Google Insists Stadia Remains 'Alive and Well' Despite Studio Closure, Departures

Google Insists Stadia Remains 'Alive and Well' Despite Studio Closure, Departures

IGN·2021-05-14 14:00

Despite the closure of its internal game development studio, the departure of its head of product, and an ongoing dearth of big, new games, Google says that Stadia is doing fine, actually.In an interview with GamesIndustry.biz, developer marketing lead Nate Ahearn said that Google Stadia is "alive and well." [Note: Ahearn is a former IGN editor.]Ahearn cited "over 100 new games launching on Stadia in 2021," growth of its Stadia Makers program, and publisher partnerships as indicators of the service's health.The Stadia spokesperson offered little in the way of comment on a series of departures at the company that have included Stadia head of product John Justice and Stadia Games lead Jade Raymond, who left when Google shut down its internal Stadia game studios earlier this year to form a new studio, Haven, which is working on a new IP for PlayStation. Six Google Stadia staff have since left to join her.Google Stadia launched in late 2019 to criticism of its catalog, its lack of basic features, and pricing model, which required users to pay full price for games on top of a subscription fee for its Stadia Pro service.We re-reviewed Google Stadia in October of last year, noting that while the service had begun to add some of the features it had promised at launch, it was still missing much of its more game-changing promised components, like Crowd Play and State Share (though these have since become available for a handful of games). Though much better than it was at launch, its catalog is "still a ghost town" as well.Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter for IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.This article was amended after publication to note that some of Stadia's previously-missing features are now available on a limited number of games.

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