Because I subscribe to YouTube Premium, I was offered a three month trial of Google Stadia, which is Google’s game-streaming platform. I decided to take up the offer and, with some stale Google Store credit I had lying around from an old phone trade-in, I also got a Stadia controller. These services are very intriguing to me and, whether this particular one stays afloat, I can picture myself making use of them in the future.
The idea behind Stadia and similar services is that you don’t need a console or powerful gaming PC. Any device you have—phone, laptop, even a TV with a cheap accessory depending on your service of choice—is capable of running the game you want. You pay a monthly fee and run games on the platform’s servers using your device of choice.
My background with gaming is mixed and inconsistent. I’ve had a Nintendo Switch for about three years, and I only play a handful of games on it. I’ve never had a powerful gaming computer, so I’ve played famous older titles like the Portal series, and very lightweight story-based games.
I’ve found that Stadia is potentially an excellent option because I don’t keep up with hardware. I don’t need to commit to buying particular games or maintaining a PC or console; all I need is a good internet connection and any device.
The other reason Stadia (or similar platforms) could prove to be a good option is that the only games I’ve enjoyed playing are story-heavy, and light on FPS mechanics. Speed and responsiveness are not as important as overall visuals. And, for the two games I’ve played so far, Stadia has been solid.
Figment is a pretty lightweight game that’s a rogue-like1Probably? I’m not into video games. similar to the game Bastion which I’ve played on my switch. It runs perfectly.
Journey to the Savage Planet is a beautiful game that is more involved and demanding. As such, there are occasional glitches if I’m hooked up to my 4K monitor, but they are minor and infrequent, mostly happening only when a new scene is being loaded.
And that is another benefit as someone who doesn’t follow the world of video games: I have a selection of titles I’m able to play—I assume it’s particularly limited in the case of Google compared to their competitors—and so I just give them a shot. If I don’t like them, it doesn’t matter. And there may be some gems I’ve never heard of, like Savage Planet, that immediately grip me.
One gimmick with Stadia is their controller. I did not read into it closely enough, but the way it wants to work is over WiFi. It connects to your game instance on the server, not directly to your device. I assume this is meant to synchronize the controller and what shows up your screen, since the pathway is Controller to Server to Device, rather than Controller to Device to Server to Device. However, since I live in University housing with a distributed WiFi network over which I have no control, this feature doesn’t work. Luckily, it has a USB-C port that I can plug directly into my computer, and that works great. Another nice feature is that the controller itself has a headphone port; I just thought that was neat.
I’ve been using the service for barely a month, so I have longer to test it out and see if it fits into my habits. It could be that I just still don’t connect with enough games for it to be worth the monthly fee, but I know it can work for my gaming preferences if my daily routine and priorities align in the future. If you enjoy games, but don’t want to invest in the hardware, give a streaming service a shot.
- 1Probably? I’m not into video games.