Put another notch on Google's axe, Stadia's switch to a licenced streaming platform is dead too

When Google shut down underperforming game-streaming service Stadia, the company announced a plan to keep the tech underlying it alive in the form of "Immersive Stream for Games", which it licenced out so other companies could let their customers play games online. One high-profile result was , but the same tech was behind AT&T letting subscribers play [[link]] Batman: Arkham Knight and fitness-bike maker Peloton launching a game called Lanebreak (turns out, ).

In the midst of promoting a to support their live service games, reporter Stephen Totilo mentioned that the .

"We are not offering that streaming option," Jack Buser, director of game industry solutions at Google Cloud, told Totilo, "because it was tied to Stadia itself. So, unfortunately, when we decided to not move forward with Stadia, [[link]] that sort of [business-to-business] offering could no longer be offered as well."

What Google's currently pushing to remind everyone it's committed to being part of the games industry now is a platform called Agones, which was developed in conjunction with . Agones was showcased at the , and combines game servers, engine integration, and a suite of metrics and player-monitoring tools. As well as Ubisoft it's apparently being used by Yager, Niantic, Unity, and other companies looking to get into live service multiplayer games.

Jack Buser, who was formerly the director for games at Stadia before taking his current position at Google Cloud, was quoted as saying, "It was at that moment when we basically had to make decisions about Stadia that we realized that, at Google Cloud, we are at our best when we're helping other people build this stuff, not necessarily building it ourselves."

Even as games like Knockout City, Rumbleverse, and Ubisoft's Hyperscape have had to shut down at most a couple of years after launching and Square Enix announced that Marvel's Avengers won't be supported past September, publishers seem determined to blithely continue chasing the service-game gravy train. will reportedly be turning the series into a live service game that spans multiple historical settings, has seasonal updates and a battle pass, and looks like it'll be a looter-shooter with gear scores and cosmetics that are earned via, yes, a battle pass.