Google Stadia’s latest free game only has a few thousand total players

Enlarge / Only a few thousand people are seeing free scenes like this streamed via their Stadia Pro subscriptions, according to leaderboard data. (credit: Drool)

The Google Stadia version of Thumper, which is being offered for free to all paid Stadia Pro subscribers, has only seen a few thousand players, based on leaderboard data reviewed by Ars Technica. The numbers suggest significant struggles as the new streaming gaming service from Google, launched in November, tries to attract players away from traditional gaming platforms.

Thumper, along with Rise of the Tomb Raider, was a free Stadia Pro title for the month of January, meaning everyone who paid $129 for the service's "Founder's Edition" and "Premiere Edition" bundles has access to it (those bundles, which are the only current way to access Stadia, include three months of Stadia Pro service). As of this morning, though, only 5,515 people have registered a score on the leaderboards for the first stage of the Stadia version of the game, which separates such leaderboards by platform. That number was at 4,563 on January 15, when Ars conducted a spot check.

That doesn't mean that Stadia Pro only has 5,515 users, of course. For one thing, not everyone who has played the game has finished the first stage (which takes about 10 minutes to complete, depending on personal performance). Trophy data for the Xbox One and PS4 versions of the game, though, suggests that almost 70 percent of all Thumper players do manage to pass this low bar, which would translate to about 8,000 total players so far for the Stadia version.

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