Google Stadia Announces Studio Acquisition | Game Rant
Though the Google Stadia already has several AAA games confirmed for streaming, including Cyberpunk 2077, Borderlands 3, and Mortal Kombat 11, it lacks something even more important: exclusives. While Stadia did have one exclusive on launch (the stealth horror game Gylt), that game was far from being the killer app needed to get gamers to come flocking to Stadia.
It seems Google already has a plan for that, as earlier today the tech company announced its acquisition of AAA game developer Typhoon Studios. As part of Stadia's first games studio, Stadia Games and Entertainment, it will be up to this Montreal-based studio to develop exclusives for Google Stadia.
The acquisition is part of Stadia's plan to fill out it's gaming library with exclusive content that will entice gamers to move to the Stadia platform. When Stadia launched in November, the cloud gaming service received a number of complaints from critics, such as the service causing Chromecasts to overheat and using up an insane amount of data. Another issue gamers have is the lack of major platform exclusives. Without any exclusive AAA titles, most gamers see no reason to purchase another platform. Jade Raymond, the vice president of Stadia Games and Entertainment, has since sought to remedy the situation, as she has said the goal of Stadia's first-party group is to create "platform-defining exclusive content."
Though Typhoon Studios has yet to actually release a game, Stadia still considers it a AAA game developer. That's because this relatively new studio is made up of seasoned industry veterans. The founders of Typhoon Studios are the former head of production for Warner Bros. Games Montreal Reid Schneider, and Alex Hutchinson, the former creative director for Assassin's Creed III and Far Cry 4.
It seems that the team at Typhoon Studios will be absorbed into the Montreal-based Stadia Games and Entertainment. This studio will be lead by the recently hired Sebastien Puel, who previously worked at Ubisoft as a developing several Assassin's Creed games. Raymond has stated that they are excited to work with the developers from Typhoon since "they're a team that has done amazing work on amazing games," listing off titles like Batman, Assassin's Creed, and the original Splinter Cell, which Reid worked as executive producer on.
In the meantime, Typhoon Studios will continue to work on the launch of it's first game, Journey to the Savage Planet, which is scheduled for release on consoles and PC on January 28th, 2020. It's a first-person, two-player co-op game set on a world full of alien creatures. While that game looks interesting, Hutchinson has said he's excited to use Google's technology and capital to make bigger, more ambitious games on Stadia. Given that the game was not included in Google's acquisition, gamers should consider Journey to the Savage Planet a preview of things to come on the Stadia.
Source: Stadia/Twitter
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