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Google Stadia first impressions - I now believe consoles may disappear

Chittagong

Gold Member
As keen Google Stadia followers may remember, I have been extremely sceptical towards gaming on the cloud, as the inherent obstacle of speed of light makes the idea of having an acceptable gaming experience on the cloud very challenging.

Still, I wanted to see it for myself - to see whether the character jumps half a second after I press the button like I have seen on that gif, or whether the stream drops into a pixelated mess every once in a while. So I bought a Stadia, just for the laughs. Here is what I found out.

Unboxing
Stadia comes in a slick box, even if barebones, with the essentials. The build quality feels a bit on the budget side for the chargers, cables and inlays, but the controller feels solid. Very similar to Switch Pro controller in feel, and not a million miles from the Xbox One controller.

img_09537wj3w.jpeg


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Setup
Setting up Stadia was a nightmare.

Setting up Chromecast. First you have to download two apps from AppStore - Google Home and Stadia. Then you need to go through screens and screens of T&Cs, privacy settings, device access and such. And even after that, I couldn't connect to the Chromecast . I used an ethernet cable as instructed for a 'better experience', but my iPhone simply wouldn't find the Chromecast. I tried rebooting the Chromecast, setting my phone to airplane mode and back, but nothing helped. As last resort, I unplugged the Ethernet cable and - boom - finally connected to my phone.

Setting up the Stadia controller. The next hurdle was setting up the controller. Turns of out the controller needs to be in the same wifi as the Chromecast. No problem, same wifi I go. Then it asks me to press certain buttons on the controller to connect to the Chromecast. I press and press, and nothing. I reboot the controller, reconnect the controller, reboot the Chromecast. Nothing seems to work. Then I google for some help, and find advice to set my iPhone to airplane mode and back and - phew - the controller finally connected.


Connection
I sit literally on top of a fibre switch in London, so I have pretty much the optimal conditions for gameplay. While today I am probably in the 0.1% of connections, in 10-15 years my connection will surely be very commonplace.

Ak752Sj.jpg



Gaming experience
I picked two FPSs with the idea that they would be most unforgiving in terms of input lag. I started with Destiny 2. I was genuinely surprised how responsive the game felt. It does help that Bungie controls always feel a bit weightier and floatier than Call of Duty, for example. Also, it felt like there was some sort of prediction going on occasionally, but generally I was able to complete the first raid well and didn't feel at disadvantage due the responsiveness.

My second game was Wolfenstein: Young Blood. Here the floatier controls are more apparent, given that Wolfenstein is usually very responsive. It didn't hinder my gaming experience, but knowing the difference, I noticed it was there. Generally, I do now believe the lag is workable for the mainstream gamer, given a good connection.

I shot two videos showing the experience. Please excuse the vertical mode, I wanted to capture both the controller and the screen. It was a particularly sunny day in London (finally!), so there is quite a lot of glare on the screen.






Visual & Audio Experience

Resolution and frame rate.
The visual quality was generally on the soft side. I would guess in the 1080P ballpark. Text feels a bit soft, but not distractingly so. The frame rate remained stable throughout my sessions, and to my surprise, I never encountered a drop in the stream quality or the pixellation I expected.

Details, effects and post processing. The games I played - Destiny 2 and Wolfenstein: Young Blood - didn't seem to run on anything near Ultra settings. To my untrained eye, the level of detail seemed about medium, and I saw visible aliasing. This was baffling, given that the games are supposed to run on powerful blades.

Audio. The audio quality is fantastic, I was impressed by the surround sound over a stream.


User Experience

No downloads, no forced updates.
Being able to buy a game and boot it right away is really satisfying, as is knowing that you'll never see any update downloads or reboots.

