Stadia, Google Game Streaming platform [2019-2021]

This isn't strange at all, this is a widespread problem that's existed since gmail was created. I had this happen to me around 2006 and it was the same issue; out of the blue I get an email from google to my backup email address advising my account was locked for "violations" and I lost my email address. There were no options to escalate or engage with a human about this.

When I worked in services procurement, one of the early questions I'd ask potential service vendors is how help line is staffed. No companies without humans accessible at least as second line support worked for us. People equate service and customer service and they're not the same thing. If service is great 99.9%of the time, you'll only deal with customer service .1% of the time but that's when it matters.

 

Just because Microsoft makes crap products does not mean all passively cooled systems will have the same problems.

 

Sure but I don't see how that has anything to do with what I said ? I specifically talked about surface devices( also we have an ipad that gets very hot i think its 3 years old its my wife's from her school). That in itself was about the chromecasts and fire stick like devices over heating when used due to bad design / placement.

 

I think you meant Intel. Their Surface line, hardware wise, has been excellant. They just chose different trade-offs than say Apple when using Intel silicon.

Apple chose the route of maximum throttling rather than allow heat to reach the end user. This makes sense as those were generally consumer facing devices where sustained high performance wasn't needed. We see Apple again make this choice with the Macbook Air with the M1, which throttles fairly quickly, while they've gone for an active cooling solution for the Macbook Pro for sustained performance.

Microsoft OTOH targetted sustained high performance and thus went with active cooling, or higher than sometimes comfortable temperatures when passively cooled. But their target audience basically demands high sustained performance.

Although to Microsoft's credit on the Surface Book 2 that I have, when on battery power it generally operates passively cooled and throttled for both comfort and battery life. On mains power, however, it quickly turns on active cooling as that Intel CPU gets hot as a MFer when allowed to stretch its legs.

Regards,
SB

 

M1 throttles fairly quickly? That's kind of the opposite I have read from reviews. MacBook air is completely passive and works very well for passive device. They don't seem to get hot to touch based on reviews which is nice. I remember some of the intel macs getting so hot that people bought specials stands to raise them off the table to let them cool. Pro model has fan and is near silent most of the time. The passive air barely is any slower than pro model other than heaviest possible loads like long video encoding sessions. In fact many youtubers made, I was wrong videos about predicting air to throttle. And the performance on m1 software seems to be very competitive against the 16inch intel mac.

Or maybe I'm watching wrong reviews and there is some specific loads that cause heavy throttling?

I'm reading things like this. That's seriously impressive performance to me from passive small design that doesn't turn into a fireball.

https://techcrunch.com/2020/11/17/y...its-the-battery-life-that-will-blow-you-away/

 

Wasn't shifty geezer always on about his surface throttling?

https://www.google.com/amp/s/mspowe...tle-gate-fix-for-windows-update-delivery/amp/

 

This was from a Linus video where they experimented with the MacBook Air to try to improve it's performance. Basically, they modified it with thermal tape so that the bottom of the MacBook Air acts as a passive heatsink for the device.

The result was better performance that didn't throttle under load, often beating the MacBook pro. The drawback was higher than comfortable thermals which precludes using it in the lap after the modification.

Fixing Apple's GOOD Engineering - YouTube

Basically the MacBook air is a trade off that emphasized passive cooling without allowing the device to become too painful to use. NOTE - this does not mean that it has bad performance, it's still an impressive design. This is only showing that even Apple makes tradeoffs and depending on the market segment those trade offs might be different from the ones that Microsoft implements.

If we go back to the Intel CPUs for Apples to apples comparisons, Apple had to seriously throttle the Intel CPUs compared to MS. And as a result they ran cooler, but at a significant performance deficit in heavy workloads. Different target markets with different ideas of what they want in a laptop.

The M1 certainly gives them an advantage in this area as it has remarkable computational power per watt so they don't have to compromise quite as much with the MacBook Air, but that compromise is still there.

Regards,
SB

 

That feels like they are not focusing on the thing apple tried to deliver/performance m1 is giving under regular use. The proof of apple reaching its goals is more on how fast m1 performs on things like 4k video editing(final cut pro, not handbrake) and how little it throttles in that type of workload. Sure, apply could have made air marginally better with better cooling. On the other hand any reviews measuring real performance in real loads shows very minimal throttling in regular use. It's to the point reviewers are saying throttling is really not an issue and there is very little reason to buy the pro version that doesn't throttle. It even beats the old 16" intel macbook pro in many tasks. Which is just insane all things considered. Also comparison is kind of unfair as m1 has hw accelerators/better sw but that is something mac users just see as new version is better. They don't care why, there is no other options in that walled garden.

There is the rumoured 12core+doubled gpu power m1x coming out this fall. Announcement probably summer time. That is probably the chip for highest performance device for those who want that type of thing. Same rumors point towards 16" macbook pro replacement and some kind of new air model with thinner bezels using m1x.

I see reviews and apologies like below. Most of t hem compare new models to old intel models and praise how much better new air is. Even the old i3 model sounds pretty horrible in comparison. Sure, it's not the cpu as such. But apple isn't in process of selling cpu's. Apple sells whole systems with optimized sw like final cut pro.

 

https://kotaku.com/stadia-leadership-praised-development-studios-for-great-1846281384

Either everything is coming up roses for Microsoft or they are going to use these statements to object to the purchase. Wonder which it is.

