It's been one week since Google Stadia launched and things have been anything but smooth for the tech giant's new gaming platform. Lukewarm reviews were replaced by delayed Founder's Edition codes for early adopters and now the Stadia team has had to issue a statement on an ongoing issue regarding the actual specs of the games players are experiencing on Stadia.
Before launch, Stadia was promised to offer 4K resolution and 60 frames per second on compatible devices, but multiple reports from players and tech wizards alike, like those at Digital Foundry, are citing lesser specs, sometimes even much less.
Digital Foundry pointed out in their trials that despite alleging to possess more power than the PS4 Pro and Xbox One X combined, Red Dead Redemption 2 on Stadia "currently only has 44 per cent of the X's rendering resolution, while even the 4.2TF PS4 Pro GPU is generating a higher pixel-count (even before factoring in its checkerboarding upscale)."
It's become such a hot button that Google released a statement on the ongoing woes:
Stadia streams at 4K and 60 FPS - and that includes all aspects of our graphics pipeline from game to screen: GPU, encoder and Chromecast Ultra all outputting at 4k to 4k TVs, with the appropriate internet connection.
Developers making Stadia games work hard to deliver the best streaming experience for every game. Like you see on all platforms, this includes a variety of techniques to achieve the best overall quality. We give developers the freedom of how to achieve the best image quality and framerate on Stadia and we are impressed with what they have been able to achieve for day one.
We expect that many developers can, and in most cases will, continue to improve their games on Stadia. And because Stadia lives in our data centers, developers are able to innovate quickly while delivering even better experiences directly to you without the need for game patches or downloads."
On the heels of this problem comes another, however, as some players are reporting overheating of their Chromecast Ultra devices which come included in Founder's Edition kits. These overheating devices are leading to some players' games shutting down without notice, as first reported by Comicbook.com who spotted the exchange unfold in the Stadia subreddit.
A Google spokesperson replied, saying the team "has done extensive testing on the hardware, services and games-this includes tests of long Stadia play and video sessions-and have not seen thermal shutdown problems," assuring players that some warmness to the device is normal even while watching "cat videos on YouTube."
But the official reply was met with more criticism from other players experiencing the same problem who feel Google is acting like it's not happening. Players have since returned to the thread to claim their Chromecast Ultra devices are shutting down due to overheating after just 10 or 20 minutes sometimes, with at least one player saying they can no longer sign in on the device after it overheated. Others have had to build their own heatsinks to keep things running smoothly. At time of writing, no Google rep has returned to the thread.
Though Stadia can only currently be used with the Chromecast Ultra devices that come includes in Founder's Editions of the platform, some players are alleging this overheating problem predates Stadia. A firmware update is meant to make all Chromecast devices compatible with Stadia at a later date, but it seems like Google may have a different issue heating up in the meantime.
