Jump to content
passwords have all been force reset. please recover password to reset ×
MFGamers

Google Stadia


DisturbedSwan
 Share

Recommended Posts

2 hours ago, wiivo 2.0 said:

2 days after release. How have they messed up so bad. Poor start. 

 

Some people asked them about the estimated dates and a support person said they were wrong and would be there by the 19th if you were in one of the first waves of pre-orderers but yeah I've no idea if that was just to placate the person who asked the question or not at this point. But yeah it's a bit shit that it's not gonna be here in time for launch day if my estimate is correct but some have got far later dates than me so I can't complain too much.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I know I made my thoughts on Stadia clear already, but would still be interested to hear what image quality is like on a large screen. It seemed to struggle with it at GC.

 

I wonder also about menu driven things like Football Manager. Menus are one of those things you feel lag instantly on (selecting a fighter in Mortal Kombat, I felt it there)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

59 minutes ago, one-armed dwarf said:

I know I made my thoughts on Stadia clear already, but would still be interested to hear what image quality is like on a large screen. It seemed to struggle with it at GC.

 

I wonder also about menu driven things like Football Manager. Menus are one of those things you feel lag instantly on (selecting a fighter in Mortal Kombat, I felt it there)

 

Well I'll be giving my impressions as soon as I've got it. I won't be getting FM though so my impressions will just be on Destiny 2 complete and Gylt. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Reviews are out for this. Summary seems to be that it works, just a bit buggy at the moment and feature bare.

 

I still wish Doom was out now so I could hear what people think about that cause I thought it looked very ugly on Stadia, but then that is a very dark lit game and dark scenes are really hard on compression algorithms.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Launch game pricing:

 

Quote

Stadia Launch Games Pricing
Assassin's Creed Odyssey - $59.99 $30.00 Stadia Pro Deal
Gylt - $29.99
Just Dance 2020 - $49.99
Kine - $19.99
Mortal Kombat 11 - $59.99 $41.99 Stadia Pro Deal
Red Dead Redemption 2 - Launch Edition - $59.99
Samurai Showdown - $59.99
Thumper - $19.99
Shadow of the Tomb Raider - $59.99
Rise of the Tomb Raider - $29.99
Tomb Raider 2013 - $19.99 $10.00 Stadia Pro Deal
Final Fantasy XV - $39.99 $29.99 Stadia Pro Deal

Special Editions:
Assassin's Creed Odyssey Stadia Ultimate Edition - $119.99 - $60.00 Stadia Pro Deal
Mortal Kombat 11 Premium Edition - $89.99 $62.99 Stadia Pro Deal
Red Dead Redemption 2 Special Edition - $79.99
Red Dead Redemption 2 Ultimate Edition - $99.99

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Digital Foundry Review

 

Quote

Stadia tech review: the best game streaming yet, but far from ready

Can it really deliver 4K - and what about lag?

Review by Richard Leadbetter, Technology Editor, Digital Foundry

  

Updated on 18 November 2019

 

Is streaming high quality, low latency gameplay over the internet now actually a viable alternative to owning a home console? Google believes so, leveraging its datacentre network and its vast influence over internet infrastructure to set up Stadia - a gaming system with next-gen level processing specs, ultimately available to stream on smartphones, tablets, TVs and computers. There's the potential here to radically change the nature of the games we play, and the speed with which we can access them. But fundamentally, Stadia needs to overcome profound technological challenges to replace the local experience - and today, for the first time, we get to see Google's 4K HDR dream play out in our homes.

 

Our focus for this piece is the Stadia bundle pack priced at £119/$129/€129, which ships an innovative new Google-designed controller plus a Chromecast Ultra for connecting to your TV in combination with a three-month subscription to Stadia Pro, opening the door to a limited selection of free games along with top-end 4K HDR streaming . Set-up for the living room in optimal conditions is a little convoluted, requiring the use of two apps.

