MULTI Google Stadia now free to anyone with a Gmail address

[JANARIOO]

Google announces Stadia, its streaming game platform, in an effort to upend the $140 billion video game industry

Google Stadia
Google



Google on Tuesday announced its plans to upend the $140 billion gaming industry dominated by Sony and Microsoft with a new streaming service called Stadia that allows people to play high-end games without purchasing expensive consoles or computers. Google said this is a “game platform for everyone.”
All of the legwork to render those games is done in Google’s cloud.


Google explained a bit how it will work. It said that, if someone is watching a video of a game on YouTube, they could hit a button that says “play now” and jump right into playing the game themselves in as fast as 5 seconds. Today, gamers have to buy physical games or wait, often hours, for the game to download before they can play. Even then, they also need special hardware to play those games.

Google Stadia
Google



Google says Stadia will run on “any screen type” but, at launch, will work on desktops, laptops, TVs, tablets and phones. There’s no box at all. “With Stadia, the data center is your platform,” Google said. A gamer can start on one platform and then pick up where they left off on another devices, which means you might game on your computer and then continue on your phone when you leave the house.

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People will be able to play with a keyboard and mouse or a special Stadia controller that Google will sell. It has a capture button that lets people share their games right to YouTube so that other people can watch. It also has a Google Assistant button, which gives access to the microphone for speaking to in-game features that developers will be able to build into their games.

Google Stadia Controller
Google



Google said it will support 4K games at 60fps with HDR but that, in the future, will support games up to 8K resolution. Most people don’t yet own 8K TVs and only the most recent gaming consoles from Microsoft and Sony currently support 4K HDR gaming. AMD helps Google power Stadia’s graphics rendering in the cloud.
Google wants developers to build games for Stadia. It says developers can build on its cloud or in their own studios.

Google will face lots of headwinds in the space, however. One expert who spoke to CNBC said Microsoft is better poised to offer a streaming videogame service, since it already has relationships with publishers in place and a strong fan base of gamers who buy its consoles. Microsoft’s upcoming competitor is called xCloud.
“I’d favor Microsoft’s chances given it too has the scale and technology but has been successfully engaged in the gaming industry via Windows and XBox for over 30 years,” Patrick Moorhead, president and principal analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy told CNBC ahead of Google’s event.
Amazon is also reportedly building a cloud gaming service that could eventually run games like “New World,” which is developed by its in-house studio but currently only works on PCs.

 

[Chandoo]

Google said it will support 4K games at 60fps with HDR but that, in the future, will support games up to 8K resolution

Good luck with that in the vast majority of the world with internet speeds and bandwidth caps.

 

[JANARIOO]

Good luck with that in the vast majority of the world with internet speeds and bandwidth caps.

again pak wll b excluded in all of this

 

[Chandoo]

again pak wll b excluded in all of this

Most of the US will be excluded in this as well. Outside of city centers etc, most of the mid-US areas have very poor internet coverage.

 

[Chandoo]

 

[Necrokiller]

But if gaming does gravitate towards what Google describes as a 'cloud native' model, there are reasons to be excited, because we may well have a compelling answer to a very simple question - what is next-gen? Over and above faster hardware, what will the next generation of gaming platforms deliver that the current consoles can't? More pixels won't cut it - there needs to be a vision, and with the reveal of Stadia, we have our first clear look at a potential future for gaming.

Guru Ledbetter seems fascinated :tv:

And rightly so. The latency matches the most powerful console being played locally in a graphically intensive game. And is ~2 frames behind in a worst case scenario.

 

[Chandoo]

And rightly so. The latency matches the most powerful console being played locally in a graphically intensive game. And is ~2 frames behind in a worst case scenario.

I don't think graphical intensity should have any impact on controller latency considering all the data is being rendered on a separate server and not locally and then being displayed at 30 FPS to the Stadia. Fast motion (action games like DMC V) and 60 FPS games will be a bigger offender and show macro blocking and streaming artifacts more than a 30 FPS game.

Doom Eternal will be a good test bench.

 

[Necrokiller]

I don't think graphical intensity should have any impact on controller latency.

It does have an impact, whether you are playing locally or on the cloud. The game engine has to process the input. Spiderman and RDR2 are both 3rd person 30fps games and at the opposite end of the spectrum in terms of responsiveness. The graphics pipeline and the physics engine all impact the responsiveness. AC is a very good test bench for a 30fps game.

 

[Chandoo]

It does have an impact, whether you are playing locally or on the cloud. The game engine has to process the input. Spiderman and RDR2 are both 3rd person 30fps games and at the opposite end of the spectrum in terms of responsiveness. The graphics pipeline and the physics engine all impact the responsiveness. AC is a very good test bench for a 30fps game.

Well .. yeah .. that's what I said. Though I meant it in terms of 'there won't be added latency for graphically intensive games on the user's streaming interface'.

