Major kudos to good friend of Stadia Dosage, @_PapaBearGaming, who discovered that the Stadia Controller is beginning to get enhanced functionality when paired with the Chromecast with Google TV (CCwGTV). Keep in mind that this could be a slow rollout. However, this is something we’ve definitely been expecting to see based on our recent APK findings in Android TV versions of the Stadia app. In those recent APK releases, we saw the introduction of a new “native” flutter shared object file (libflutter_android_gamepad_lib_flutter_artifacts.so) and a bunch of strings like:
- FromControllerServiceToUi.ListenResponse
- FromControllerServiceToUi_OnDisconnectNotification
- FromControllerServiceToUi.ServiceStartingUpNotification
- discoveryControllerUuid
- FromUiToControllerService_RedirectConnectionToUiRequest
- FromControllerServiceToUi_RedirectConnectionToUiResponse
- FromControllerServiceToUi_GetActiveConnectionsResponse
- And more…
We had expected the “ControllerService” would add deeper integration between the Stadia Controller and AndroidTV. That appears to now be in flight.
Stadia Controller Now Auto-Launches the Stadia App
What @_PapaBearGaming discovered today is that now when he powers on a controller that was previously paired to a CCwGTV, the Stadia app is automatically started on the Android TV device.
As stated, this is similar to how things work on the Chromecast Ultra, and points to a deeper level of integration between the Stadia controller, the Stadia app and Android TV. It will be interesting to see if the new ControllerService discovered in the APK has any other tricks up its sleeve. You can find all our APK discoveries here.
We want to close this article out by noting that @_PapaBearGaming also has a fantastic YouTube channel with which we will be partnering for an upcoming giveaway! As soon as the channel passes 200 subscribers, he’ll be giving away devices and games!
Update! @_PapaBearGaming also discovered that the Stadia button will also wake the CCwGTV up from sleep and turn on your TV! Check out his video:
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So cool!