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Netflix continues to expand into games, opening a new development studio in Southern California. Netflix’s vice president of games Mike Verdu said the new studio will be led by former Blizzard vice president and Overwatch boss Chako Sonny.
“He could have done anything, but he chose to come here,” Verdu said. “Those people aren’t going into your organization to build the next big thing in gaming unless they feel like they’re really in it for good reasons in the long-term.”
The online streaming giant is looking to expand its presence in the gaming space and may even try to create its own cloud gaming service.
“This is an added value,” he says Verdu. “We’re not asking you to sign up as a console replacement. It’s a completely different business model. Over time, I hope it becomes a very natural way to play games wherever you are.”
Unfortunately, as it struggled to survive and numbers dwindled, Google announced that he would be discontinuing Google Stadia by January 2023. But Netflix doesn’t think Stadia has failed per se, just its business model.
Of course, Netflix isn’t the first to try video game streaming. Google Stadia has attempted to do just that, allowing a user to access a library of video games without using his PC or game console, simply by using Stadia devices and services.
“Stadia was a success technically,” he said of Verdu. “It was fun playing games on Stadia. Admittedly, there were some issues with the business model.” Refused to check if this applies to game services.