify the files, then it locked me out of my account due to some linking issue between the two, then it just kept refusing to start saying it was already running and then many, many hours later, I was able to sit down and play it for an hour and a half which is all i wanted, which wasn't really worth it in the end. Why is the user experience and entry into gaming so rough/awful?

xhrpost 4y ago
While Valve has made a decent cloud download platform, it seems other publishers have struggled to keep up in terms of quality and performance of their cloud systems. It's a bit puzzling to me since this is where companies make their money now. I'm only guessing, but I would think that having higher priorities like DRM, analytics/tracking, profit squeezing (remember Blizzard's first platform requiring you to help P2P share game downloads with other users?), etc., ultimately gets in the way of a good user experience.
dgellow 4y ago
Didn't Stadia compete more with consoles than PC gaming? You don't have that launcher bullshit to deal with if you're using a PS4 (or whatever other console you like). Edit: If I were you I would try out GeForce Now[0], you can connect your Steam account and play your game with a decent experience. I don't believe they have Red Dead Redemption 2, but next time you want to play just 30min-1h, it could be a good option. [0] https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce-now/ https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce-now/
seaal 4y ago
I'd hesitate to buy anything on the EGS, partially because Steam will give you a refund if you have less than 2 hours playtime on a game. Rockstar games are also made with a focus towards consoles first so there are often bugs on the PC port that can ruin your experience, like the notorious GTA loading issues that were fixed by one guy[0]. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26296339 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26296339
999900000999 4y ago
Xbox Game pass is the only cloud gaming service that does this right. It's 15$ a month, and you get a few hundred games to chose from. You have the option to run the games locally via a PC or Xbox as well. Games work best locally, but if your fine with streaming then you can try tons of different games instantly. Stadia's issue was you needed to subscribe and pay for games separately. It even shipped with a bizarre controller that didn't work with anything else. If anything Google got out competed, plus Gamepass is baked into Xbox Live so you had an existing customer base.
- ChildOfChaos 4y ago
  This is not correct. You did not need to 'subscribe and pay for games seperately' You could buy a game and play it on Stadia, you did not need a subscription. The subscription was to play the included games and get a few new ones each month. The controller wasn't bizarre, it used Wifi to connect directly to the servers to reduce latency of it having to go to your device first via bluetooth then to the servers, hence why 'it didn't work with anything else', which is also not correct, it worked fine wired, you could also use an xbox controller just fine which is what I did, it wasn't something that 'shipped' with Stadia, it was an optional extra.
  - 999900000999 4y ago
    Ok, I'll admit to being wrong here. You did need the subscription for 4k streaming which Gamepass just doesn't offer. I'd still argue Gamepass does this much better since for 15$ a month you get a good variety of games to play, plus the option to run them locally with whatever resolution your hardware can handle. Google tried moving into a market they couldn't compete in. I actually got a free Stadia kit with a 4k Chromecast + Stadia controller. I might of gotten confused since you had to sign up for a pro subscription to get the free kit.
    - ChildOfChaos 4y ago
      To be fair, a lot of people thought the same as you, even when Stadia closed a lot of news articles mentioned this as being a reason. Google did a horrible job of selling the product, that was one of the main reasons why it failed. Gamepass does seem like a decent product, particularly if you are a big gamer, it's not for me as I don't like subscriptions and I don't play games enough, but it is a decent offering.

xhrpost 4y ago

While Valve has made a decent cloud download platform, it seems other publishers have struggled to keep up in terms of quality and performance of their cloud systems. It's a bit puzzling to me since this is where companies make their money now. I'm only guessing, but I would think that having higher priorities like DRM, analytics/tracking, profit squeezing (remember Blizzard's first platform requiring you to help P2P share game downloads with other users?), etc., ultimately gets in the way of a good user experience.

dgellow 4y ago

Didn't Stadia compete more with consoles than PC gaming? You don't have that launcher bullshit to deal with if you're using a PS4 (or whatever other console you like). Edit: If I were you I would try out GeForce Now[0], you can connect your Steam account and play your game with a decent experience. I don't believe they have Red Dead Redemption 2, but next time you want to play just 30min-1h, it could be a good option. [0] https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce-now/ https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce-now/

seaal 4y ago

I'd hesitate to buy anything on the EGS, partially because Steam will give you a refund if you have less than 2 hours playtime on a game. Rockstar games are also made with a focus towards consoles first so there are often bugs on the PC port that can ruin your experience, like the notorious GTA loading issues that were fixed by one guy[0]. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26296339 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26296339

999900000999 4y ago

Xbox Game pass is the only cloud gaming service that does this right. It's 15$ a month, and you get a few hundred games to chose from. You have the option to run the games locally via a PC or Xbox as well. Games work best locally, but if your fine with streaming then you can try tons of different games instantly. Stadia's issue was you needed to subscribe and pay for games separately. It even shipped with a bizarre controller that didn't work with anything else. If anything Google got out competed, plus Gamepass is baked into Xbox Live so you had an existing customer base.

ChildOfChaos 4y ago
This is not correct. You did not need to 'subscribe and pay for games seperately' You could buy a game and play it on Stadia, you did not need a subscription. The subscription was to play the included games and get a few new ones each month. The controller wasn't bizarre, it used Wifi to connect directly to the servers to reduce latency of it having to go to your device first via bluetooth then to the servers, hence why 'it didn't work with anything else', which is also not correct, it worked fine wired, you could also use an xbox controller just fine which is what I did, it wasn't something that 'shipped' with Stadia, it was an optional extra.
- 999900000999 4y ago
  Ok, I'll admit to being wrong here. You did need the subscription for 4k streaming which Gamepass just doesn't offer. I'd still argue Gamepass does this much better since for 15$ a month you get a good variety of games to play, plus the option to run them locally with whatever resolution your hardware can handle. Google tried moving into a market they couldn't compete in. I actually got a free Stadia kit with a 4k Chromecast + Stadia controller. I might of gotten confused since you had to sign up for a pro subscription to get the free kit.
  - ChildOfChaos 4y ago
    To be fair, a lot of people thought the same as you, even when Stadia closed a lot of news articles mentioned this as being a reason. Google did a horrible job of selling the product, that was one of the main reasons why it failed. Gamepass does seem like a decent product, particularly if you are a big gamer, it's not for me as I don't like subscriptions and I don't play games enough, but it is a decent offering.