Google Stadia Revealed: News From GDC 2019 Keynote

Google's GDC event has wrapped up, and as expected, it focused on the company's entry into the gaming world with a new cloud streaming service called Stadia. The company had teased it would reveal its "vision for the future of gaming," and that's just what we got, as Stadia could be the future of gaming. You can read a quick recap of some highlights from the event below, or watch the video above to see the entire keynote for yourself. The full thing is also on YouTube.

Google has officially announced Stadia. This is its new streaming service that is meant to bring game to people anywhere, on any device. Ex-Sony exec Phil Harrison came on stage to talk about the usage for Stadia, and he outlined a scenario where you watch video of a game online and then click a link to begin playing it in your browser within seconds.

We then saw Assassin's Creed Odyssey being played on low-power laptops, desktops, and tablets with the same experience. This concluded with the game being played on a TV with a Chromecast Ultra streaming device. Afterward, we learned that Doom Eternal will also be available on Stadia. We also got a look at the Stadia controller and learned about its cross-platform support. You can get the full rundown in our roundup of Google Stadia gaming news from GDC, or check out our hands-on impressions with Stadia.

Original story: Google hasn't specified how long this will run for or exactly what kind of news it has in store, although a display seen in the GDC lobby suggests it will have some kind of hardware to showcase. Ubisoft might be involved in some capacity based on a tweet--that, or its community manager is just really excited. But the game publisher's involvement would make sense, given its previous involvement with Google.

Google recently shared a teaser video that showed vignettes of different common game genres, suggesting big plans for its own platform.

The announcement is surely related to Project Stream, a cloud gaming platform from Google. As referenced above, it partnered with Ubisoft last year to offer Assassin's Creed Odyssey to play through Chrome browsers for free to testers. Google has been rumored to be working on a "Project Yeti," which is thought to be its equivalent of a console. The company also recently hired former Ubisoft and EA studio head Jade Raymond, suggesting she could be playing a role in the company's gaming plans.

Perhaps related to Project Stream, Google has filed for a trademark on something called Google Stream. Trademarks aren't always utilized, but the basic details included in the filing would seem to make sense for a cloud gaming service. We should know for sure whether it's being used in the next hour or two. Reinforcing the Project Stream connection, Google sent out an email to testers of the service advising them to tune into the live stream above to "see how you helped create one place for all the ways we play."

To learn more about cloud gaming ahead of Google's announcement, check out GameSpot's primer on how cloud gaming works and what it could mean for the future and some of the companies investing most heavily in the tech. Among others, Sony already offers its PlayStation Now service, and Microsoft once again just recently showcased its upcoming xCloud tech.