I said this in another thread about Stadia, the market for Stadia is vanishingly small. The people who have high enough internet speeds that either can't or won't get a "traditional" console or PC is extremely small. Too small to signal to Google that this is worth maintaining (https://killedbygoogle.com/).
For Stadia to survive, Google needs to bring in new "gamers", because existing "gamers" already have their own in-house platforms to play on. OnLive tried streaming games a few years ago (granted, without the Google advertising budget and infrastructure) and it was too unstable to play.
On top of all this, Stadia is going to have to either pony up and pay an existing company to include Stadia players in their online servers (Steam, Epic Games, etc) or silo all the Stadia players together. The first time input lag causes you to lose a fight is the day you cancel your subscription. "Gamers" are not very forgiving.
It's a terrible idea that was built because Google can build it (as stated in article). It may live on with a cult following but I highly doubt it.
I think they are probably betting that for $10 a month, people who already have a playstation or xbox would check it out and subscribe from pure curiosity. When the next generation of consoles come out in a couple years, here's the choice users will be looking at:
$500 for a new playstation/xbox? Or just keep paying that $10 a month subscription that I forgot about two years ago?
Imagine you are a parent and your 13 year old kid wants to play whatever the new popular game is. You can spend a few hundred bucks on a console, or you can spend $10 a month for them to play the same game. It's an easy decision.
This is a very naive point of view. The whole reason to buy a console is exclusives. I'm not buying a PS5 to play the next crossplatform game, and 13 year old will want many of those same exclusives.
Also, the next gen of consoles is slated to drop next year.
Disagree, there are a ton of professionals that would love to play current games casually, but don't want to spend on extra hardware (or even having another device around), and waste time with game patches/updates.
For me, I just don't want to lug around a bulky/heavy device in addition to my primary notebook just to play the occasional game or two.
I'm not sure what your most recent experience with games is, but this is not an issue on any modern game platform. That stuff happens behind the scenes while you sleep or go to work. I've never once gotten home from work and had to "waste time with game patches/updates" unless I felt like heavily modding my game.
> I just don't want to lug around a bulky/heavy device in addition to my primary notebook
This is also completely untrue with modern devices. I have a $1700 Dell XPS 15 off the rack, dual booted windows/linux, and it can run almost every single game in my 250+ game steam library on high graphics with zero issues. It is also my one and only dev machine, and it weighs about 4 lbs or so (while the brand new MBP 16" weight 4.3 lbs)
You seem to be making arguments based off of experiences you might have had many years ago.
Also, to nip this in the bud: XUbuntu LTS installed onto my Dell with absolutely zero config issues, all hardware drivers supported. Literal plug-n-play. I spend more time installing Windows.
Edit: I just looked it up for size/weight:
Dell XPS 15: 0.45-0.66mm thick, 4.0 lbs for base configuration[1]
MBP 16": 0.64mm thick, 4.3 lbs for base configuration[2]
Edit 2: I am making an assumption based on demographic on HN that your primary dev machine is a MBP or similar Apple product -- If I am incorrect you are welcome to correct me, sorry.
For Stadia to survive, Google needs to bring in new "gamers", because existing "gamers" already have their own in-house platforms to play on. OnLive tried streaming games a few years ago (granted, without the Google advertising budget and infrastructure) and it was too unstable to play.
On top of all this, Stadia is going to have to either pony up and pay an existing company to include Stadia players in their online servers (Steam, Epic Games, etc) or silo all the Stadia players together. The first time input lag causes you to lose a fight is the day you cancel your subscription. "Gamers" are not very forgiving.
It's a terrible idea that was built because Google can build it (as stated in article). It may live on with a cult following but I highly doubt it.