Google recently acquired Green Throttle Games, a company that builds game controllers. Image: Green Throttle Games
It looks like Amazon and Google are building game consoles.
That may seem like an odd thing. Amazon and Google are companies that typically look to the future, and in many ways, game consoles are things of the past — devices that still rely on expensive, shrink-wrapped boxes of software. But judging from a slew of reports over the past several days, the two web giants are looking to put a new spin on this very old idea. They are poised to open up gaming, offering standardized gaming platforms with low barriers to entry, a move that could increase consumer choice, empower indie game developers, and drive down prices.
Amazon and Google see gaming as part and parcel of much larger efforts to get their online services onto our living rooms televisions — including services that send music and TV shows and movies over the net — and in that they are up against some stiff competition. Microsoft has already established a dominant position in the living room: the Xbox One console. Now, Amazon and Google are looking for a way of leap-frogging their big rival. Internet television is one of the next big frontiers for the giants of the web, and games can help provide a path into that frontier.
According to TechCrunch and The Wall Street Journal, Amazon is poised to release a small device that could stream games as well as music and video across the net to your television, and a Brazilian regulator filing has apparently revealed a picture of the device’s wireless game controller. Meanwhile, Google has acquired a gaming controller company called Green Throttle Games, fueling speculation that it will adds games to its ongoing efforts to take hold of the living room. The company already offers a small device called Chromecast that plays content from the web, but games would be new.
Details are still scarce, but it appears that Amazon and Google are departing from the old-school game console idea in two ways. One, their devices are much smaller. Apparently, like Google’s Chromecast, Amazon’s device is something the size of a USB stick. And, two, they’re looking to stream games over the internet rather than asking you to purchase game titles on physical disks. In this way, they’re following in the footsteps of the Steam Machine, a new device from a company called Valve.
Like Valve, Amazon and Google could open televisions to a much wider array of games. Traditionally, if you’re a game developer, getting a title onto a TV platform involves some serious money and, in some cases, creative concessions to console vendors like Microsoft and Sony. Indie developers find that life is tough in the console world, which is dominated by huge game studios. But this could change with the new breed of consoles.
Both Amazon and Google’s rumored consoles are built on the open-source Android operating system. It’s trivial for any game developer to open an account in the Amazon and Google online stores. This type of relatively open setup has already led to an explosion in game development on Android and its rival iOS. Similarly, the open architecture of Intel-based personal computers, which Amazon is said to be embracing, has enabled an inspiring surge in quality indie games on Valve’s Steam platform.
“I definitely welcome more platforms and competition and people trying crazy stuff. I think that’s all very healthy and usually helps continue the trend of better ecosystems for developers,” says indie game maker Chris Hecker. “As a developer, I kind of just assume that if I make an awesome game, when it’s ready there will be places for me to sell it and for players to buy it.”
But the bigger point here for Amazon and Google is that games are just one part of the equation. The companies want to secure a larger hold on our televisions. The Microsoft Xbox One and the Sony PlayStation 4 gaming consoles are two of the chief ways that people get the Netflix TV and movie streaming service onto their TVs, and now Amazon and Google are eying similar ways of delivering their own music and TV and movie services. The gaming console isn’t the past. It’s the future.
