I have found the discussion around Google's Stadia fascinating in that *videogames as a subscription service* & questions of owning physical media and personal hardware power have already been trod by print journalism and the music industry, but videogames are so much newer.

I'm personally interested in the idea of harnessing massive computing power that doesn't have to be contained in a sleek plastic box in a living room equally as much as I am disinterested in console vs PC discussions.

I do find the affection for physicality & "archival" resembles my thoughts on vinyl as a recording artist, but streaming a massive catalog I don't have to have personally acquired has benefitted music as a whole so much that I want the same for videogames.

Ofc, I feel I'm an atypical gamer in that I'm obsessed with environments, world building, narrative through interaction, mechanics rather than I am in framerates, deluxe box editions, or how high a score can be wracked up.

Steam & Nindies (+ Unreal, Unity) demonstrate how many people are able to participate in creating games; the more the merrier.

We still haven't tapped all the potential of the medium of videogames; if this means more accessibility for more people to make & play the better.

The downside of Stadia is the same as MySpace or G+ losing media; some of the games created on the Stadia platform are going to be ephemeral and likely to disappear, leaving just the experience & whatever was screencapped.

So a year later, I bought in to find out what happens with Stadia...and I have a lot of free time on my hands. https://twitter.com/JPHX/status/1244098571688968194

To update: Stadia works. For me, at least.

As mentioned in above tweet, might be that I have an amazing ISP and an amazing router, but I've only had two times that a session was unplayable, and tbf, it warned me.

I did buy in physically, now possessing a 4K Ultra Chromecast plugged into an old HDMI, but again, it works.

I got 3 "claims"; I chose Glyt, Destiny 2, & Spittlings, & I bought Doom Eternal, because will it play Doom, and also no one has spoiled the plot for me yet.

I'm not a graphics guru so I can't do an A/B with my fully stocked custom LED coated gaming computer, but I can say that it looks like it is running as full spec as it can to my uninformed eyes, which have been staring at demons I've been squishing and their ghastly domiciles.

Because I got a new stand for my phone, I tested the mobile version tonight, which requires plugging in the controller to the phone with the app (oddly not coming with a USB C to USB C cable in the kit).

And it *worked*.

Stadia playing Doom worked *great* on my Pixel 3a.

It worked so well in fact that I dusted off this thread, because although obviously there's a trade off in scale, there was no trade off in quality or playability using Stadia with my budget Pixel.

Which frankly was as fun as playing a Gameboy, once the phone was in a stand.