But not truly pick-up-and-play yet, either. The games are currently hindered by the fact that they are simply rewrapped console games. I was expecting that when I quit Wolfenstein I could just jump in to where I left it and continue playing. This is currently not the case. The game reboots with all the publisher, developer and tools logos and menus - and it doesn't even seem to autosave very often. If games would be natively made for streaming platforms I would expect that to change. Given that there are virtually no loading times you should be able to jump right back into the game, but naturally the games need to be designed for this. I believe this will be a big theme in the next few years - pick up and play.

Barebones shopping experience. Currently you have to shop on your phone, which is not optimal - should be in the core experience. Also interestingly, it seems Google has managed to bypass Apple rev share on the iPhone app - I don't expect that to last very long.


Reflection
Perhaps because my expectations could not have been lower, I came away impressed and convinced. It's interesting to think that the experience I had today is probably the worst it will ever be, because the onboarding, internet speeds, net code and user experience will all keep evolving. It's already a playable product, so I expect next 5 years can make the experience compelling for the masses.

I haven't seen my consoles in 10 years as they are inside my cabinet. Also, I have bought games only online in this generation on PS4, Xbox One and Switch. So buying and streaming them from an online service is not conceptually that different from what I currently do. If I am offline on a console, I can't even start many new console games for the first time. And if Xbox or PlayStation pull the plug, I will lose my games library. Naturally, Google has poor history in supporting anything, so I would rather trust Xbox with my money.


What I think the future holds

Cloud native games will become a jump-in experience.
Games will be packaged and experienced differently than they are today - no loading screens, title screens or menus, but a jump-in experience. This can be a big differentiator, depending on how realising the same idea on the new SSD consoles pan out.

TVs with native cloud gaming apps may bridge the input lag gap. The current beta quality experience of plugging in a Chromecast will be history soon. Creating TVs with native gaming apps will cut the input lag from the HDMI input, a downside consoles can never overcome. This means 20-60ms depending on TV. Native cloud gaming apps on TVs may bring the input lag difference between consoles and cloud gaming to a nearly negligible level.

Mainstream games quietly become 'floatier'. Developers will quietly steer away from fast twitch controls to give streaming platforms an equal experience. Fortnite, Destiny and others will work well in the new future, whereas the likes of Call of Duty may be less fitting.

There may be no PS6 / Xbox Three generation. It will become increasingly hard to explain the benefits of buyinga $400 box to the mainstream consumer. When you can boot Fortnite at 4K with max details on your smart TV, the convenience of an ever-so-slightly more responsive gaming experience on a console will be lost for most.

Democratised access brings about a new heyday of AAA gaming. As the barrier of buying a console will be removed, and console quality games will be accessible to anyone with a tablet or TV, the gaming population will radically expand. People who were interested in games but not interested enough to buy a console will join in. People who could never afford a console will join in.

PlayStation's and Nintendo's changing role. As hardware and platforms become irrelevant, Sony loses it's lock on the market. Whether it can launch its own service successfully, or will become a third party to the other platforms remains to be seen. In all likelihood we will have a number of cloud gaming apps - Xbox, PlayStation, Google and Apple would be my bets. I expect Nintendo's content to live on most of these.


EDIT:

Extended impressions after two hours of gameplay.

I tried to connect the ethernet cable, but it doesn't work at all, since Chromecast and the controller have to be in the same wifi. Even worse, it kicked off the controller connection hell again. Had to reset everything after unplugging the ethernet cable to get the controller play ball again.

Completed a couple of missions in Wolfenstein. I want to finish the game so that I can say I have completed a full game from the cloud. Gameplay wise it will be fine, I don't mind playing it at all, but let's see if I can stand the cringe.

In my two hours of gameplay I had three hitches. Instead of becoming unresponsive, Stadia seems to do frame freezes.

Took some more videos.

Detail / Fidelity

Zoomed out


Zoomed in medium



Zoomed in close


Gameplay / action


Input lag test



tl;dr - it wasn't as shit as I thought it'd be
 
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Stuart360

Member
You're right, but its a lot further away than you think. Obviously we wont be playing consoles 30 or 40 years from now, and everything we do will be on the net at some point.
But image quality, latency, and slow internet/capped internet is very much a problem in the current world. Probably why that analyst company (who are supposed to be very good) said they expect streaming to only have about 5% of the gaming market by 2023.Early Stadia sales would show they are probably right.
 

