Streaming is being promoted by companies such as Google as the next big thing within the video game industry. The search-engine giant wants to make high-end gaming accessible across multiple devices and remove the current technical barriers and limitations in place with its new Stadia platform.
So, what does Nintendo think about this push to make streaming the norm within the video game industry? In an article published on Fortune yesterday, following an interview conducted at E3 2019, Nintendo of America President Doug Bowser said it’s something the video game giant is closely watching:
“The Switch delivers on a lot of the promises [of streaming]. It’s a device where you can play anywhere, at any time, with anyone. It’s obviously something that we’re closely watching, and looking at, and understanding.”
As Doug notes, the Switch is a promising device when considering its portable design. Obviously, the system has already played host to a number of streaming experiments in Japan. These include cloud versions of Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, Resident Evil 7 and Phantasy Star Online 2.
In a separate interview with TIME during the week of E3 2019, Nintendo of America’s president provided a similar response to the one above, saying how the company was “looking” at streaming, but was currently more focused on providing seamless game experiences:
We’re looking at those technologies and understanding their capabilities and how they may contribute to the gameplay experiences we desire with our IP and characters and environments.
However, we also believe that at this point in time Nintendo Switch also offers a very compelling and unique gameplay experience. It’s a very unique platform in that you can play it at home on your TV, and instantaneously pull it out of the dock and go to a portable mode, whether that’s a tabletop mode or a handheld mode, and continue playing that game seamlessly wherever you go.
Would you like to see Nintendo embrace streaming services in the future? What are your thoughts in general about streaming video games to play them? Tell us below.