Google is shutting down its Stadia cloud gaming service after 3 years of unsuccessful attempts to attract players. The servers will be available to players until January 18, 2023, and Google will refund all Stadia hardware purchased from the Google Store, as well as all games and additional content purchased from the Stadia Store. The company expects this repayment to be completed by mid-January 2023.
Google management announced that it has decided to close the service due to its low popularity. The company admitted that they never managed to attract a large audience to Stadia. One of the reasons gamers and the media have repeatedly pointed out to Google is the lack of interesting games and exclusives.
Google plans to continue using Stadia technologies in its other products and services and will also provide these technologies to partners.
The Google Stadia service was officially launched in selected countries on November 19, 2019, and has been actively developing over the first two years, hiring top game designers and creating new studios. But according to employees cited by Bloomberg, Google did not understand the game business and was just wasting time and money. Therefore, from the beginning of 2021, the company began to reduce the development of its own games, closed the Stadia games and entertainment division and the Typhoon studio.
According to The Verge, the decision to cancel the service was made after the failed launch of Cyberpunk 2077 on Stadia. Kotaku believes the trigger was the announcement of Microsoft’s acquisition of ZeniMax Media.
A total of 281 games were published on Google Stadia. Almost all of them are available on any other platform.