Voost Kain
Banned
Stadia’s Android app hit the Play Store for download on November 7, almost two weeks before the game streaming service’s actual launch. After four months, the client now has 500,000 installs.
According to the Play Store today, Stadia for Android has over a half-million downloads. The app (or its iOS counterpart) is required to set up Stadia and customize gameplay settings.
This includes creating an account by entering a Stadia code and creating a profile, as well as setting privacy, data usage and performance, display, and Assistant. While a web app is available, it lacks some preferences, while the Chromecast client doesn’t have options.
Its last update earlier this month introduced a handful of visual tweaks, and hinted at what’s next for the platform.
For most of the app’s life, it was in the over 100,000 installs range, but just under 500,000. The count was likely meaningfully boosted by Google expanding Stadia mobile compatibility to 19 Samsung, Razer, and Asus phones on top of the existing 8 Pixel models.
Most gaming platforms would have reached over 500k five months after launch. Platforms that might I add, had not been given the luxury of a major mega-corp like Google investing billions of dollars into them. The lack of transparency, delayed release dates, cancellations, and poor general game library are resulting in complete apathy for the product. Even a $99 subscription-free model would not be enough to revitalize interest in Stadia
Remember that Google had promised the free model, without giving the price, would be released earlier this year. Where is it you ask? A good question if you want the Stadia Twitter account to block you, as it seems rather clear to me that they have decided to cancel it. The failure to release the free model also eliminates their one and only chance to save the product.
I myself am done with Stadia, I managed to sell my controller to an uninformed gamer for $90 so it wasn't a complete loss along with the Pixel phones I brought which are useful in their own way, and are pretty good phones to boot. I sadly have to take a permanent loss on the games I purchased.