Exclusives have been a rarity on Stadia. Though a few games like the upcoming Orcs Must Die! 3 do pledge timed exclusivity to the digital platform, there’s not nearly enough of them, and while Google does seem to be working towards building up its own first party portfolio, that’s probably going to be a long, ongoing process.
In the interim, it seems Google is going to be relying on deals with other developers to develop exclusives for Stadia. At the recent Stadia Connect, in fact, they announced that they have signed deals with Harmonix (developers of Rock Band) and Supermassive Games (the studio behind Until Dawn and Man of Medan) to develop exclusive Stadia titles.
“Our teams create games that mix powerful storytelling with cinematic production values. Combining these elements is key to what we do,” Pete Samuels, CEO of Supermassive said. “We’ve always had a passion for exploring the benefits of new technology and new platforms, and the features of Stadia really enhance what we see as the values of our games. Our games are designed to be played by anyone (as long as they are old enough!) and we love the accessibility of the Stadia platform. The low barrier to entry and ability to play across multiple devices allows players to quickly immerse themselves in our games. We couldn’t be more excited about the partnership.”
Meanwhile, Steve Janiak of Harmonix had this to say about the studio’s partnership with Stadia: “Any time our team gets to work on a new platform they are eager to discover what new gameplay they can pioneer. How can we push music gaming forward? The power and accessibility offered by Stadia, combined with Stadia Enhanced Features and the backing of Google, has enabled our team to develop something completely new and unique. We can’t wait to share more about it.”
The upcoming projects of Supermassive and Harmonix are probably not going to be revealed for a while yet, but it’s good to see that Google is taking at least some measures to address the drought of quality exclusive content on its service. Given the reputation of both these studios, their Stadia projects are very likely going to be worth keeping an eye on.