Is it too early to start a funeral procession for Stadia?
What you need to know
- Stadia’s general manager and head of creatives services have left the company.
- They have joined Jade Raymond’s Haven Studios, working on a PlayStation exclusive game.
- This news comes shortly after Google confirmed Stadia VP John Justice was no longer with the company.
Stadia has had a rough few months as even more talent leaves the studio. Following Jade Raymond and VP John Justice, General Manager Sebastien Puel and Creative Services and Publishing Head Corey May have also departed the floundering service (via Game Informer). Puel and May have apparently joined Raymond at her newfound venture, Montreal-based studio Haven, which is working on a PlayStation exclusive game.
Puel and May aren’t the only Stadia talent to join Raymond’s team, however. Cyberia on ResetEra discovered that several other employees had left Google for Haven as well, including Jonathan Dankoff, Erwann Le Rouzic, Francis Denoncourt, and Pierre-Marc Bérubé. Each of their LinkedIn profiles has been updated to reflect their new jobs.
In March, Raymond announced that she had founded an independent studio called Haven and revealed that it was working with PlayStation on a new IP. It’s unclear what the game will look like, but it will likely be built for the PS5. If you’ve managed to buy a PS5, you have some mysterious projects to look forward to.
Raymond and May have worked together previously at Ubisoft. They were integral members of the Assassin’s Creed team, producing and writing what would become one of the most successful gaming franchises in history.
It’s unclear what this means for Google Stadia going forward, but things are certainly looking grim, especially following the closure of its internal games studio. The service’s biggest announcement recently was that it had finally added a search bar — Yes, a product under Google didn’t have a search bar for over a year.
