Amazon's next service will be a direct competitor to Google Stadia and Microsoft Project X Cloud. The retail giant is pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into an upcoming cloud gaming platform called Project Tempo. The goal? Go from zero to a leader in gaming.
We don't know much about the service except sources speaking to The New York Times said Amazon wanted to introduce it this year but plans could slip into 2021 due to delays caused by the coronavirus.
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“The big picture is about trying to take the best of Amazon and bringing it to games,” Mike Frazzini, Amazon’s vice president for game services and studios, told the NY Times. “We have been working for a while, but it takes a long time to make games, and we’re bringing a lot of Amazon practices to making games.”
Amazon will first make a splash onto the gaming scene with an upcoming sci-fi shooter called Crucible. Originally meant for release in late March, Crucible will now be released in May (pending further delays) under Amazon's Relentless game studio.
The ball will keep rolling with a second game called New World, a massive online multiplayer (MMO) set in a fantasy world based on an alternate 17th century. Amazon will harness its AWS servers to offload certain processes so your PC hardware can focus on the important things. New World is in development by a separate studio that was formed after Amazon acquired Double Helix Games.
The same group is currently working on an MMO based on the Lord of the Rings franchise.
Amazon has already proven its ability to disrupt established industries. Prime Video is a compelling alternative to streaming services like Netflix and Hulu, while Prime Music packages features offered by Apple Music and Spotify into a Prime membership. The company has even found success selling hardware with its e-readers and Fire tablets.
The blossoming video game industry presents a huge prize for whichever company can compel gamers onto their platform -- but it's a competitive space entering a new phase with the impending launch of the Xbox Series X and PS5.
