Google Stadia: the latest news about the cloud gaming platform – The Verge

Remember Google Stadia? Steam finally made its gamepad worth rescuing

2025-12-12T12:37:43-05:00

The Google Stadia Controller.

December 31st, 2025 is the deadline to save the Google Stadia controller. That's less than three weeks from today - but there's never been a better time. Last month, I discovered the controller is finally a first-class citizen in Steam and SteamOS.

The Stadia controller was originally designed to connect to your Wi-Fi network and remotely control games from Google's cloud servers. But when Stadia shut down in January 2023, the company did an amazing job shutting down the service: it offered full hardware refunds and let you rescue the Stadia Controller by turning it into a generic Bluetooth gamepad instead.

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Google Stadia is how you shut down a service right

2025-12-11T15:33:04-05:00

Google Stadia is survived by its gamepad, fans, and its Nvidia and Amazon rivals. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Google made a few mistakes with its Stadia cloud gaming service. Maybe more than a few. Okay, it made a lot of promises it didn't keep and said a lot of things that look pretty laughable in hindsight and totally pulled the rug out from under its indie developers. We did our best to warn you!

And yet, I don't think Stadia will be remembered poorly now it's gone - because in the end, Google did right by its customers. Pay attention, rival companies: this is how you shut down a service right.

I can't remember a company ever trying so hard to erase its mistakes: Stadia users got full hardware and software refunds, save game transfers, even a f …

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Google’s Stadia controller is getting Bluetooth support

2023-01-13T16:23:17-05:00

Google is launching its final Stadia game today and is promising to release a tool next week to enable Bluetooth connections on its Stadia controller. The last Stadia game to launch on the service is Worm Game, a test game that was technically available on Stadia before Stadia launched publicly in November 2019. Developers at Google have decided to release the game just before the streaming service disappears next week.

"Worm Game is a humble title we used to test many of Stadia's features, starting well before our 2019 public launch, right through 2022," says Google in its listing for the newly published title. "It won't win Game of the Ye …

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Ubisoft has started transferring games from Google Stadia to PC

2022-12-19T10:30:26-05:00

Ubisoft games originally purchased on Google Stadia have started to appear on users’ Ubisoft Connect accounts. | Image: Ubisoft

Ubisoft has started handing out PC versions of games originally purchased on Google Stadia in preparation for Stadia's shutdown on January 18th, 2023.

Ubisoft previously announced back in September that any Ubisoft titles purchased on the cloud gaming platform would be eligible to transfer over to PC, promising to share "specific details as well as the impact for Ubisoft+ subscribers at a later date." 9to5Google now reports that this migration process quietly started on Friday, December 16th.

Games that support cloud cross-save may have saved game data ported over to a user's Ubisoft Connect account

Users have seen the game licenses transfe …

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Google is letting some people launch cloud games directly from search results

2022-08-11T15:49:02-04:00

Friction is the mind-killer when it comes to cloud gaming. You can't just click a game trailer to instantly be playing a game quite yet. But this week, Google appears to be rolling out a feature that could reduce that friction: if you simply search for the name of a game in Google search, you might be presented with a "Play" button that can instantly launch the title.

It looks like the Google search engine has a new update for cloud gaming platforms!!!

When searching for a game players can now launch a game directly from the search results utilizing @GoogleStadia. pic.twitter.com/xblOsBpF6O
- Bryant Chappel (@BryantChappel) August 11, 2022

T …

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AT&T is not building a cloud gaming business — but it might be angling for a cut

2022-07-27T17:06:48-04:00

For many months, AT&T has been dangling a tantalizing possibility: what if its network let you instantly try blockbuster games for free? The company started by generically bundling free six-month subscriptions to Google Stadia and then began letting its customers stream full copies of Batman: Arkham Knight and Control over the internet. Next, it hinted at something even more intriguing: a try-before-you-buy game service where you could try a game directly from a search result, buy and download a full copy once you determine you like it, and pick up right where you left off.

No current cloud gaming service offers anything of the sort.

But, …

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Stadia just made it a lot easier to play the Resident Evil Village demo

2022-06-10T17:32:20-04:00

“Instantly” is only a slight exaggeration.

Capcom has launched a demo of Resident Evil Village that's powered by Google's Stadia cloud gaming tech, letting people test out the horror game in a browser. In a press release, Google says that the idea is to let people try out the game, no matter what device they own. The game and its demo were already available for Stadia subscribers, but now, anyone can try it out for free provided they have a supported web browser and an internet connection faster than 10 megabits a second. You don't even need a Google account; you just navigate to the website, enter your birthday (the game's rated M), and click the play button.

As for how the demo lo …

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Google Stadia is subtly reinventing itself to attract new games and gamers

2022-03-15T12:00:00-04:00

Google's Stadia cloud gaming service didn't stick the landing, and it's been a rough ride since. But today, at the Google for Games Developer Summit, it feels like Stadia might be moving in a promising direction - one that gives both gamers and game developers a reason to pay attention. And the magic word is "free." Free demos, free trials, free for developers to offer, and hopefully free of the friction that made Stadia a difficult investment to start.

I want to start off with something I wrote last February, when I explained how Google had drastically reduced its Stadia ambitions from what was effectively "become a game company" to "offer …

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Google hints at Windows games running on Stadia

2022-03-09T12:28:44-05:00

Google appears to have built its own solution for running Windows games on Stadia. Google is planning to detail its Windows "emulator" for Linux next week at the company's Google for Games Developer Summit on March 15th. Reddit users have spotted a session at the summit that will detail "how to write a Windows emulator for Linux from scratch."

The session will be led by Marcin Undak, on Google's Stadia porting platform team, and promises a "detailed overview of the technology behind Google's solution for running unmodified Windows games on Stadia." It appears that Google has built its own Windows emulator for Linux to help developers port g …

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Google Stadia has reportedly been demoted, but it might show up in your Peloton

2022-02-04T13:58:19-05:00

One year after Google revealed it now saw Google Stadia cloud gaming idea as a mere "technology platform for industry partners" rather than a true rival to Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft, Business Insider is reporting that some Stadia gamers' fears have come true: the entire Stadia project has been demoted within Google, and its new priority is to power experiences from companies including Peloton, Bungie, and Capcom rather than attracting more games to Stadia itself.

In fact, Peloton bike owners might have already experienced the fruits of those labors - BI reports that Peloton's very first video game, Lanebreak, was actually powered by Go …

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