It seems that the Stadia conundrum on iOS continues. Although Stadia has an official app on the App Store, you can’t use it to play actual games without downloading them first. Google’s true game streaming service was first brought to iOS devices via a third-party app – the Stadium browser. It was then taken down by Apple for violating certain guidelines and then brought back again after the developer fixed the issue.
Now there’s another development to the saga. Google announced that it plans on developing a web app that will allow iOS users to play Stadia games on their phones and tablets without the need to download them. The company will initiate “public iOS testing” in the following weeks and it will use a web app in order to bypass Apple’s guidelines stating that:
“Games offered in a streaming game service subscription must be downloaded directly from the App Store, must be designed to avoid duplicate payment by a subscriber, and should not disadvantage non-subscriber customers.”
Even though the Stadium browser is technically available on the App Store and it can run games with the native Stadia controller hooked up, it’d be nice to have something official from Google regarding iOS users. We have to wait and see how Apple will react to all this.