Chittagong

Gold Member
You're right, but its a lot further away than you think. Obviously we wont be playing consoles 30 or 40 years from now, and everything we do will be on the net at some point.
But image quality, latency, and slow internet/capped internet is very much a problem in the current world. Probably why that analyst company (who are supposed to be very good) said they expect streaming to only have about 5% of the gaming market by 2023.Early Stadia sales would show they are probably right.

Yeah, I would say we are about 10-15 years out at this point. 5G may bridge that gap a bit quicker in some areas as it has low latency and big bandwidth, but I'd but the transition towards 2030. It's a fascinating glimpse of the future at this point.
 
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DunDunDunpachi

Patient MembeR
Wow, excellent write up!

These half-breed consoles that require huge installs, huge patches/downloads, numerous DLCs to get the "full" game are already starting to lose me, and if they go full streaming, they've lost me entirely. It's marvelous technology, though. Music and TV broadcasts have slowly fallen behind because they don't offer what streaming and what physical ownership can offer. I think there will always be a market for both types of consumers: radio-listeners and record-buyers. It has been that way since the advent of pop entertainment.

That said, streaming's market success would give casuals yet another way to play AAA games. The "radio listeners" don't have a viable way to play the newest CoD or Halo unless they purchase a console (or heaven forbid, a PC). This influx of curious customers will keep the AAA market afloat for awhile longer (for better or worse) allowing EA and Activision et al to carry on like business is usual.

I fear that it will turn into another Wii bubble / smartphone bubble, though.
 

DESTROYA

Member
Gaming hardware/consoles aren’t going anywhere for a long time, nVidia and AMD are not going to let them just die.
If anything I’ll just move to PC gaming exclusively before supporting google in any way.
 

Chittagong

Gold Member
That said, streaming's market success would give casuals yet another way to play AAA games. The "radio listeners" don't have a viable way to play the newest CoD or Halo unless they purchase a console (or heaven forbid, a PC). This influx of curious customers will keep the AAA market afloat for awhile longer (for better or worse) allowing EA and Activision et al to carry on like business is usual.

I think that sometime around 2028, when Joe Mainstream buys a new Samsung smart TV that comes bundled with a controller and has a native gaming app preinstalled, and then sees the new Call of Duty flash up on their TV on launch day, the penny will drop.
 

Chittagong

Gold Member
Gaming hardware/consoles aren’t going anywhere for a long time, nVidia and AMD are not going to let them just die.
If anything I’ll just move to PC gaming exclusively before supporting google in any way.

I do believe PCs will survive and exist, because they serve a premium demographic and are not fixed boxes but evolve with the times.

I won't trust Google with anything, it pained me to give the Stadia app all kinds of access rights on my iPhone. I will erase everything once my experiment is over.
 

Mista

Banned
That was one hell of a good read thank you Chittagong Chittagong

While I disagree I also understand where you’re coming from. Keep in mind that most of the owners are casuals and I don’t think they’d even bother with all this. Consoles aren’t going to disappear and PC too.

We also don’t know if Google is going to kill this(as usual) or they’ll keep on supporting it. I don’t trust them
 

DESTROYA

Member
I think that sometime around 2028, when Joe Mainstream buys a new Samsung smart TV that comes bundled with a controller and has a native gaming app preinstalled, and then sees the new Call of Duty flash up on their TV on launch day, the penny will drop.
Your making the mistake of thinking it’ll be around for 8+ years, with the shit start in general sales and bad rep with the business model and latency issues users are reporting google will pull the plug way before that.
 
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Chittagong

Gold Member
Your making the mistake of thinking it’ll be around for 8+ years, with the shit start in general sales and bad rep with the business model and latency issues they are getting google will pull the plug way before that.

