Google just unveiled Stadia, its ambitious attempt to upend the video-game industry and take on Xbox and PlayStation. Here's everything we know. (GOOG, GOOGL)
Unlike Microsoft's Xbox, Sony's PlayStation, and Nintendo's Switch, Google is promising no additional hardware is required with Stadia.
"At launch, we'll support being able to play games across desktops, laptops, TV, tablets, and phones. This new generation of gaming is not a box," Phil Harrison, a Google vice president, said on Tuesday.
Instead, processing is handled "in the cloud" â by Google's hardware in a data center â and streamed to you instantly. Your inputs are then instantly beamed back to the computer elsewhere.
This is an oversimplification of what is assuredly a deeply complicated process, but it's similar to how Netflix works: Instead of having to run physical media, it's simply streamed to wherever you're watching it.