 

First of all, Chromecast Ultra is attached to the HDMI port of your TV, then plugged into the mains. The power supply also features a LAN port and while not essential, I do recommend using that to attach the device directly to your router. Google's Home app is used for a relatively painless set-up, then you're directed to the Stadia app for set-up of the controller - principally, to hook it up to your WiFi network. After that, Chromecast and controller are linked and one press of the Stadia home button later, you're in.

 

The set-up here is interesting in that Chromecast and controller are individual clients to the Stadia network and aren't directly communicating. Google believes that by cutting out the middle-man, you get lower latency. This is an approach we'll need to test more fully (for various reasons, our time with the kit has been limited) but initial results certainly look impressive.
 

Of course, there are alternatives to the Stadia Premiere Edition configuration. The simplest solution is to hook up a USB controller to your computer, then head over to https://stadia.google.com, log in to your Google account and you're good to go. In this configuration, a range of pads are supported - including the Stadia controller itself, which has USB-C wired functionality. Another alternative is to connect a controller to a smartphone and go from there. However, in the Android ecosystem at least, only Google Pixel 3 and Pixel 3a phones are currently supported. 

 

We're focusing on the big screen primarily because right now at least, it is the only way to access Stadia's top-end video output - ultra HD at 60 frames per second with HDR support. However, actually accessing this does require some serious bandwidth. On a standard 30mbps fibre connection, it wasn't possible, even though the connection was rated as 'good' (look for a 'great' or 'excellent' rating to avoid issues). This may well be a limitation of my specific home connection - the reason we haven't produced coverage of Microsoft's xCloud yet is that UK ISP Sky seems to have an aversion to streaming platforms. I ended up moving to a Virgin Media connection (rated 'excellent') with a surfeit of bandwidth in order to get the job done. In terms of your connection, Google has a connection checker for determining the type of experience you're likely to get.

 

Once into Stadia, there's the sense that the platform isn't really complete. The integrated Google Assistant support isn't live at the time of writing (though basic functions may be active on day one), the UI is very basic, and there's a strange reliance on the Stadia mobile app for basic functionality - like buying games, or adjusting stream quality. Other essential features like family sharing aren't active either. Google itself is pitching this as an evolving platform, with the Premiere Edition aimed at elite users looking for a great big screen experience. You can't avoid the sense that the current set-up is far from the finished article though - xCloud is effectively the full Xbox environment in the palm of your hand. Going back to OnLive, for all of its faults, its front-end functionality was remarkable and very forward-looking. 

 

There's bigger fish to fry here though - the viability of Google's cloud gaming system, for starters. When we last looked at the system at the Google Campus, image quality from a computer was essentially unchanged from the Project Stream beta and while latency numbers looked good, we had no apples-to-apples comparison points - and we were running the system on a Google connection we can assume to be exceptionally good. Out of controlled conditions, how does Stadia fare?

 

Image quality is important, but latency defines the experience. Lag tests were carried out across multiple games and where we had equivalent experiences on Xbox One X, we stacked up Google's 'button to pixel' response numbers against the local competition. To do this, a 180fps high speed camera was pointed at display and controller. Count the frames between button press and animation kicking in on-screen and there we have our end-to-end latency. Display lag in our set-up is a fixed cost at 39ms - which was calculated by re-running the Xbox tests on a CRT monitor. This 39ms is removed from the final results here. 

 

A chart from Google showing how much bandwidth is needed to access each key quality tier.
 

Latency Tests

Xbox One X                                      StadiaDifference

Destiny 2n100ms (30fps)            144ms (60fps) +44ms

Mortal Kombat 11 78ms              122ms +44ms

Shadow of the Tomb Raider 60fps 83ms         139ms+56ms

Shadow of the Tomb Raider 30fps 167ms         217ms+50ms

Gylt                     N/A (Stadia Exclusive) 139ms-

 

Before we go on, some caveats. The use of a high-speed camera for latency testing does have some error built in - you need to judge when the button is fully depressed, and you need many tests to settle upon the most likely measurement. Secondly, different actions within a game can have different levels of latency. Destiny 2 and Shadow of the Tomb Raider were tested by using the jump action, MK11 from a fast jab, while Gylt was tested with a crouch motion. The idea here is that by matching the same actions from system to system, we can build up a picture of relative latency from a local experience to a cloud-delivered rendition. One further caveat: there can be variations in latency between platforms. This is especially true of Unreal Engine titles.

