Stadia died because the business model made no sense. The service was squarely targeted at AAA gamers. However, it was a poor deal for AAA gamers and (much more importantly) a horrible deal for AAA game companies.
The deal for AAA companies was: Port your game for an entirely different OS/API, pay the Google tax and be subject to Google reviews. But you can't treat a game streaming service like a Play Store. AAA game companies have way more power and money than the typical mobile app developer, and will fight you even on mobile where GoogleApple is strong (see Epic). No way they want the Play Store experience when they can avoid it by going to the competition. So Google had to bribe and bribe. Eventually it became depply unprofitable, and Google had to pull the plug.
Was there any way to avoid that?
A) Make the service more accessible to casuals. Like by having a search bar, a subscription model and making some Windows compatibility layer so indies could more easily port. But there's no way Google's ego could accept a service not targeted at AAAAAA.
B) Make 1st party studios and show capabilities only cloud gaming could have. Force AAA companies to your service to compete. This requires investment for a good time with uncertain rewards and possibly no promotion. We're talking about Google here.
C) Pivot to a white-label service and give AAA companies a way better deal. This is what Google is trying to do. Of course, there's no reason to keep Stadia in that case.
The deal for AAA companies was: Port your game for an entirely different OS/API, pay the Google tax and be subject to Google reviews. But you can't treat a game streaming service like a Play Store. AAA game companies have way more power and money than the typical mobile app developer, and will fight you even on mobile where GoogleApple is strong (see Epic). No way they want the Play Store experience when they can avoid it by going to the competition. So Google had to bribe and bribe. Eventually it became depply unprofitable, and Google had to pull the plug.
Was there any way to avoid that?
A) Make the service more accessible to casuals. Like by having a search bar, a subscription model and making some Windows compatibility layer so indies could more easily port. But there's no way Google's ego could accept a service not targeted at AAAAAA.
B) Make 1st party studios and show capabilities only cloud gaming could have. Force AAA companies to your service to compete. This requires investment for a good time with uncertain rewards and possibly no promotion. We're talking about Google here.
C) Pivot to a white-label service and give AAA companies a way better deal. This is what Google is trying to do. Of course, there's no reason to keep Stadia in that case.