Earlier at present, Google confirmed that its shutting down Stadia, its short-lived cloud gaming service. Whereas the corporate plans on refunding all software program and {hardware} purchases associated to Stadia, the way forward for the few remaining exclusives on the service is much less clear. And in the event that they don’t get ported to different platforms earlier than Stadia rides into the sundown subsequent yr, they may fully disappear, by no means to be performed once more.
When Google Stadia launched in late 2019, the search engine firm had huge plans, promising unique video games that may make the most of options solely attainable by way of cloud streaming and off-site computing. Within the years that adopted, Google would cease specializing in Stadia exclusives, even closing down its personal recreation studio within the course of. Nevertheless, just a few unique video games stay stranded on Stadia. And with at present’s sudden information that Stadia is shutting down completely on January 18, 2023, we don’t know what’s going to occur to those video games. In each a weblog put up saying the shutdown and a FAQ concerning the state of affairs, Google did not make clear what’s the future for the few remaining Stadia exclusives.
Kotaku has contacted Google about these video games and can replace the put up if it shares any new particulars or plans with us.
By our rely, there are 5 video games that may solely be performed by way of Google Stadia. Right here’s the listing:
Hi there Engineer
Launched in October 2021, that is the latest unique on the listing. Hi there Engineer is described by the devs as a “multiplayer machinery-building development recreation” and is ready in the identical universe as the favored horror recreation, Hi there Neighbor.
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PixelJunk Raiders
This can be a poorly reviewed third-person roguelike motion recreation from the oldsters at Q-Video games, the identical devs who made The Tomorrow Kids and the opposite PixelJunk video games.) It does have a neat characteristic the place gamers can share a screenshot and others can hop into that recreation state utilizing simply that picture. However the remainder of the sport sounds form of uninteresting.
Outcasters
Developed by Splash Harm, Outcasters is a top-down on-line multiplayer fight recreation that options characters that appear like they fell out of a Fall Guys knock-off. Whereas some gamers had good issues to say about Outcasters, it hasn’t discovered the viewers it wanted, even after going free-to-play, and it seems like as of late it’s principally a ghost city.
PAC-MAN Mega Tunnel Battle
Launched in 2020, Mega Tunnel Battle combines the traditional Pac-Man arcade recreation with a battle royale. As much as 64 gamers can play collectively, competing to be the final Pac-Man standing whereas utilizing a mixture of new and returning power-ups throughout retro-inspired maps.
GYLT
GYLT is a third-person horror recreation starring a younger woman and is taken into account by many Stadia followers to presumably be the very best unique recreation launched on the service. It was developed by Tequilla Works and is about six hours lengthy, filled with some respectable bounce scares, puzzles and fight. Nothing tremendous particular, however a strong recreation that can hopefully get ported to Steam or Swap so extra of us can take pleasure in GYLT for years to come back.
Whereas a few of these video games aren’t unbelievable and I doubt many individuals would care in the event that they by no means bought to play them once more, shedding them would nonetheless be a disgrace. Online game preservation is vital if we need to save this artwork kind’s historical past and present the way it has advanced and altered over many years of innovation and new expertise. Shedding these video games to the void, even when a few of them aren’t all that nice, would suck.
Hopefully, the devs and publishers concerned can and can port them to different platforms. If that doesn’t occur, they’ll die perpetually when Google kills the Stadia servers, as not even pirates had been in a position to rip and share the video games on-line. A tragic finish to video games that individuals doubtless spent years engaged on.