 

Probably the most useful comparison here is Shadow of the Tomb Raider, which offers up a 30fps high resolution mode, and a 60fps performance alternative - on both Stadia and Xbox One X. Results here indicate a delta of 50-56ms between the local and cloud-powered experience, but what's really surprising here is the variance between 30fps and 60fps modes on both systems. Destiny 2 is perfectly playable on Stadia and delivers the 60fps experience that Xbox One X cannot, but even so, it feels considerably snappier on console - and this is borne out by the latency numbers. The best result for Stadia is a mere 44ms differential between Mortal Kombat 11 running on Xbox One X and Stadia.

 

Ultimately, the question is how the game feels in the hand. Nothing I played could be considered 'unplayable' or very laggy - with the possible exception of Tomb Raider in quality mode, but I even got used to that after a while. Remember that different actions may have different latencies, so the table above is far from definitive. At best, it's a test of the one particular motion carried out in the same scenarios on each system. More tests on more titles may put Stadia into better focus, but 45-55ms of lag generally is perfectly acceptable for many experiences and even a fast-paced FPS like Destiny 2 plays out fine on the pad. Obviously though, if you're gaming on a living room display via Chromecast, do make sure game mode is enabled and definitely ensure that you're using a LAN connection.

 

Onto the next crucial test then: image quality. Google is selling the Stadia Premiere Edition as a 4K HDR experience with its bundled Chromecast Ultra in place, and that is indeed the type of signal the device is capable of outputting. In fact, HDR works fine on lower resolution video too and just works out of the box on selected titles (it can be enabled or disabled, but only in the Stadia mobile app). In order to show Stadia at its best, we've managed to capture the Chromecast Ultra's HDMI 2.0 output, while playing on a 200mbps connection. This is to ensure maximum bandwidth and stability. We've got a series of comparison galleries here, and we'll kick off with the most impressive Stadia port of the bunch we tested: Shadow of the Tomb Raider.

 

Stadia uses a 2.7GHz Intel CPU (not confirmed, but we suspect eight cores and 16 threads) in combination with a 10.7 teraflop AMD GPU that sounds a lot like RX Vega 56 with the full bandwidth HBM2 memory found in the higher-end RX Vega 64. When combined with server-level solid-state storage, we're looking at hardware that outscores Xbox One X on all levels. We're going to be carrying out more detailed Stadia analysis on key titles going forward, but Shadow of the Tomb Raider is a great place to start.

 

Google promises us a 4K experience, and in Tomb Raider's quality mode, that's what you get - viewed through the lens of a compressed feed, of course. A performance mode is also available which is the preferable way to play, and does seem to deliver a locked 60 frames per second - based on the admittedly small sample we've experienced so far.

 

The Tomb Raider shots here though are important in that it does validate Google's 4K claims - not to mention that our capturing solution is grabbing Stadia output at its best. The game's general darkness in these areas does help the encoder in maintaining more quality - more bits can be spent on the brighter, more details areas but there is some loss of fine detail in the darkness. Generally speaking though, some clarity is always lost, but the image holds up in motion. It is a 4K video feed, the game is rendering in 4K, but some fine detail is lost.We'll look at the differences in visual features in another article and there are some enhancements, but if there's a blemish, it seems to be a reduction in anisotropic filtering quality.

Our friends at Nixxes seem to be responsible for this Stadia conversion which looks very well executed overall - and I'm looking forward to checking out the other Tomb Raider titles in the streaming line-up. However, our next port of call in the here and now is Destiny 2 from Bungie, where we see a very different strategy from the developer.