I certainly think they see how much money and time it will take to compete with the big 3 right now. You don't grow studios over night and if other companies are buying then your going to have to open your wallet up big

 

Nah, more likely that is the statement used as scapegoat for Stadia leadership to explain their pivot from gaming. Like You see MS had a headstart, spent 8 billion etc.

Well, MS has been in gaming longer than Sony and in console gaming for 20 years already, yet it was close to being segaed this gen.
I am more curious abour Amazon. Amazon is always really persistent in whatever it are doing, in comparison to Google who uses hit and miss approach. Their main money tree is search and android.

 

Google cant object, the period in which 3rd parties can submit comment to the EU about the zenimax deal closed on the 15th, and the FTCs approval period has already lapsed. Seems the zenimax acquisition killed two birds with one stone.

Now it just remains to be seen if amazon will feel pushed into a corner and splash out on something big to try and claw their way in, I somehow doubt it, they seem hell bent on home grown with their game development, not using existing IP or playing to their studios strengths, like double helix and fighting games, amazon has never attempted to make a fighting game as far as I am aware.

 

The last game they were working on New World got delayed again today
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidj...e-content-instanced-dungeons/?sh=10fea3520829

So not much ?

I was in an alpha phase and it reminded me of UO a lot but then they changed the head of the dev team and now i don't know what its supposed to be and haven't been in an alpha since

 

This is an interesting point. The fewer independent studios making AA and AAA games the harder it will be for any newcomer to launch a genuinely new console or gaming ecosystem. You need content for your ecosystem and most of that will come from independent publishers - this is entirely why Microsoft are buying publishers in the first place.

And Google couldn't have raised concerns immediately following the EU posting their preliminary decision?

 

No, by persistence I mean - even if they delay, fail they will continue developing. Eventually they might succeed.
I just don't think that they will leave that easily like Google.

 

Yeah your right, I jumped the gun a bit on that. I would imagine that if they were protesting the acquisition they would have released a blog post or something similar talking about how bad it apparently is.

In reality I don't think there is any real legitimate complaint that they could make about it, at the absolute worst I could see the EU forcing bethesda to continue supporting stadia for the near future, almost all of stadia's big games were bethesda titles, with doom eternal, iirc launching on the service, as well as elder scrolls online, and several others that I cant recall.

 

I can't think of a single instance where Google have publicly showboated on an issue like this so I don't know why they would foolishly publicise any strategy they have. It's got to be the dumbest thing to tell your competitors what your plans are for disrupting their business.

If Google really care about the gaming market, and let's not ignore that Google are pretty flighty when it comes to their ventures (i.e. here today, gone tomorrow), they could leverage this. By appealing to the EU's current stance that allowing this acquisition would make it that much harder for them to continue as an independent platform vendor relying on third party publishers for content, how can you claim that is not a "legitimate complaint" from their perspective?

Don't discount out that Sony and Nintendo may have raised similar concerns, and Nvidia and Amazon - anybody with a horse in this race. Other large publishers, who have to compete with Microsoft for sales of software may raise concerns that this gives Microsoft more power over a platform the already entirely control. Indies may also not feel like they would do as well if Microsoft are including so much premium content in GamePass - how are they even going to get a look in?

You have to consider the EU's position, they're an organisation actively trying to de-monopolise markets, i.e. moves to break up big tech and give consumers more choice.

I personally don't see this as a big deal but equally I don't work or have money invested in this market. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

 

I mean this is the company that released a game , then unreleased it , then put it in beta and then canceled it so who knows what will happen to new world

 

Sorry I meant that google didn't have a legitimate complaint, not that other organisations couldnt complain.

If hypothetically google complained that it would be harder for them to rely on third party publishers if microsoft completed the zenimax acquisition I'm sure that the EU would basically laugh them out the room, they more than have enough money and resources to acquire a publisher if they were truly committed, just because zenimax becoming first party might make their operating expenses higher isn't a reason for the deal to be scrapped.

But yeah we both agree its likely to just sail through without issue. I am really curious to see if anyone has filed a comment to the EU about the acquisition, do you know if they publish comments that they receive after the fact? or will we not know?

 

Rage 2 and Wolfenstein Youngblood were among the second batch of games to come to Stadia. Google had support from Zenimax studios a year ago that they may not have going forward.

That is obviously a legitimate concern there because without games, Stadia is worthless. With less games, Google's platform has less appeal. Again, this is why Microsoft want to buy Zenimax. Microsoft have said this explicitly.

Yeah, I didn't say this . Where I am is that I as a consumer with no vested interest here because Zenimax games will be still on platforms I own, don't care. But I can see why other companies in the industry may not like it. Put yourself in any other company's position then ask yourself, with no bias, is this good for me as this company? Is this good for Sony? Good of Nintendo? Good for Google? Good for Nvidia? Good for Amazon? Good for EA or Ubisoft?

 

I've read across the web about different takes on this and while the Bethesda acquisition itself wasn't the crossing of the Rubicon but the spirit of it was. Basically, they had to ask themselves how badly did they want this? Obviously not enough to jump in the deep end of the pool to swim with the sharks. I fully believe that we are in the early stages of a large scale battle of attrition. They need games and they are a few generations late to the party. Amazon will soon have that gut check too. Will they be content to be niche or will they bow out gracefully? Those are the only two inevitable outcomes I can see for them.