And yeah, even though there aren't any concrete plans to bring the service to Australia - we're still curious to see how Google Stadia performs in the U.S. and Europe. As a streaming service Google Stadia offers a platform for players to purchase games individually and then play them over a network. With minimal or imperceptible latency. That's the plan.

But, in execution - at launch at least - Google Stadia isn't quite ready for prime time. Most of the line-up comprises of titles you can find a lot cheaper elsewhere and the non-subscription based approach make it feel a little weird compared to services like Xbox Game Pass, Apple Arcade, and even Project xCloud.

Engadget writes.

The first Stadia game I booted up was Destiny 2 on the Chromecast Ultra. The title screen loaded quickly and I created a new character; the process felt so smooth and familiar that I forgot I was playing a AAA, online game on a streaming puck the size of a Thin Mint.

But then, I started shooting. The lag was immediate.

Before adding.

Destiny 2 continued to stutter and suffer from input lag every now and then -- especially when people in my neighborhood began coming home -- but it wasn't pervasive enough to destroy the fun of Destiny 2. The same goes for Mortal Kombat 11 on the phone and Gylt on the laptop. In my time with each title, resolution dipped every now and then, and some button presses would trail behind the on-screen action, but overall, they performed like console-quality video games.

And this is in a country with internet that would make Australia's infrastructure blush. According to Digital Foundry though, there are notable shortcomings.

There's the sense that the platform isn't really complete. The integrated Google Assistant support isn't live at the time of writing (though basic functions may be active on day one), the UI is very basic, and there's a strange reliance on the Stadia mobile app for basic functionality - like buying games, or adjusting stream quality. Other essential features like family sharing aren't active either. Google itself is pitching this as an evolving platform, with the Premiere Edition aimed at elite users looking for a great big screen experience. You can't avoid the sense that the current set-up is far from the finished article though - xCloud is effectively the full Xbox environment in the palm of your hand.

PC Gamer shared similar concerns related to maintaining a stable connection and lag.

Stadia is a great innovation, nearly free from the hardware needs that bind our gaming PCs to our bedrooms and far more portable than a PS4. But since it relies heavily on the internet to deliver a good experience, it's only as good as the internet in your home, and when it doesn't work perfectly, figuring out why can take even more technical savvy than building the best gaming PC.

Before confirming exactly why it might be a while before Stadia reaches our shores.

In my tests, playing each game for about 30 minutes (a total of 2.5 hours of game time) at 4K consumed around 40GB of data, with Mortal Kombat using up the most data in its story mode. Every game is going to take up a different amount of data based on the bitrate needed to maintain a quality video signal. The more the images on screen change, the more data used. Based on our live data usage, the highest spikes represented the most activity happening on screen; Mortal Kombat topped out at around 6 MB/s, while Kine maxed out at around 8 MB/s, surprisingly.

Of course, that data drops down significantly when you lower the resolution, but if you play Stadia at 4K for 2.5 hours every day for 30 days, you’ll use about 1.2TB of data.

For a high profile streaming service we should expect teething issues, and hopefully these can be improved in the coming months. That said, there's still an air of Beta-ness about the Stadia launch. The service's highly touted features like being able to jump into a game directly from YouTube or share or stream instantly are still in the works, with the current UI described as functional at best.