 

As soon as you boot Destiny 2 on Stadia, you know you're in for a very different experience. For starters, the prolonged, agonising loading times on the current-gen consoles are enormously reduced, but more than that there's a shift in rendering priorities. Console Destiny is limited to 30 frames per second, while the Stadia version runs at 60 frames per second instead. It may not be faster than the Xbox One X version in terms of controller response owing to the cloud-based nature of the experience, but it's certainly more pleasing to look at in motion with the frame-rate holding steady in some pretty hardcore battle scenes.

 

The cost of this performance level is pretty straightforward based on the comparison images above - resolution. Our time with Bungie's game on Stadia - played on the same connection during the same session as Shadow of the Tomb Raider - resulted in a 1080p experience scaled up for 4K output over the Chromecast Ultra. HDR is supported, the high frame-rate is very welcome and the experience is exceptionally good fun, but it's not quite what we expected from a system with this much graphics power - especially when you consider that the PC version of the game is one of the most well-tuned, well-executed ports of the generation.

 

The comparison images also hint at some reductions in the game's visual features too, which we'll be looking at more closely in due course, but fundamentally, the idea that Bungie chose to lock at 1080p resolution on a high-profile title like this raises questions. It's early days for Stadia development, of course, and we've no real notion yet of the challenges facing game-makers - but it's not really something we expected from a cutting-edge hardware configuration.
 

Our final game focus is the big one - Red Dead Redemption 2. Stadia is based on a Linux OS running the Vulkan graphics API, and we know from our recent PC testing that Rockstar supports both this and DirectX 12 with the latest iteration of the Rage engine. We also know that invoking the PC game's higher-end features comes at a cost, so the developer's choices here in how to use Stadia's power should be intriguing.

 

Again, the obvious takeaway from Stadia is that despite a 4K output from Chromecast Ultra, the game itself is rendering at a lower resolution. It took a bit of effort to figure out what's going on, but the evidence points to Red Dead Redemption 2 operating with an internal pixel-count of 1440p. Again, we'll be looking at the specific visual feature set of the Stadia port in future, but first impressions suggest a good level of similarity in terms of specific settings with the Xbox One X version. Meanwhile, the Stadia port of RDR2 also seems to be running at the same 30 frames per second frame-rate as well. It's Red Dead Redemption 2 in its entirety, it plays well, and even with the existing, very large latency built into the game, there are no issues whatsoever in progressing through the game via the streaming platform.

 

Across the three ports tested, there are two key takeaways. First of all, at the highest streaming quality level, image quality (in terms of how well the encoder compresses the core image) is pretty impressive - Stadia's compressed stream seems to add some blur, and that blur can be compounded by temporal anti-aliasing and resolution upscaling, but bearing in mind how tricky streaming games is, it's still a notable achievement. What Stadia delivers is also a significant improvement over what we've seen from Google's streaming technology before, during the Assassin's Creed demo period. How this level of image quality holds up in more bandwidth-constrained situations is a test for another time.

 

The question is really whether marketing Stadia as a top-end 4K gaming system for big screen play (with a subscription required to access it) is the best way forward when the absolute clarity you associate with ultra HD isn't on par with established experiences. However, what is more concerning is that for a system designed to take on the next generation consoles, the three key ports we tested don't tally with the kind of increase to performance we would hope for from Project Scarlett or PlayStation 5. A more powerful CPU delivers the 60fps Destiny 2 experience we've always wanted from consoles, but Xbox One X's native 4K picture is still a class apart. Stadia's 10.7 teraflop GPU is more powerful and more modern than Xbox One X's core technology, so we would hope to see an improved experience on the Google kit, whether it's in pixel-count, features or both. Strangely, the jury is out on this so far.

