I tried Stadia at the start of Lockdown#1 – around the middle of April 2020. I didn’t play huge sessions but I had a go of GRID for about 2 hrs and Destiny for about 4 hrs.

I had low expectations but I was really surprised at how good it was. Fair enough I was only running at 1080p but it ran really well. There was no input lag at all.

Given this good experience I convinced 2 friends to try it out too and they also reported that it was as if they were running it locally with no input lag.

That being said – there’s no way I’m going to pay for it! The selection of games for a subscription based service just isn’t there. Furthermore I’m not sure the model really works for the way I play games. I tend to play the same game for many many hours – it just makes sense to buy it rather than pay monthly.

It is interesting that the technology does work though – I can imagine this could change the shape of gaming in 5 to 10 years but not until they fix the pricing model. Certainly nVidia Now has a more appealing offer. I could see how gamers could transition to it as the hardware demands of new games surpass their current rigs.