I totally expect Google to pull the plug, they have the attention span of an ADHD kid. I am more inclined to think Microsoft and possibly Apple will have this.
 

DESTROYA

Member
I totally expect Google to pull the plug, they have the attention span of an ADHD kid. I am more inclined to think Microsoft and possibly Apple will have this.
You know what I would try Apple or Xcloud streaming before touching anything offered by google even if a Stadia was free.
 

Mista

Banned
I totally expect Google to pull the plug, they have the attention span of an ADHD kid. I am more inclined to think Microsoft and possibly Apple will have this.
Yes. Now we’re talking
If anyone of them took it seriously they’ll definitely ace it!

I just can’t get my head over streaming my games will praying my internet connection stays stable for god’s sake. I also like to own my stuff, if they shut down then all is gone no doubt.
 
Good write up, Buddy.

My concerns with Stadia are:

  • How it was marketed as a console killer, but can't keep up with the resolution/framerate of local hardware
  • I'm streaming to play local, yet Google kept using 'convenience' to sell Stadia. Stating it was going to play 4k/120fps games on the go (mobile)
  • It's Google, they'll kill it or it will be hacked, bye-bye credit card details.
  • The celebration of not having to download a game, when physical still exists.
  • The price, it is overly expensive.
  • It's the equivilent of 1980's VR. Impressive tech, but one step too early.

With all that said, cheers for your opinions and effort in to the OP.
 

DunDunDunpachi

Patient MembeR
I think that sometime around 2028, when Joe Mainstream buys a new Samsung smart TV that comes bundled with a controller and has a native gaming app preinstalled, and then sees the new Call of Duty flash up on their TV on launch day, the penny will drop.
Agreed. Future consumers will likely be fine with the compromise and will be happy to pay, but I expect it will exist alongside a thriving physical/hardware videogame market as well.
 

Bryank75

Banned


A mobile Youtuber.... 'The experience sucks' 'lag ruins the game experience'

Whether on his gigabit connection or his balanced 100 up, 100 down connection.

There is no buffering for gaming, unlike film or music streaming.

Doubts it will ever work....
 

llien

Member
Consoles/PC wont disappear since its not the Intel, AMD and Nvidia business. Nvidia wants to get $1,300 from you every time they launch a brand new Ti hardware, they dont care about Google hardware farms for a fraction of that business.

It also wanted you to pay $200 premium for a monitor, to have VRR experience.
Oh, and it also wanted that you buy more Turing cards.

Remind me, how it went.
 
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cormack12

Gold Member
Wow, excellent write up!

Yeah great thread of substance and impressions Chittagong Chittagong - I almost did the same until I learned the sub didn't get you any of the games included (like gamePass). For me, as a digital first PS4 owner, the big wins for me are:

No downloading 60GB games after purchase
Being able to play on the big TV but then just switch device to my tablet or Laptop with the same expectations.

I think it's still early adopter price though and to get more buy in, they're going to need to incentivise it a little more to get word of mouth spreading positive impressions.
 

Ar¢tos

Member
Hmm no.
- Requires fast connections with no cap that aren't available in a big part of the world.
- Impossible to stream VR games
- No offline gaming (internet down, shitty hotel internet)
- When the service shutdowns you are left with a big empty in your wallet and absolutely nothing else. Your games are gone, your saves are gone, your achievements are gone.
 

nowhat

Member
TVs with native cloud gaming apps may bridge the input lag gap. The current beta quality experience of plugging in a Chromecast will be history soon. Creating TVs with native gaming apps will cut the input lag from the HDMI input, a downside consoles can never overcome. This means 20-60ms depending on TV. Native cloud gaming apps on TVs may bring the input lag difference between consoles and cloud gaming to a nearly negligible level.
Yeah, no. Current mid-price TVs have input lag of around ~20ms in game mode, less in top end models. Even if you're located next to a Google datacenter with gigabit fiber, there will be more input lag.

