Google Stadia's Storefront Has Already Been Shut Down

2022-10-15 00:30:05 By : Mr. Gary Chen

Buying a game on Stadia is already a thing of the past.

Google announced earlier today, rather unsurprisingly, that it will be shutting down its cloud gaming service Stadia, refunding every customer who has purchased hardware from the Google Store or any games/add-ons from the Stadia Store. The service is still set to run until January 18 next year, but after that it will be shuttered. However, it seems like Google doesn't want you buying anything else from the Stadia store, as it's been discovered that the service's storefront has already been shut down.

Revealed on Twitter by user @stopskeletons, Google seems to have shut down the Stadia storefront with zero warning despite the service remaining active for another few months. Users who access the store are now greeted with a short statement that reads "Stadia will wind down 18 January, 2023. The Stadia store is now closed." The user explains that they can still download games with their Pro subscription, but it now seems like nobody will be able to buy any more titles from now on.

Related: Stadia Was A Failed Experiment, But Being Able To Jump Into People's Screenshots Felt Like The Future

As previously mentioned, Google seems to have given neither users nor developers any warning that the store had been closed. While it's unconfirmed, the reason for the closure is likely because the company didn't want to take cash from people when it would have to immediately refund it just a few months later. Still, it kind of sucks for those developers who had exclusive titles on the platform and don't even seem to have been notified that their games have been taken down.

Adding to claims that Google hasn't bothered to notify people about its decision are reports from several developers who have claimed that they only found out about the shuttering of Stadia at the same time as everyone else. For example, Tangle Tower co-creator Tom Vian revealed that his game was set to launch on Stadia in just two days time, but wasn't even aware of Google's decision to shut down Stadia until earlier today.

Next: The Death Of Stadia Is A Massive Blow To Cloud Gaming

Joshua Robertson is a News Writer for TheGamer, based in Barnsley, England. When not playing or writing about Pokemon, Yakuza, or Fallout, he can usually be found spending too much time on Twitter @JoshRobertson97.