Google Shutting Down its Stadia Game studios & Jade Raymond leaving the company

I am sure most of them have already started looking. Game developers aren’t going to want to move over into some random part of Google.

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What exactly has Jade Raymond done since leaving Ubisoft? Everywhere she goes ends up falling apart

I hope MS and Xbox stay far away from her and other washed up developers like Cliffy B and Itagaki.

Couldn’t have said it better.

I don’t think that’s on her, but rather shitty publishers.

They are learning the lesson Xbox took to heart this gen. Content is key. No content, no customers. The service was good but not enough to keep em afloat. Doesn’t help that they seemingly refused to invest in content.

It puts all this talk about Google buying EA on it’s head. Wonder what the long term implications are for Xcloud. Xcloud’s biggest benefit is that it is just one way of interacting with the platform not the ONLY way. MS is still fighting Tencent though. Wonder how Amazon responds.

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Agree. I will never understand why gamers hate game developers so much. Always seeking out an opportunity to turn on them…

I don’t know if I’d roll out the red carpet for Jade, but she (and others) are certainly not “washed up”. Definitely take a meeting with her.

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The google acquisition spree looks good :phil_lmao:

Rekt.

Stadia fanboys are destroyed.

ngl we could do without this kind of console war rhetoric here, there aren’t enough stadia users to even have a sort of consistent fandom that’s big enough to pervade popular gaming culture like Xbox, PS and Nintendo have. :sweat_smile:

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I wondered if Brad Sams heard right about Google looking for acquisition, or if this was before they decided to shut down their first-party content.

There’s a lot to unpack here. I think it’s safe to say that Stadia’s lukewarm reception has a lot to do with this.

In-house exclusive content from Google will never see the light of day, which is a bit of a shame considering that it would have likely been a high-pedigree title(s) aiming to be a system-seller.

It also might speak to Microsoft’s head start in this area, even when disregarding of their recent acquisitions to grow exclusive content. The next Halo, Hellblade, Forza, etc were all going to appear on MS’s streaming service and here is Google trying to create their first title.

That said, the wording seems to imply business partnerships to fill in the role of exclusive games. It might be more economical in the long term to buy a studio and their current projects than to create one from the ground up.

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Exactly!

The first time we saw “Humble Sony” was when the 360 was in the lead. That’s when they created PS Plus and, two years later, the “Instant Game Collection” (anyone remember that? that shit was Game Pass before Game Pass), among other things.

With the 360 in the lead we’ve seen some poor decisions, especially under Don Mattrick’s management.

Then PS3 surpassed the 360 at the end of its life cycle and the PS4 crushed the Xbox One. Then we started seeing Microsoft with Backwards Compatibility, Game Pass acquiring studios while “Arrogant Sony” is back.

All we are seeing today with Xbox wouldn’t happen if it wasn’t for competition.

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https://killedbygoogle.com/ someone should update this now :echidnut:

Nothing fell apart at ea she just left to go to Google. Nothing so far has been on her. Seems like a extreme reaction

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Between that and the Alanah Pearce/Gary Whitta comments, that seems to be a theme from him.

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Wasn’t that actually due to hackers taking PSN down and not so much 360? The progress borne out of competition often happens in phases. Tech platforms don’t just try to innovate constantly day in and day out. They do their big push for new ideas upfront then try to let those features land first before building from it. I honestly don’t see Stadia as providing MS with much meaningful competition in that regard. Their features and business model and content efforts thus far weren’t worth copying tbh. Amazon is a much better competitor for them right now since they are coming in with fresh ideas/biz model.

If the underlying concept is ‘the market pushes competitors forwards’ then we should also just accept that sometimes ‘the market culls service/products laden with poor design’. The industry is better off without Stadia imho. Lets everyone focus on the approaches that actually can produce worthwhile results from a strong foundation. I think Game Pass has by far the best approach as is, but can see Amazon’s model being strong potentially too.

Note: Too much ‘competition’ is what led to the 1983 industry crash btw.

Microsoft will need to keep their foot on the pedal to attract new subscribers and retain their existing ones. Not really worried about Microsoft becoming complacent anytime soon.

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The PSN hack happened in April 2011 and the services were down until May. At that time Sony offered a “Welcome Back” program, which among other stuff allowed users to pick 2 out of 5 games.

The Instant Game Collection was introduced around E3 2012.

I remember those things because I was on the blue side at the time :stuck_out_tongue:

But yes, the PSN outage was one of the biggest factors that contributed to the 360 lead – the PS3 releasing a year later with a higher entry price point was also determinant, for example.

And I do agree that too much competition can result in bad market decisions. But no competition at all just leaves us with companies without much reason to evolve besides profit.

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Yeah at the moment MS has enough ambition that Stadia wasn’t gonna push it notably. They are in the process of dramatically disrupting how games are made, played, delivered as well as what a platform means, how software works, how buying a console works and even shaking up retail a bit. To say nothing of their 1P studio growth, of course. At the moment, they are short on ambition. Let’s hope it stays that way. Amazon can push them, I’m sure. And Sony in the meantime. There are a lot of paradigms that need major changes in the next few yrs. :slight_smile:

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