Further. One thing that cannot be corrected for quite some time is the image compression. If you enjoy your games looking like YouTube videos in dark scenes go right ahead, but I'll enjoy my local gaming experience thankyouverymuch.
 

Bryank75

Banned
COD will never be on Stadia btw. Neither will FIFA or Fortnite or Apex..... it also doesn't have any good exclusives.

The image will never be better than a bad 1080 due to compression and across all the reviews despite having gigabit and faster broadband, barely any had a good experience and by all accounts most of them sucked.

PlayStation is the only place you can play the majority of games with the best high end exclusives. A PlayStation with a Switch is basically all you need.
One online sub for PS+ and that is it.... why get bogged down with loads of subs and crap that you never own?

Also consistency.... Stadia does not guarantee stability, it can come in at any state including unplayable. You buy a console for a consistent experience and a great catalog of games!
 
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kraspkibble

Permabanned.
consoles aren't going anywhere any time soon and i mean decades.

i think streaming has a place but it needs a lot of improvement. hopefully Google get their shit together, Sony starts taking it seriously, and Microsoft can release a good product. and of course if streaming is to have any hope of succeeding then ISPs need to stop ripping customers off with crappy speeds and datacaps.
 
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cormack12

Gold Member
Further. One thing that cannot be corrected for quite some time is the image compression. If you enjoy your games looking like YouTube videos in dark scenes go right ahead, but I'll enjoy my local gaming experience thankyouverymuch.

That's kind of where I'm at too. Low bit rates, colour banding etc. really irritate me. LoD and popin is also really noticeable for me. I thought this was a really good video on compression etc

 

Bryank75

Banned
That's kind of where I'm at too. Low bit rates, colour banding etc. really irritate me. LoD and popin is also really noticeable for me. I thought this was a really good video on compression etc


Yup and here is the killer fact!

It is easier to upgrade local hardware with raytracing, instant loading hardware / superfast RAM, faster CPU's and GPU's than it is to upgrade the global internet standards, construct data centers at all relevant points, improve compression quality, eliminate data caps and the numerous other issues.

Local hardware will leave streaming in the dust.
 
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Ballthyrm

Member
It is easier to upgrade local hardware with raytracing, instant loading hardware / superfast RAM, faster CPU's and GPU's than it is to upgrade the global internet standards, construct data centers at all relevant points, improve compression quality, eliminate data caps and the numerous other issues.



You would be surprised what people in search for money can accomplish.
As, i think, it is in the big publishers interest to move toward streaming and the new internet constellation would want a part of the ISP pie.

Console hardware is a money losing business, only Nintendo truly ever succeeded in making money out of it. Sony and MS are moving away from hardware and MS especially want to win the digital war with Gamepass.

The TVs manufacturer will want to sell TV with game enable features like OP said. What you are missing is, all that stuff will be a new marketing ploy for everyone.

The problem with local hardware is that it doesn't scale very well. You need to build and distribute all that stuff, and you artificially constraint the market to people who can afford a console.


Local hardware will leave streaming in the dust.

Quality doesn't matter to most people.
It doesn't NEED to be good, it just need to be good enough.
Only gamers care about the points you've highlighted, not needing to bother has more value, which was OP's point.
 

Havoc2049

Member
The Destiny 2 footage you showed wasn’t of a raid, but was from the single player portion of the game. The raid requires 6 people. How do the raids and the multiplayer work?
 

VFXVeteran

Banned
Consoles/PC wont disappear since its not the Intel, AMD and Nvidia business. Nvidia wants to get $1,300 from you every time they launch a brand new Ti hardware, they dont care about Google hardware farms for a fraction of that business.

I would be more inclined to believe that Nvidia and AMD would be getting a lot of sales from developers that want to create their own renderfarms or get sales through a store like Steam, Origin, PlayNOW, MS Store, etc.. where those places have their own hardware clusters. Imagine booting up Uncharted 6 that uses an offsite PC with next-next-next gen hardware using every ray-tracing feature in the book. You wouldn't have to wait for iterations anymore. The game would sell in this case - not the hardware.

