In a call focused on Alphabet’s earnings over the latest fiscal year, Google CEO Sundar Pichai has discussed Google Stadia and particularly has answered a question about publishers being cautious about approaching the cloud gaming platform, which is releasing later this year.
In a call focused on Alphabet’s earnings over the latest fiscal year, Google CEO Sundar Pichai has discussed Google Stadia and mainly has answered a question about publishers being cautious about approaching the cloud gaming platform, which is releasing later this year.
According to Pichai, Google has not seen a particular “pushback” from developers and publishers but is conscious about the fact that, as a brand new platform owner running a brand new technology for the industry, the company has to show its “commitment” on the longer term before seeing everyone jumping in.
“They want to see our commitment, which is what we demonstrate and they are working hard to make the investments on their side. So it’s a big joint effort, and it’s working well,” Pichai told the analysts during the call. But he’s also quite convinced that just trying games on the platform will be enough to spark enthusiasm among both the makers and players of the titles.
“We see genuine excitement because I think they see the opportunity for a shift, a point of inflection, but they realised the technical challenge of pulling something like this off. Once they get their hands on with the technology and then they see the experience, [it] completely wins people over.
And so we are having conversations across the board and I think people are definitely engaging in a very committed way, and they are investing in it. So it’s up to us to bring it all together and have a compelling service later this year.”
For what matters players, it’ll be important for Google Stadia to have aggressive pricing and offering proposal when it launches later this year. We should learn about that this summer, as shared by VP Phil Harrison, but it’ll be so crucial that Google won’t have to make mistakes both on the software side and on the business model side.
Perhaps, the way they handle subscription or direct sale of the games, and which games are going to be available, will determine Stadia’s success more than the limitations in terms of bandwidth.
