Google Stadia Being Free Right Now is a Very Smart Move

April 8, 2020 at 10:09pm
By Jason Stettner

Well, Google Stadia hasn’t necessarily had the best of launches and it’s been quiet for awhile in regards to additions for the platform. That’s likely about to change to some small degree with the announcement of two free months of Stadia Pro access.

That’s right, the company is offering the opportunity to try out their top tier offering for nothing. This is noted as a way to help ease and comfort those around the world. Obviously the whole COVID-19 situation is what’s causing some distress in most people’s lives, and this offering is a smart move by Google for a number of reasons.

It definitely comes across as altruistic which it is to a degree, but it’s also a smart business move. Gaming time is up considerably across the globe, and getting players into your ecosystem is essential for growing your service.

That is especially important when your service is digital based, and not necessarily seeing massive numbers at the current moment. This is going to help grow the player bases for these games, and improve the numbers for the platform. You’ll see this offer in fourteen countries by the way, in case you were curious.

Aside from boosting statistics in regards to those playing the games, it’ll also be a good way to possibly retain customers in the long term. It will automatically charge you the monthly rate if you don’t cancel after the time is up, an aspect that many will likely forget to do. That’s just the basis for most subscription models, an obvious yet oblivious fact to most. Disney+ caught me there, guess I could have cancelled but wanted to see how it turned out in the first year

. There’s also the potential for some game sales that might be made during this time, and going back to numbers those stats will be used to try and rope in additional publisher or developer support. Another area where the platform is struggling, it has some decent options but still a very minimal offering. It’s a weird situation as I’m sure Google has already invested a lot, but will obviously need to invest more to attract companies and grow their offerings.

Most of the games they present are likely already owned by users on other consoles or platforms, with minimal exclusives being offered on Stadia. It’s definitely harder these days to attract customers that are invested in other ecosystems, so you need to really deliver. So what they’re doing is giving a fairly good selection of games, and hoping this showcase keeps players in their new ecosystem. There's Destiny 2, their exclusive Gylt and more. It’s an interesting gamble, and I expect to hear about lots of changes during this time to excite those trying it out.

It’s a very smart move, it grants easy access and enjoyable games to try. This will give players a taste, and possibly attract those that were previously hesitant to try it. I’m honestly perplexed they didn’t do this at the start. It’s sort of dumb not to with a subscription service, that being a month free. Everyone does it that runs a subscription, there also probably should have been a larger influencer movement at the start and afterwards.

It’s been very quiet, with the only elements I’ve heard since launch being largely negative. I know some folks hate the term and those that come with it, but it gets the word out there in the local gaming communities. Whatever the case, it should be neat to see if they do bring it, and provide good reasons to keep gamers engaged. I’m personally excited to try and review some aspects of the service, this is a good opportunity for myself to see what they have.

I’ve already tried Microsoft’s Xbox Project xCloud on IOS and Android, being thoroughly impressed with that. There’s also Amazon’s apparent effort on the horizon, so lots of competition. You can read about what the Google Stadia Canada PR noted about IOS support below, or our general Google hub for more coverage on their products and services.

Read our About Stadia IOS Support
View our Google Hub