The Quarry and High on Life started as ‘signature Google Stadia releases’, claims report

It’s come to light The Quarry and High on Life may have started life as potential exclusives for Google Stadia.

According to an Axios report, both Supermassive’s The Quarry & Squanch Games’ High on Life were set for the streaming service. According to them, both games were at one point said to be ‘signature’ titles for Google’s cloud gaming console. This seems to imply they would’ve been heavily promoted, if not timed exclusives, to encourage people to sign up for the service.

However, plans seemingly changed when Google made the decision to cut back on exclusive Stadia games in February 2021. This resulted in the company shuttering its own internal studios and a number of high profile departures. Perhaps the most notable being Jade Raymond, who would go on to found Haven as the newest PlayStation Studio.

It seems both The Quarry and High on Life were orphaned around the same time. However, as we now know they ended up with happier endings as The Quarry released through Take Two’s 2K label just a couple of weeks ago. High on Life meanwhile debuted at the recent Xbox Games Showcase and will launch on Xbox & PC later this year.

It’s worth noting that representatives for both games and Google have declined to comment on the report directly. Google Stadia did announce on its blog that it was working with Supermassive in July of 2020 which lends the report a lot of credence for The Quarry, at least. However, Take Two would only say Supermassive “was looking for a publishing partner as the project came to completion”.

Regardless, it’s interesting to think what could’ve been, had The Quarry or High on Life been Google Stadia exclusives. Josh reviewed The Quarry this weekend, and you can check out his thoughts here.