Despite mostly positive reviews that pitched GeForce NOW as a potential rival to Google’s Stadia, NVIDIA’s new cloud gaming service is now facing a major problem. Following Activision’s decision to pull their games from the service last week, Bethesda has now followed suit. The catalog of Bethesda games which was available during the service’s trial are being pulled.
Bethesda Games Will no Longer be on GeForce NOW
In a statement released earlier today, NVIDIA announced that support for all Bethesda Games will be removed from GeForce NOW today, with the sole exception of Wolfenstein: Youngblood. Unfortunately, this includes all games published by Bethesda Softworks, which includes series like Doom and Prey, in addition to Elder Scrolls and Fallout titles. Sadly, this means if you want to perfect your Skyrim alchemy recipes or explore the Commonwealth, you’ll have to do so on another platform. Neither NVIDIA nor Bethesda has released a reason for why Bethesda is pulling support from GeForce NOW.
The news comes barely a week after Activision Blizzard announced that they would be pulling their own games from GeForce NOW. Like Bethesda, many Activision Blizzard titles were available through the service during its trial period. In this case, it seems that the reason for the split was down to a licensing dispute; NVIDIA reportedly secured access to the Activision Blizzard library while GeForce NOW was in its beta stage. However, once the service became publicly available NVIDIA began charging a subscription, making it a commercial product, and this seems to be the root of the licensing disagreement.
Activision also reportedly had objections to how GeForce NOW allows gamers to play games which they own on other platforms, such as Steam, through the service. This approach, which GeForce NOW’s competitor Stadia does not permit, was considered much more consumer-friendly. However, it seems that some publishers like Activision may want to ensure that gamers have to actually buy their games on the service. It seems likely that Bethesda may have pulled their games from the service for similar reasons. NVIDIA addressed this, somewhat optimistically, in a recent blog post, where they wrote; “Some publishers may choose to remove games before the trial period ends. Ultimately, they maintain control over their content and decide whether the game you purchase includes streaming on GeForce NOW. Meanwhile, others will bring games back as they continue to realize GeForce NOW’s value.”
