Yeah, if I had known this would be how they would have handled a hypothetical shutdown, I would have very happily used the service. Instead I signed up for GeForce Now since I can buy games through Steam and play them there. The main thing that stopped me from going with Stadia instead was that I was pretty confident that at some point it would shut down and I'd lose access to $xxx worth of games. If they had promised up front to do this in case of failure, maybe it wouldn't have failed.
How is GeForce Now with Steam? I have a Steam link but find it to be a pain in the rear. It's also difficult / clumsy to use for non Steam games. Does GeForce Now solve this or is it just ... different?
GeForce Now gives you a Windows box with Steam on it, and you log into your Steam account on it. They pair it with a super fast cache of the Steam Depot so your first install is speedy. That way, there's no integration necessary, and Nvidia doesn't have to reinvent the achievement/launcher/licensing wheel.
It's probably just different. I don't know what the Steam Link is like. GFN streams the games from a datacenter, so the quality will depend on the quality of your internet connection. Also, GFN can't play all Steam games; publishers have to agree to allow their games to be played on GFN, and several major publishers don't agree (eg Bethesda, Rockstar). All that said, I'm happy with it. Usually I can't tell at all that it's being streamed, and it's cool to be able to max out every single graphics setting without thinking about it.
> publishers have to agree to allow their games to be played on GFN
Hrm. I have an "eclectic" mix of native Steam games, non-Steam games (added to my Steam library) and some emulators. I can't imagine those will be available, thanks for this info.
>it's cool to be able to max out every single graphics setting without thinking about it.
I certainly like this.
Do you use it with your TV? Do you need a Shield too for the controller?
If you have an Nvidia graphics card that supports game streaming, install Moonlight on the steam link and look up how to stream the entire desktop using Moonlight.
It works perfectly for non Steam games and usually works better for Steam games as well.
I would recommend a wireless keyboard and mouse to launch the games or if you just want to use a controller to launch your games the Playnight launcher.
I'm a Stadia user, and Google's handling of the shutdown of Google Play Music is what gave me confidence to purchase anything on Stadia (~$500 on a quick review). I actually thought we'd be sent personal links of our games, which would live-on in Google's white-list stadia product called Google Stream - they did something similar for GPM which merged into Youtube Music. I'm fine with a refund though.
Free at time-of-service (and as mentioned, of course you're paying with your privacy anyway) doesn't mean there's not very real costs to the customer if the service goes away though.
Most people's lives would be turned upside down if, say, gmail closed down. It would take dozens of hours just to migrate away the accounts that I care most about. Even though it's "free" I don't want to build my life around shifting sands like that.
Gmail of course is a key service to google that will never be shut down, but I'm starting to get nervous about having my life built around Google Voice. That one doesn't seem nearly as solid and again, it's going to be a major undertaking to migrate all my 2fa/recovery. I'm planning on doing it during my next phone upgrade... I'll put the phone on a second line for a month, transfer my google voice number to it, then migrate all my legacy 2fa/recovery (that wouldn't accept google voice as a cell number) from the underlying phone line to the google voice number (now with AT&T). Huge pain in the ass and would be really tough without a second line to handle that switchover, but I'm not 100% (or even 75%) sure that Google Voice is going to be here in another 5 years when I upgrade next.
So like, who gives a shit that it was "free" (apart from my privacy)? I am having to shape my whole life around migrating off this google service, it's a massive pain in the ass and will cost a decent amount (a couple extra months of service on a second line) even to migrate off "the cheap way" in a planned fashion, if tomorrow they said "oops lol it closes in 30 days" I'd be buying a burner or upgrading off-cycle just to get things migrated. The obvious takeaway as a consumer is "don't let these google services get too entrenched in your life", let alone as a business.
This is the exact reason that I don’t mind purchasing Amazon’s experiments. If it doesn’t work out, I get my money back and Amazon has more data for product dev
If they consistently take this approach for other cancellations, it could change the the common view from:
"why use this? They're just going to shut it down in a few years anyway"
to:
"oh neat, Google's experimenting with something new. Let me try it out. If it doesn't work out, they'll take care of me."