On the one hand, you want to be surprised by these revelations. There’s certainly a degree of surprise that comes naturally when you hear that two of the largest companies in the world have seemingly botched their entries into the video game industry so soon after they started. There was this idea that both companies would stay in the game long enough to just figure it out eventually.
They Just Never Had the Games
Success in the gaming industry comes down to a variety of factors, but at some point, you’ve got to actually release noteworthy video games to survive in this business.
They Wanted to Use Games To Promote Other Services
As for Google, their blog post makes it pretty clear that they saw Stadia first and foremost as a piece of technology designed as an extension of the Google brand. Google finally seems willing to farm out Stadia as a piece of technology, but their insistence on gating the service’s best features behind the Google ecosystem clearly prevented Stadia from reaching the heights that it could have reached by now.
Their Culture Problems
As for Google, they again seemed conflicted regarding whether they were a technology provider or a console manufacturer. They ultimately ended up treating Stadia like the worst of both worlds. Even now, it’s not clear how they’ll market Stadia as a pure cloud service in such a way that will allow them to compete with Microsoft’s impressive xCloud efforts or even established PC marketplaces like Steam and Epic Games.
