Google Stadia trying to attract more indie developers with new program

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Google Stadia hasn’t been doing particularly well lately, they have a very particular lack of games on their platform, especially those indie games that make up for the large libraries that both Xbox and PlayStation offer. However, Google is now wanting to change that by offering a self-publishing program for indie developers, called Stadia Makers, in an announcement made at the virtual Games Developer Summit.

Essentially, this program will help entice indie developers to release on Stadia’s platform, with benefits beyond just more money. It was recently revealed that Google simply weren’t offering enough of an incentive to indie developers to create games on their platform, but this new program offers many more reasons for them to do so now.

For starters, developers don’t have to worry about exclusivity, in fact they only need to make sure that Stadia is one of the platforms available on launch day. Secondly, they will also receive financial support from Google by offsetting some development costs, plus technical support from their program’s partner, Unity. Thirdly, developers may receive up to five development kits depending on the size of the team working on a project.

During the same announcement, Google said that developers have currently launched 30 games on the platform, and that another 120 will be launched this year. It’s clear that Google has heard the complaints about a lack of titles available on the cloud gaming platform, and are looking into more ways for enticing indie developers to also launch on Stadia.

There are some prerequisites however: developers must be building a game in Unity 2019.3 or later and are expecting to launch the game in either 2020 or 2021. Applications are now open on Stadia’s official website.

What do you think of the news? Is this a good move from Google? Will we see more games available on their platform? How will this affect indie developers? Let us know your thoughts!