Netflix Reportedly Bringing Gaming To Its Streaming Service 'Within The Next Year'

I said this in the article back in May that Netflix is definitely going to give Microsoft a run for its money if it's going to offer a service where you can watch movies/TV shows AND play video games for the same price. Looks like this will be the case. I'm very interested to see how things will turn out next year.

Not quite sure how they plan to approach this.
They obviously have no dev studios, so they have no chance of competing with Game Pass.
Relying on 3rd party devs as the only source of games is VERY costly, especially if they don't plan to increase the sub price of offer another tier...

I hope they make a sweet black and red controller that connects directly to their servers. Design lab turned me into a controller head, lol. I even have a Wasabi Stadia controller on my shelf...

This will end in nothing but failure. As a couple people have already mentioned, they have no studios. They’d have to buy content to put on their streaming service and for no increase in their monthly rate they won’t make any money. EA and Ubisoft aren’t doing great with it and they actually have some games.

Netflix will probably go the indie/mobilephonegame route with this service. I cant see this as direct competition to GPU because Netflix subs who also game got their consoles and pc. Netflix subs who dont game is who might find this interesting but only if the games arent too complex.

@thenewguy I thought the exact same thing, okay not word for word, that would make me a mind reader, but yes, I share your view dear sir

Begun, the streaming wars have.

Netflix will see lower than predicted/desired uptake and will abandon game streaming within a few years, guaranteed.

@thenewguy I agree with you, although I wouldn't use the same terms. I think Netflix Gaming will most likely be aimed towards a casual audience where the games will consist of "interactive experiences". They've already done this before, I remember you could play e.g. Minecraft Story Mode on Netflix for a while. So I think that's the type of games they will have on offer. Telltale's Walking Dead, Batman, Minecraft, and Dontnod's Life is Strange just to name a few examples. These "interactive experiences" will probably dominate the gaming part of the service, which is a good thing because the casual audience isn't into console gaming but would most likely love to play games like these if they're easily accessible. I think it'd be good for everyone if Netflix could bring games like these to a much larger audience.

@Xenomorph_79 likely planning on offering smaller and older titles, the kind of stuff you also see on Luna for the base price without paying for the UBisoft premium pass.

Like they said, their goal, at least initially, is to add some value to the service.

Doubt they will be starting making their own games, but even if they did, canceling shows is not unlike never developing a sequel to a game due to lower than necessary sales or engagement.

Really doubt this will help them much, I mean, chances are they won’t be able to offer this in consoles, this won’t work on settup boxes that can’t sync in a Bluetooth controller, and Apple is extremely likely to allow this on their stores.

This basically leaves this as a PC and browser only (on mobile) experience. Maybe Android?

So a streaming service that will include TV shows, anime, movies and now video games? If they get the price right then this could become "the" streaming service to have

Also since they aren't in direct competition with Sony as they don't have studios to make their own games or have gaming hardware/software for sale, Sony could include some of its titles on Netflix, there would be way more people subscribed than playstation now.

Surely this will end up the same as game pass but probably without MS owned games. So those games currently on GP will probably be contracted to Netflix as well. It will likely have a knock on effect of making any games GP rent more expensive if they want exclusivity.
On another knock on effect MS will probably then Buy as many studios as they can to block Netflix from offering a competitive alternative.

Alot of variables to consider. If Xbox and Netflix work a deal out to get gamepass on there, that would be spectacular. Watch an episode of the Witcher and them get some matches in halo infinite. It will be too costly feeling with 3rd parties. Are they willing to spend to invest in 1st party teams? Would they try to buy up playstation? Let's see how this plays out.

@LtSarge What if they use their existing studios and production pipelines and just hire some game devs? Unreal Engine already has some applications in movie production.

Trojan horse for an eventual price increase in due time.

@SplooshDmg my thoughts exactly. It would be very expensive for Netflix to make something that could compete with Xbox Game Pass. At the very least, they would have to make a major purchase rivalling what Microsoft payed for Bethesda. Even Google doesn't look very keen to shell out that kind of money for 1st party studios at the moment.

I believe Netflix is eyeing the mobile game market. Stuff you can play on your cell phone through Netflix's app.

@SplooshDmg I agree with you. Videogames company don't merely have customers, they have fans. There is passion for the big 3 brands. You can't build that overnight, it takes a long time and a major investment to make hit games that will create that fanbase.