在3月19日举行的游戏开发者大会上，谷歌隆重进军游戏流媒体领域。这家搜索巨头在旧金山举行的大会上宣布了流媒体游戏服务Stadia。展示了对游戏未来的大胆设想——基于云端服务器的游戏平台。

通过Stadia，玩家可以在任何手机、平板、电脑、电视等屏幕上玩任何游戏，不用买游戏光盘，不用下载游戏程序，所有的工作都在一个离线数据中心完成。“游戏的未来不是一个封闭盒子，”谷歌说，“而是一个地方。”就像人类几百年来建造体育场馆一样，谷歌相信它正在建造一个虚拟的游戏体育场。玩家不需要昂贵的游戏PC或专用游戏机，相反，只需要访问谷歌的浏览器，就可以在手机、平板电脑、个人电脑或电视上即时玩游戏。对于游戏的发展方向，这是一个大胆的设想，谷歌希望它的视距云流媒体服务将使其成为现实。

外媒评价，这并不是第一个旨在颠覆该行业的流媒体服务，但它是最有说服力的服务之一。然而，Stadia推出后面临的一个主要的问题将是，通过该服务，玩家究竟能够玩到些什么游戏？

在游戏开发者大会上，谷歌仅提及了三款游戏将确认在Stadia上线。首先是《刺客信条奥德赛》，在大会的演示环节，谷歌正是使用了这款游戏来展示这项新技术：演示者从手机转向电视，再转向笔记本电脑和个人电脑来玩同一款游戏。

《毁灭战士：永恒》，这款游戏的上线可以回答玩家们对Stadia的一些疑问。

作为一款闪电射击游戏，即使是很小的输入延迟也会破坏游戏进程，影响玩家体验。不过外媒评价，在大会上进行演示并不能完全说明Stadia平台的处理速率，真正的考验将是，当玩家在远离数据中心、连接速度较慢的农村地区使用时，是否还能保持同样的游戏体验。谷歌证实，Q-Games将围绕“state share”功能开发一款游戏，这款游戏将允许你在观看Youtube视频或Youtube流媒体直播的同时玩游戏。

谷歌Stadia服务的核心是YouTube和Chrome浏览器。除了上文介绍的在观看Youtube视频或Youtube直播的同时玩游戏外，Chrome作为谷歌的主流网络浏览器也扮演着重要角色。Stadia最初只能通过Chrome、Chromecast和Android设备使用。谷歌承诺未来会有更多的浏览器支持使用，但目前还不清楚何时会推出。另外一点值得注意的是，在大会上谷歌只在自己的设备上演示了这项服务，没有提到通过专用应用程序或苹果的Safari移动浏览器支持iOS系统使用这项服务。

除了谷歌，索尼、微软、亚马逊都加入了这场云游戏战争。索尼现在拥有了游戏和PlayStation，微软可以利用其Azure数据中心和Xbox Game Pass来支持xCloud，亚马逊可以凭借其云计算主导地位Prime和广受欢迎的Twitch服务来吸引玩家。作为搜索引擎巨头，谷歌也有其自身竞争优势，但看起来这场云游戏战争才刚刚开始。

Google Stadia：“A game platform for everyone”that could shake up the industry

Yesterday，Google made its grand entrance into the world of game streaming. The search giant announced Stadia at the Game Developer’s Conference in San Francisco，showing off a bold vision for a gaming future where anyone could play any game on any screen，with all the hard processing work done at an off-site data center.

“The future of gaming is not a box，”according to Google.“It’s a place.”Just like how humans have built stadiums for sports over hundreds of years，Google believes it’s building a virtual stadium，aptly dubbed Stadia，for the future of games to be played anywhere. You won’t need an expensive gaming PC or a dedicated game console. Instead，you’ll just need access to Google’s Chrome browser to instantly play games on a phone，tablet，PC，or TV. It’s a bold vision for where gaming is heading，and Google hopes its Stadia cloud streaming service will make it a reality.

Google may have just unveiled the future of gaming at the Game Developers Conference (GDC)，but it’s a future the company has left us knowing very little about.

It’s not the first streaming service that’s been meant to disrupt the industry，but it is one of the most convincing. When it launches in 2019，however，a major question will be what games we’ll be able to play on it. Google was pretty light on those particular specifics for this presentation， but we do know three titles.

The first one is Assassin’s Creed Odyssey. It was the test case for Project Stream，and people have already played a remote version of this game in a web browser. Google used Assassin’s Creed Odyssey to show off the new tech during the presentation as a demonstrator moved from phone to TV to laptop and PC playing the same game session.

Doom Eternal：This was meant to answer some of people’s doubts about Stadia. Where Odyssey is a relatively forgiving title that can handle a little latency without disrupting the experience，Doom Eternal is set to be a lighting quick twitch shooter where even a tiny bit of input lag could absolutely wreck a play session. Announcing Doom Eternal was Google’s way of saying that they were aware of these concerns and wanted to meet them.

The game will be playable at the convention，but that isn’t a huge test，to be honest. The real test will be when this hits someone living out in a rural area，far away from a data center and with a slow connection.

Something from Q-Games：Google confirmed that Dylan Cuthbert’s Q-Games would be building a game around the “state share”feature that will allow you to instantly start playing a game at the same moment as a Youtube video or a live Youtube stream.

At the heart of Google’s Stadia cloud streaming service are YouTube and Chrome.Chrome also plays a big role as Google’s dominant web browser. Stadia will only be available through Chrome，Chromecast，and on Android devices initially. Google has promised more browsers in the future，but it’s not clear when this will arrive.Google only demonstrated the service on its own devices，and there was no mention of iOS support through a dedicated app or Apple’s Safari mobile browser.

Sony，Microsoft，Amazon，and Google will be the key players in any cloud gaming war. Sony has the games and PlayStation Now，Microsoft can leverage its Azure data centers and Xbox Game Pass for xCloud，and Amazon can lean on its cloud dominance，Prime，and its massively popular Twitch service to entice gamers. Google has some fierce competition，but it looks like this cloud gaming war is just getting started.

南都记者 张沛 综合整理自Forbes The Verge Financial Times