Google Stadia’s Director of Games Jack Buser has left the platform after being promoted to Director of Global Gaming Solutions at Google Cloud.
- READ MORE: What Happened, Google Stadia?
Buser joined Stadia in 2016. His new boss Lori Mitchell-Keller, VP of Industry Solutions, said in a statement to ZDnet that “his five years at Google will help open doors for broader strategic partnerships with customers across YouTube, Stadia, and more,” implying the Stadia platform isn’t dead yet.
“Jack’s hire illustrates Google Cloud’s continued investment into our global, customer-first gaming strategy,” she added.
Stop scrolling – you've reached the latest Stadia Savepoint!
Catch up on all the new games, updates and details you may have missed last month: https://t.co/BfwGs3fLQH pic.twitter.com/UKiYLYwIiA
— Stadia (@GoogleStadia) September 3, 2021
In recent months, Stadia’s Head of Product John Justice also left the company. Six other employees also moved to Haven Studios, the company set up by former Stadia VP Jade Raymond who left in February when Google announced the closure of its first party Stadia development studio.
A job-listing posted at the start of August suggested that Stadia was set to rebrand as a platform for other developers to hire.
“In addition to building our own video game platform, we see an important opportunity to make our infrastructure and tools available to partners who want to build their own interactive streaming platforms,” said the advert. “Our goal is to build a long-term, sustainable business that helps grow the industry across gaming and other interactive streaming applications.”
Going down that route would mean the Stadia platform remains at the heart of cloud gaming, but that it wouldn’t need to commit to any first or third-party development or publishing.
Google launched the Stadia cloud-streaming platform in 2019, allowing consumers to play games over an internet connection. After falling short of initial sales expectations, Google started scaling back the platform.
In other news, PlayStation fans noticed a trailer for a game titled Tuesday Morning was uploaded to YouTube over the weekend, but the initial response has been far from positive.
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