 

Obviously, it's early days for Stadia and there's a lot the system gets right. The controller is excellent and innovative in the way it directly connects to the cloud as a separate client. While image quality can't really hope to equal the local experience on a living room display, it's still delivering results that can look really impressive, and while never pristine as such, Stadia looks good on smaller screens. Yes, the lag is perceptible, but remember that the vast majority of players are gaming on flat panels with game mode disabled - lag is a thing that many gamers just accept. Latency is important for sure, but across years of cloud system testing, we'd found that consistent response is probably more important (something we discussed with the xCloud team in an interview coming soon).

 

And what you lose in precision detail and latency, you gain in convenience. Load up Red Dead Redemption 2 or Destiny 2 in parallel with their console counterparts and the reduction in loading times alone is tremendous. Meanwhile, just to get the comparisons in place for this article, I've had to leave my Xbox One X downloading overnight a couple of times to access titles that can have storage footprints in excess of 100GB. Put simply, instant access to anything and everything in your library has enormous value.

 

As a technological statement, Stadia impresses with the best image quality and latency I've seen from a streaming platform, but there's definitely scope for improvement from a stability perspective, and I'm not sure the question of what happens when someone else taps into your bandwidth has been adequately resolved: audio stutter and wobbly resolution were common on my fibre connection and even a 200mbps hook-up had very occasional slowdown. Games can't buffer to iron out these issues in the way that movies and TV can. There's the sense that many of the challenges in streaming games have been improved massively since the OnLive days, but bandwidth is still very much a precious commodity for most users and Stadia at its best requires 20GB of the stuff for an hour of play at its highest quality level.

 

Perhaps more pressing is the value proposition. Netflix works because the subscription model is easy to understand - you pay extra for more screens and UHD but that's it. Stadia is the same in terms of demanding a premium for UHD (even if key titles don't seem to be rendering at 4K) except that you're still paying top-end prices for your games on top of that. Combined with the feeling that the platform and the ecosystem is still some way off completion and I do feel that it's perhaps too early for Stadia to be rolling out as a full service, especially when games are limited and the all-important platform exclusives are very thin on the ground.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Patrick Klepeck was taking question on Era, he says the experience was mostly fine but that he doesn't care about frame drops and 4k.

 

His review https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/j5yzv8/stadia-the-technology-awesome-stadia-the-service-not-so-much

 

Forbes wrote a scathing review

https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2019/11/18/google-stadia-launch-review-a-technical-conceptual-disaster/#1a08c3d95ec7

 

That sound desync issue is something I also saw on MK. Gaming definitely has a low tolerance for buggy dropouts like that

 

As far as this streaming stuff goes, I'd be cool with a sort of add on service to PSN (like NOW) and the gamepass stuff MS is doing with Xcloud. This closed garden stuff, especially by Google, it's the sort of thing I hope doesnt hit critical mass

Link to comment
Share on other sites

14 hours ago, Hendo said:

The payment model and those prices are insane. Hard pass.


The prices are expensive but the same as digital prices on PSN/MS Store. I wish the business model was more Game Pass-like though.

 

Also, considering the cost is far less than new consoles and you get 2 games with Stadia Pro a month I think the value proposition is still pretty decent. It’ll only get better in 2020 too when Stadia Base comes out for free available on any device you own pretty much.

 

In other news my Stadia bundle has shipped! But I haven’t got my invite code to get on the app or reserve my name or anything yet which is a bit puzzling.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It reminds me of when Hooli in Silicon Valley launched their streaming company and the product was immediately tanked

 

But for real, that show gives a good insight into the structure of companies like this I think. How you can have a big company like Google but inside it you might have the equivalent of (well funded) scrappy startups with all the same bootstrap mentality as smaller companies. That's how this Stadia thing appears to me. Just because they got the big bucks doesn't mean that they aren't also facing the same struggles to 'disrupt' tech with 'fledgling' solutions. ie, faking it till you make it.

 

Stadia, Google or not, just seems a very familiar story to stuff like Onlive so far.

