Antstream Arcade the retro gaming cloud gaming service has added a mixed bag of news over the last few months with new games being added, old games being removed and a March Connect which gave us some news on future plans, so let’s go over why I am cautiously optimistic about the future of Antstream Arcade.
New Features
The first thing I want to address is the new features that are helpful and in some cases awesome for all Antstream players. Antstream Arcade plans to roll out a brand-new UI for its cloud gaming platform in 2024, when exactly this UI be out? We don’t know, but I assume it will be around the year’s second half. The second major feature that Antstream has confirmed is actually the launch of Free Tournaments which allows players who don’t have the money to pay for Antstream (although its £4 monthly sub is extremely attractive to me) Free Tournaments allow players the opportunity to win a year’s subscription to Antstream Arcade.
Antstream’s Game Library Needs Some Addressing
Right this next point is going to be the long point but here me out. So far this year we have seen a total of over 100 games leave Antstream, by comparison, we have gained less than 30 games which has put Antstream in a bit of a predicament, Now Antstream has addressed this by doing a March Connect to announce some new games for the platform coming over the next few months, however, the downside of the Connect was only two publishers were shown, and they were Piko Interactive and Tatsujin (who owns the library of Toaplan).
Notable publishers like Namco, Tatio, and Atari did not appear at the Antstream Connect which is a little disappointing to me, especially since we recently saw games by Interplay Entertainment removed from Antstream Arcade. Now games get added and removed from these cloud gaming platforms all the time but if you can’t announce games to help keep the hype around the service then people will lose interest.
My Take
I’m going to try to be as positive as possible here so let me explain. The first thing I think Antstream needs to do is tease more developers/publishers who will be coming to Antstream later this year. Hundreds of gaming companies out there who could provide their game libraries to Antstream Arcade. I also think Antstream needs to be prepared to roll out its new UI sooner rather than later. One thing I do want to note is the recent addition of Indiana Jones and The Fate Of Atlantis which is a LucasArts game and is owned by Disney. This shows that games can leave and then be added back whenever Antstream can work out a contract.
Antstream Arcade is my favorite cloud gaming service. It is extremely helpful when I get the itch to play some classic retro games that I don’t own on platforms like Evercade or that I can’t find on digital stores like Steam. This is why I am cautiously optimistic about Antstream’s future, for every negative there is always a positive.
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