Just two weeks after the death of Stadia, Google revealed a new range of Gaming Chromebooks designed for Cloud Gaming.
Three so-called gaming Chromebooks from Acer, Asus, and Lenovo were unveiled by Google today, boasting their impressive specifications for laptops, including refresh rates of up to 144 Hz. And according to Google, the hardware is ready to stream games from the Xbox Cloud Gaming beta, Amazon Luna, and Nvidia GeForce Now.
It’s no secret that Google has been working for quite some time on new ways to bring the gaming experience to ChromeOS with their recent project, including NVIDIA GeForce Now and Amazon Luna, which no doubt opened the door for Google to expand this new project along. As well as partnering with peripheral manufacturers like Acer, Corsair, HyperX, Lenovo.
Lenovo’s Acer Chromebook 516 GE, Asus Chromebook Vibe CX55 Flip, and Ideapad Gaming Chromebook laptops unveiled today stand out with higher-end specifications than the typical, more affordable Chromebooks, including higher-resolution screens that support gamer-level refresh rates and stronger CPUs. In a move to make the new laptops more reasonably priced, Google has marked the cost from $399 to $799.
They will supposedly have capabilities geared to provide the best online gaming experience as well as some notable shared features:
- 120Hz or faster refresh rate screen
- Wi-Fi 6/6E support
- Anti-ghosting keyboard
According to Google, the new laptop series will now support three popular cloud gaming services: Xbox Cloud Gaming (Beta), NVIDIA GeForce NOW, and Amazon Luna2, which Google stated will enable users to play entire PC and console games directly from the cloud.
Additionally, they collaborated with NVIDIA to provide GeForce NOW’s RTX 3080 tier on Chromebooks for cloud gaming. Users may be able to broadcast games like Fortnite, Cyberpunk 2077, and Crysis 3 Remastered, which feature resolutions of up to 1600p and frame rates of 120.
In order to guarantee a fluid experience with 120 frames per second and input latency that is less than 85ms for consoles, they have also been independently tested by the game performance measurement platform GameBench.
In essence, Google wants to provide a reasonably priced Chromebook without the hassle of managing drivers, OS upgrades, or game installation, one of the more obtuse ways that a Chromebook differs from a laptop. “I’m sure many of you hear this: I want a gaming computer, but it’s a lot of time and money,” said John Maletis, vice president of product management for Google’s Chrome OS.
“It’s going to feel like you’re playing on a local device,” Maletis added.
As a Chromebook user, I’m excited about the possibility of having a portable gaming laptop for when with friends and travelling, and hope Google will continue improving on what Chromebooks can offer.