 

I think MS will be the first to breach the streaming space. They have a far better strategy for it imo.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

7 minutes ago, one-armed dwarf said:

 I think MS will be the first to breach the streaming space. They have a far better strategy for it imo.


I don’t think we really know how good their strategy is yet, we don’t know how good their streaming will be either.
 

From what I’ve heard xCloud is just 720p.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

But they're offering it as a side option. It's just an additional incentive for now which will slowly improve which is what I mean by their strategy. While Stadia you've got to buy all in and there's little cross compatibility with other ecosystems you've invested in.

 

On the tech side of things Stadia is probably the best in town right now, but it offers streaming and nothing else.

 

Like from what I've seen and heard Stadia is just sort of alright, but it still offers a lesser experience than console. I can't imagine that this is all people had hoped for, other than those who maybe want a way to bring games with them when visiting family who have great internet but no consoles (which is one way they could sell me on the product as my parents have great internet.. but Stadia needs the games to get people like me on board and a faaaaaar lower asking price)

 

edit, I might be wrong about Xcloud, isn't it supposed to be like some sort of gamepass type subscription?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don’t know what pressure the Stadia team were under but I feel like this whole thing needed a lot more time. As impressive as it is that you can now stream top quality games over the internet, in a browser, and the quality (presumably) is only a bit worse than playing on a console or PC, then that’s actually pretty good going considering how long streaming has been talked about. Companies have talked about and tried this for a while now and the fact that it’s working I think shouldn’t be overlooked or dismissed. It is cool. 

 

At the same time, the only unique selling point right now is that the games are being streamed. With none of their screen swap features, being able to jump in to someone else’s game, copy someone else’s save, the “High end PC” experience not being delivered on yet, and all the other stuff they talked about at announcement that would make Stadia unique, it seems like right now the only key selling point is that it’s being streamed. Which is great, but less great than what I already have. So...why right now? 
 

I think as gamers we’ve got used to game related things coming out a bit early and they will be finished later. Sometimes it’s a patch sometimes it’s an early access thing. Sometimes it’s understandable, sometimes it’s not. I don’t feel like this is acceptable when it isn’t feature complete. It isn’t oh, it’s all there but it needs a couple of patches to be 100%. Most of what this thing is being sold on it can’t do right now. Which is why to me it sounds like a scam.
 

Imagine if when Sony announced the Playstation 4 and all the things it can do, but then when you bought it you could only play games but you can’t take it online, you can’t take capture screen shots or video, you can’t share stuff with your friends, you can’t use non game related apps. I would feel like I was short changed. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't think it sounds like a scam, I think they ran out of time and had intense meetings deciding what the minimal viable proposal was going to be. Sometimes you're forced to make decisions like that cause of business realities that are outside your control so a lot of it probably isn't on the Stadia guys. Whoever is above the Stadia guys, more likely.

 

I think the business concern here is getting ahead of the next wave of hardware releases. PS5, Xbox whatever, the next wave of GPUs that offer more affordable ray tracing or whatever. So they whittled this thing down to just releasing the bare requirements to make the product function at bare minimum and had to take hard decisions on features that make the product unique and salable. 

 

Like when an update is made to a piece of software with the *'known issues'. Which is happening with this actually, the krypt mode for Mortal Kombat isn't working which is pretty weird. I read somewhere that these aren't PC ports exactly, or at least not Windows PC. These are Linux ports. I could be wrong on this but it would explain the extra dev work needed for games like Mortal Kombat and the strange bugs it appears to have. But that also kind of seems like an obstacle if you have to get every game up on Linux. Might explain the weak release line up

 

As I typed this I went and checked and yup, it's Linux 

03k6vdub74n21.png?width=960&crop=smart&a

 

 

 

I bet the base experience of Stadia will be just fine. But that doesn't really seem like a ringing endorsement if it's meant to be competitive. It will have to do more than just catch up to PS5 at this rate, it might also need to recover its brand and make it a more premium product. Not just something that's pretty alright and works most of the time.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...