Is Google betting big on gaming?

Surbhi Chawla, May 03, 2013
Google is not really associated with nurturing gaming ambitions of any kind but that may be about to change.

TechCrunch is reporting that the company has hired gaming veteran Noah Falstein as the Chief Game Designer. The website is reporting Falstein has updated his LinkedIn profile to indicate his new designation as "Chief Game Designer" at Google and has also mentioned that he joined the company in April 2013. Furthermore, in an earlier cached version of his profile his position was listed as "Chief Game Designer at Android Play Studio."

For those who are unaware about Falstein's breath of work, he has been associated with the gaming industry since 1980. He was initially working with LucasArts Entertainment and during the course of his career has worked on gaming titles such as Sinistar, Battlehawks 1942, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure, and Hungry Red Planet.

Falstein entry in Google's corridors is a clear indication that search engine giant is cooking something big on the gaming front. Though it is a bit premature to guess what Google has up its sleeves but one cannot rule out the possibility of augmented-reality game in conjunction with Google Glass.

The search engine giant has recently issue schedule for its forthcoming Google I/O conference, to be held later this month. From this schedule to it appears that this year Google will be focusing heavily on 'gaming on Android'. So we might see some pieces of the puzzles being revealed at the conference.

Earlier, there had been news reports about Google working on its own socially driven multiplayer gaming network. Android Police in its teardown of My Glass, had discovered an alleged feature list related to a service that could become Google's answer to Apple's Game Centre.

So far the details regarding this forthcoming gaming portal for Android seem to be sketchy but it does help cement the fact Google is ready to take a big plunge into the gaming world.