Jade Raymond is bailing, too.
Remember when Google promised original content for Stadia? And delivered… *checks notes*
Well, that doesn’t matter, now, because Google is shutting down their Stadia-related studios in Montreal and Los Angeles. Oh, and alos, Jade Raymond, the industry veteran they tapped to run their game development division, is leaving the company too. Stadia VP Phil Harrison explains the overall move in a blog post:
Creating best-in-class games from the ground up takes many years and significant investment, and the cost is going up exponentially. Given our focus on building on the proven technology of Stadia as well as deepening our business partnerships, we’ve decided that we will not be investing further in bringing exclusive content from our internal development team SG&E, beyond any near-term planned games. With the increased focus on using our technology platform for industry partners, Jade Raymond has decided to leave Google to pursue other opportunities. We greatly appreciate Jade’s contribution to Stadia and wish her the best of luck in her future endeavors. Over the coming months, most of the SG&E team will be moving on to new roles. We’re committed to working with this talented team to find new roles and support them.
What does this mean if you’re a current or future Stadia gamer? You can continue playing all your games on Stadia and Stadia Pro, and we’ll continue to bring new titles from third parties to the platform. We’re committed to the future of cloud gaming, and will continue to do our part to drive this industry forward. Our goal remains focused on creating the best possible platform for gamers and technology for our partners, bringing these experiences to life for people everywhere.
Harrison also says that the move was a matter of focusing on what the platform is best at: its infastructure and tools.
In 2021, we’re expanding our efforts to help game developers and publishers take advantage of our platform technology and deliver games directly to their players. We see an important opportunity to work with partners seeking a gaming solution all built on Stadia’s advanced technical infrastructure and platform tools. We believe this is the best path to building Stadia into a long-term, sustainable business that helps grow the industry.
Look, I’m going to be real with you, here. Platforms live and die on exclusives specifically in their early days. Stadia really doesn’t have much in that way, and none of what it does (Orcs Must Die! 3, Outcasters, and Submerged: Hidden Depths) is what anyone would call a killer app. And with their own studios turning out basically nothing before their untimely demise (aside from “any near-term planned games”, whatever that winds up meaning), I’d argue things aren’t looking good.
As of November last year, Stadia’s Jack Buser had stated that 400 exclusive games from the likes of Supermassive and Harmonix were headed to the platform. That may be the case, and that may be a saving grace. Who knows?
What I do know is that Google as a company will absolutely shut down a project for any reason. Just look up Google Glass. I wouldn’t be surprised if Stadia lasts precisely long enough to serve its contracts and no longer.
That said, I do wonder what this means for Typhoon Studios, which was snapped up by Google in 2019 for the express purposes of developing games exclusive to Stadia. They, uh, probably won’t have much to do outside the Stadia ecosystem, I’d imagine.
Source: Engadget
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