Google is shutting down Stadia in September, offering refunds for games and controllers

Google is shutting down its cloud gaming service Stadia, the company announced Thursday. <br><br>Stadia will continue to operate until January 18, 2024, Google said, and most of the Stadia team will be moved to other parts of the company.<br><br>Google said it will allow Stadia Pro subscribers who bought hardware from the Google Store to receive a full refund. Additionally, players who purchased games or content through the Stadia store will also receive a full refund, which is expected to be completed by mid-January.<br><br>The tech giant said it would share more details about the process of receiving a refund in the coming months. Players will still be able to access their game library until Stadia closes shop.<br><br>Stadia vice president Phil Harrison took to the company blog to share that despite acquiring millions of active users, the service failed to gain sufficient traction and achieve the level of traction Google had hoped for.<br><br>"Today, I announced that Stadia, our cloud-based gaming service, will shut down on January 18, 2024.," Harrison wrote. "We have made the difficult decision to begin winding down the Stadia service and shifting our resources toward platforms where our technology can be used to benefit gamers and game developers."<br><br>Stadia was first launched in 2019 as a service that allowed users to play high-quality games on any devices capable of running a Chrome browser, without the need for a physical console.<br><br>---<br><br>This is a developing story and will be updated.