Of course the PC space will always exist because of it's agnostic nature but I believe the console space is going to be "iffy" after this generation.
 

Bryank75

Banned
You would be surprised what people in search for money can accomplish.
As, i think, it is in the big publishers interest to move toward streaming and the new internet constellation would want a part of the ISP pie.

Console hardware is a money losing business, only Nintendo truly ever succeeded in making money out of it. Sony and MS are moving away from hardware and MS especially want to win the digital war with Gamepass.

The TVs manufacturer will want to sell TV with game enable features like OP said. What you are missing is, all that stuff will be a new marketing ploy for everyone.

The problem with local hardware is that it doesn't scale very well. You need to build and distribute all that stuff, and you artificially constraint the market to people who can afford a console.




Quality doesn't matter to most people.
It doesn't NEED to be good, it just need to be good enough.
Only gamers care about the points you've highlighted, not needing to bother has more value, which was OP's point.
Then why hasn't Switch, mobile or other streaming killed consoles?
Fact is, quality does matter, content does matter, Sony destroyed the competition based on content this generation, the base console is still 300 here in europe, its biggest selling region.

100 million+ customers that will most likely buy the next console.

Xbox is dead, Nintendo is gone mobile. Once people see the quality dips, lag and bad image quality as well as service outages on streaming, they will return to console or PC.
 

TGO

Hype Train conductor. Works harder than it steams.
Great write up, sadly those input demonstrations looked way off.
Still a big no from me.
 

01011001

Banned
we are coming closer and closer to a point where the hardware of local consoles will have enough power to make graphics a thing that's only dependent on the developers/artists.

and when we hit that mark there will be absolutely no need for streaming services and all the drawbacks that come with them.

so no, game streaming will die as a main way to play games is what I predict. it is clunky as fuck, it is unreliable, it will never lose the input lag issue... that's just not physically possible and the issue of remote places having connection issues will keep it forever from being mainstream.
the only place streaming has is the role of a side thing that you use from time to time as a backup when your console/PC is not in reach.
xCloud is the perfect service IMO because of that reason. it is an added bonus to Xbox consoles, you can stream your whole digital Xbox library if you're not at home etc. but the main way to play is still your local console.


Xbox is dead,

I love how selling 40 to 50 million consoles = Dead
Microsoft literally never had a console sell worse than the GameCube and the Xbox One is only slightly behind the Xbox 360 in the same timespan... yet Xbox is dead... these fucking people 🤣🤣
 
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ethomaz

Banned
There are a lot of input lag in Destiny 2 videos.
Seems like when I play with Vita remote play but a bit longer.
Can you try Crucible?
I can play fine Raids with Vita Remote Play but I need to adequate to the bad input lag... while in Crucible it is more critical because you will always be hit before with that lag.
 
The Destiny 2 footage you showed wasn’t of a raid, but was from the single player portion of the game. The raid requires 6 people. How do the raids and the multiplayer work?
It's from the tutorial to be exact. I'm interested in Crucible and raid results too. Is Destiny 2 Stadia crossplaying with PC or do they have their own servers?
 

DESTROYA

Member
If people are complaining about Stadia's pricing, I highly doubt they'd be any happier with any service from Apple
Not talking about pricing but the hoops they make you jump through just to steal and use your personal info, yeah Apple does it too but are not as big of A holes that run google + they at least put some effort into doing things and not half assed like google.
Streaming would be dead last to me on any platform and and if offered as only option I would just game on my old hardware.
 

Phase

Member
Great write-up but watching your gif I still see noticeable input lag. This will always be the first hurdle for me to even consider something like this. The other being the fact that we won't own anything we purchase. Maybe when those two issues are changed for the better I'll give it a shot, but not now.
 

