Slightly Mad Studios has been wanting to release a console for a while, one that they were planning on calling the “Mad Box.” We now know it won’t actually be called that, since the trademark has been pulled due to a dispute from a French company, but the studio still seems to want to pursue the idea for the hardware. However, the trademark isn’t the only issue. It seems the announcement of Google’s streaming service, Stadia, dealt a big blow to the console’s potential future.
Speaking with PCGamesInsider.biz, online marketing director Nathan Bell said that the announcement of Stadia caused an expected hit to the project’s future. He says that two investors pulled out after the Stadia announcement. He gave no details on how many other investors remain, but he definitely feels Google’s announcement had a big effect, and could possibly have that kind of an effect on gaming in general.
“Google’s announcement of Stadia hasn’t helped the project with our investors,” he said. “We had some solid investment lined up but Google saying ‘the future of gaming isn’t in a box’ hasn’t done us any favours. Two investors pulled out after the announcement of Stadia. All I can say at this stage is the future of the project is questionable.”
From the start, the ‘Mad Box’ has been met with skepticism and doubt, largely because of Slightly Mad’s size and the colossal amount of capital launching a console of any kind in today’s market would require. We’ll just have to see how it all pans out and what this thing will end up looking like, whatever it’ll be called. If it even gets to the point where it exists, that is.