Everything is being processed on the Cloud servers which are hosting the Stadia games, meaning what the end user is seeing is the result *after* all the processing has been done. Whatever engine the game is running can add it's own latency, but there shouldn't be any additional impact on the user viewing that 30 FPS stream (excluding some frames added by the TV, WiFi etc).

e.g if you're streaming RDR2 and Spider Man on this device, Spider Man will still feel more responsive because that's the way the game's engine is designed.


edit: cleaned up post.

 

[JANARIOO]

Goooooooooooooooooooooooooooogle

- - - Updated - - -

 

[JANARIOO]

 

[manigamer]

the controller looks exactly like the switch remote.

 

[manigamer]

[h=1]Google announces new first-party game studio, led by Jade Raymond[/h]

[h=2]It’s called Stadia Games and Entertainment[/h]

Google is building its own in-house studio to make original games for its new streaming platform, Stadia. Named Stadia Games and Entertainment, the new studio will be led by Jade Raymond, the former Ubisoft and Electronic Arts executive.
Raymond said that Google’s first party will “reimagine the new generation of games” and “will also be working with external developers to make all of the bleeding-edge Google technology you’ve seen today available to partner studios big and small.”
Stadia Games and Entertainment will be comprised of multiple studios, Raymond said. The team will also work with external developers to bring their games to Stadia. Google’s currently announced game development partners include Ubisoft, id Software, and Q-Games.
Raymond did not announce any specific titles for Stadia, which is slated to be released in certain territories in 2019.
Prior to Google, Raymond previously worked at Ubisoft, where she served as executive producer and co-creator of the publisher’s Assassin’s Creed franchise, and later general manager of Ubisoft Toronto. Raymond then worked at Electronic Arts, where she oversaw EA’s Motive Studio, PopCap Studio, and Star Wars portfolio. She left EA in October 2018.
Raymond announced her move to Google last week. Raymond is part of a growing gaming team at Google, which includes Phil Harrison, formerly of PlayStation and Xbox, and Jack Buser, previously the director of PlayStation Now and PlayStation Home.

 

[Necrokiller]

I never said anything about 'additional' lag though. A graphically intensive game like AC is a good test case instead of , say, a 2D indie game.

Whatever the case, it makes sense for a company like Google to tackle game streaming and I'm interested to see where they take this. Even the days of instant, hassle free console gaming are long gone. No box to manage by the end user, no game installation/uninstallation, storage management, system updates, game updates etc.

People who choose to have hassle free couch and portable AAA gaming have an option in Stadia, while traditional consoles and PC will continue to cater to the purists.

 

[Chandoo]

If any company can nail the mythical all digital, all streaming console .. it's google.

Let's see how well this does.

 

[mbk99]

Microsoft will also announce their own Gaming Streaming service pretty soon, and Microsoft already has deals with more publishers regarding its streaming platform!

and Amazon is preparing its Gaming streaming service as well.

 

[CerebralTiger]

Even the days of instant, hassle free console gaming are long gone. No box to manage by the end user, no game installation/uninstallation, storage management, system updates, game updates etc.

lol storage management has been a thing since there were memory cards with limited space for save files. Game installation/uninstallation isn't a thing with Nintendo switch cartridges. On the PS4/XBO, installation via disc can take a couple of minutes, but happens on its own without user intervention, and you can often begin playing before that. Uninstallation happens at the touch of a button and takes less than 3 seconds. Game updates and system updates aren't mandatory in most cases for single-player/local multiplayer games.

I don't see anyone playing on a sony or nintendo console giving up on their first-party lineup to avoid that kind of hassle. The xbox, on the other hand, is where things get interesting. It's no secret that their first-party lineup is less than stellar. I'm expecting Google's first-party games to be of similar quality to that of xbox. Stadia could offer stiff competition to Game Pass.

 

[Necrokiller]

lol storage management has been a thing since there were memory cards with limited space for save files. Game installation/uninstallation isn't a thing with Nintendo switch cartridges. On the PS4/XBO, installation via disc can take a couple of minutes, but happens on its own without user intervention, and you can often begin playing before that. Uninstallation happens at the touch of a button and takes less than 3 seconds. Game updates and system updates aren't mandatory in most cases for single-player/local multiplayer games.

lol I won't get into this debate. l know how it used to be and how "trivial" it is now. If Stadia can get rid of all that user intervention in the back end that would be a far superior and streamlined (pun intended) experience in my books that I expect from a console.








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[Necrokiller]

I don't see anyone playing on a sony or nintendo console giving up on their first-party lineup to avoid that kind of hassle.

Maybe you need to see this. Not a lot of people care that deeply for the first-party line-up as you think lol

In fact, looking at this hard data, its easy to make an argument that situation is equally jaded on PS4 as it is on Xbox One lol

 

[CerebralTiger]

Maybe you need to see this. Not a lot of people care that deeply for the first-party line-up as you think lol

Why share charts through to September when we have data for the whole of 2018? lol

And here's the Switch:

Doesn't look like people don't care deeply for first-party titles based on these statistics.

In fact, looking at this hard data, its easy to make an argument that situation is equally jaded on PS4 as it is on Xbox One lol

Nah, it only looks to be jaded on the Xbox