01011001

Banned
Great write-up but watching your gif I still see noticeable input lag.

it's especially funny when people say they feel no lag but in the video they say that you can even see the lag with absolute ease...

and when you're at the point where you see the input lag, it's way too much to be enjoyable.
even having lag of around 150ms (game/system lag + TV lag + input device lag) is already not great but at that point you can't see it by just looking at someone playing.
 
This is like the 3rd one of these in like 3 days.

We will still have hardware 20-30 year from now, by then I'm expecting us to evolve from SOC to soething that would allow innovations, one thing you have to realize is we have been stuck with the same design architecture for almost 15 years because of lack of competition.

While Streaming will grow, hardware will still be needed for proprietary reasons, for addition features, for connectivity, for DRM, and for the new technology that will come out that can't be translated to software. it's very likely we companies will ahve their own "streaming" hardware box, likely slim and small in size with some ports and wireless nfc-like capabilities, and you would need to buy said box for the service. As in the future putting everything through one server or putting a whole service on an app store would be suicide especially since the App stores by then will have thousands of apps, so they'll release dedicated hardware for the service in stores or online delivery.

If we had more innovation and competition that Xbox One and the PS4 wouldn't have released outdated with compromised chips and we would have reached Toy Story 2 real-time graphics by now.
 

Ballthyrm

Member
Then why hasn't Switch, mobile or other streaming killed consoles?

Because Stadia is not good enough yet, most people don't have good enough internet.
As for mobile, it took over the game industry, most of the growth of the game industry this decade went into mobile.
The consoles market-share went down, it is not niche yet, but we have now a couple of generations that grew up with a Ipad on their lap playing on mobile and i don't see that going away.

100 million+ customers that will most likely buy the next console.
Even if that's the case, it is small compared to the potential amount of customer you can touch via Streaming.
Every one on the planet will soon have access to internet and with that, streaming game on their smartphone.

Fact is, quality does matter, content does matter, Sony destroyed the competition based on content this generation, the base console is still 300 here in europe, its biggest selling region.
You missed the point, of course content matters. That where the future wars will be fought.
The quality of the experience however just need to be good enough.
The tech features, the hardware, the minimum LAG, everything that people don't like about Stadia.
All that stuff is not that important for most people, as long as it does the job of delivering the content. (which it is NOT right now, but it won't stay like that forever)

What you're describing is basically the mobile market.

And if that's the future of gaming, I guess I'll have to seek a new hobby.

I never said i liked where things were going.
I think we will switch toward a platform market with content as the underlying thing people compete on, like Netflix / Amazon Video / etc
 
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Chittagong

Gold Member
Extended impressions after two hours of gameplay.

I tried to connect the ethernet cable, but it doesn't work at all, since Chromecast and the controller have to be in the same wifi. Even worse, it kicked off the controller connection hell again. Had to reset everything after unplugging the ethernet cable to get the controller play ball again.

Completed a couple of missions in Wolfenstein. I want to finish the game so that I can say I have completed a full game from the cloud. Gameplay wise it will be fine, I don't mind playing it at all, but let's see if I can stand the cringe.

In my two hours of gameplay I had three hitches. Instead of becoming unresponsive, Stadia seems to do frame freezes.

Took some more videos.

Detail / Fidelity

Zoomed out


Zoomed in medium



Zoomed in close


Gameplay / action



Input lag test
 

DESTROYA

Member
Every one on the planet will soon have access to internet and with that, streaming game on their smartphone.

They will?
We still have parts of the USA without good fast internet bandwidth needed for this to work for everyone.
Not to mention current cap limits a lot of providers have in place. It’s a long way off for streaming to work for everone on the planet.
 

nowhat

Member
Not to mention current cap limits a lot of providers have in place. It’s a long way off for streaming to work for everone on the planet.
TBH, data caps seem mostly to be a US thing (well, Australia too). I'm not sure if I'm able to get a capped mobile plan here in .fi as a consumer (there are some for companies, so that e.g. a secretary can get her emails but it doesn't cost much extra). There have never been data caps on fixed lines. The ISP situation in the US is just fucked.
 
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