Google Stadia rolls out new features

Authored by: Kirsten Holst Apr 17, 2020

Despite some teething troubles, Google Stadia is turning more and more into a solid game streaming platform. Besides free offers and new game announcements, Google wants to make the platform more interesting with improvements. Subscribers can now look forward to these new features.

Google is well aware of its competitors in the cloud gaming market. After its bumpy start last year, the company is constantly improving its game streaming platform Stadia. New games have been announced, a limited free version has been launched and the platform itself is also set to get new features.

Google Stadia: various improvements to the gaming platform

Earlier this month, GoogleWatchBlog pointed out that Google wants to improve gaming on smartphones with a touchscreen controller. The interesting thing about this is that the source code contained hints that not only refer to the most important buttons, but also indicate the use of shoulder buttons through gestures. According to the reports, the user should also be able to individually adjust the position and size of the buttons.

But the company doesn't want to leave it at an integrated controller and yesterday (16 April) posted some interesting innovations on its Stadia Community Blog and Twitter account, which it has now rolled out for its platform.

We've rolled out some new features on Stadia, including:
🔊 5.1 surround sound on web
🔔 Mobile connection notifications

Take a look at our latest patch notes here → https://t.co/k4562oj1qy
— Stadia (@GoogleStadia) April 16, 2020

According to the blog entry, the service should also support notifications, apart from the on-screen keyboard and 5.1 surround sound. The latter will tell you how good your connection quality is when you are playing on mobile devices. A handy tool for all those who want to try out some of the games on the subway as well.

Cloud Gaming: a market on the rise

Sure, the market for cloud gaming services is still young, but that's exactly why new opponents keep pouring into the battlefield. After Google and Nvidia, Amazon also wants to enter the market and has a very strong background. So it's no wonder that Google is hurrying to improve its offers in order to bind users to itself early on.