The latest Stadia app is hiding a ton of new features we’ve all been waiting for

Thanks to a comprehensive app teardown by the guys over at 9to5 Google, the latest version of the Stadia app has been laid bare and the stuff found on the inside hints at an avalanche of upcoming features. Some of these things we’ve been waiting for and some of them we didn’t even know were coming. Either way, all of these features sound great and we can’t wait for each one to become part of the overall Stadia experience. Let’s break it down.

Stadia Base and Pro trials

Right now, we still don’t have a way to really try Stadia apart form blindly signing up or getting a buddy pass from someone you know. According to a few text strings found in the current Stadia app, however, it looks like Stadia Base is just around the corner.

Text on the button that allows the user to skip code redemption and continue on with the account creation flow.

Continue without a code

Without need for a code of some sort, it looks like users will soon be able to get started with Stadia right out of the box and leverage the free, Base version, too. But that isn’t the end of the new user flow if the next snippets are anything to go by. It looks like new users will also be offered a free month of Stadia Pro to start out their new gaming experience, and this only makes sense.

Title text on the Pro details page introducing the free trial.

Play for free

Button text for the Pro details page that allows you to start the free Pro trial.

Start playing

With a

1 month

Stadia Pro free trial

This feels like the right move for Stadia. It will give users the option to play for free with a quick, 30-day trial of the Pro version for absolutely nothing down. I’d bet many players will see the value of the Pro level over time and may perhaps stick around. It’s a great strategy to pull in a few more Pro players as Base rolls out.

Pro Passes

In addition to Founders Edition, Premier Edition and Buddy Passes, it looks like an additional way to get Pro playing time on Stadia is coming via Pro Passes. This only makes sense as it will allow for the eventual sale of Pro subscriptions via gift cards both virtual and physical. After all, you’re not always going to want to buy an entire package for someone to play Stadia with.

Body of the page that allows the user to optionally redeem a code and proceed with account creation.

For Founder’s Edition, Premiere Edition, Buddy Pass, and Pro Pass players only.

YouTube Streaming

Part of what made the announcement of Stadia so amazing was the promise of seamless, simple streaming to YouTube. With so many hours of gaming being watched on YouTube every day, it only makes sense that Stadia would be the absolute best option for game streamers across the board. When it launched without this on board, it was a bit of a letdown. It looks like YouTube streaming is on the way, however, as shown in the following strings:

Label for the button that starts livestreaming the game session

Start live stream

Title for the menu that contains options for live-streaming

Live stream options

Notification message shown when live streaming of a game stops

Livestream ended

Notification message shown when live streaming of a game starts

You’re live streaming

It also appears you will have some additional controls over your stream like naming, YouTube visibility, and whether or not to show or hide your current viewer count.

Label for the field displaying the title of the live-stream

Label for a toggle that controls whether the number of live-stream viewers is displayed on-screen during play.

See viewer count while playing

Label for a dropdown controlling the visibility status of a YouTube live-stream (private, unlisted or public)

Privacy

Family Sharing

Another feature that has been eagerly anticipated is family sharing. We fully expect for those in your Google account family to be able to share games with on another, but the following strings clarify that while this is on the way, games can only be played by one family member at a time. For simultaneous play, you’ll need to purchase an additional copy.

Title of a dialog displayed to a user trying to launch a game when the selected game is unplayable (launch is blocked) due to another family member(s) playing the shared title.

Game in use by family

Message displayed in the dialog which appears when a game the user is trying to launch is unplayable (launch is blocked) due to another family member(s) playing the shared title.

Family sharing lets only one of you play this game at a time. Try a different game.

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Base Player Limits

Finally, it seems Google will be setting limits on how many Base players can sign up in any given region. This is likely to keep servers running at full steam and to avoid degradation of play for the paying Pro user base. While it isn’t clear what constitutes a region, know that it won’t be a free-for-all when Google does open the doors for Stadia Base.

Title of page explaining that user cannot sign in because Stadia has hit full capacity.

Sorry, Stadia is full in your area

Body of page explaining that user cannot sign in because Stadia has hit full capacity.

In order to provide the best game quality for everyone, we limit the number of accounts on Stadia. We’ve hit that limit, but we’re working hard to build additional room in the Stadia cloud so more people can enjoy the same high-quality game performance. Please check back in the future for new player availability.

We expect to see many of these new features go into play over the course of the next few weeks, so keep an eye out as they do. We’ll report on each as we see them go live and will likely get some video content out as well showing off how these new Stadia abilities play out in real world use.