Nvidia Gamestream is a service that, when used with the right hardware, can stream games in 4K from a high-performance PC to your living room TV; the service, which launched in 2013, works with a device called the Nvidia Shield TV.

It was too good and too pure for this world; Nvidia announced (open in new tab) that as far as the company is concerned, GameStream has reached the end of its life and that "in mid-February, a planned update to the Nvidia Games app will roll out to Shield owners in to Shield owners in mid-February. With this update, GameStream functionality will no longer be available in the app."

Nvidia adds that Shield owners will be able to stream games to their TVs using Steam Link in the future, and the GeForce Now service will allow cloud streaming to Shield TV (which is not the same thing).

Since GameStream is one of the core features of the Shield hardware, this is a big deal for those who use their Shield TV like a cold cup. It's one thing to announce the end of support for live services, but not this; I fully believe it was a major selling point for many who purchased Shield.

"WTF Nvidia?" wrote a Shield user on the NVIDIA subreddit (opens in new tab).

"This is my primary game mode on my Shield and 3080. To say I am disappointed is an understatement as this was the main reason I owned both Shield and Nvidia cards.

Some responded, "Why would anyone actually buy a Shield TV if not for the features that are being removed?" This is quite annoying. It's the only reason I bought the bloody thing." "I have a feeling they can't remove the feature and will just stop supporting it in the future." "Because it is one of the things they use to advertise it."

Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be the case. In fact, Nvidia's announcement seems to be trying to preempt this by suggesting an available alternative. However, there is no denying that GameStream was a selling point for Shield, and some people may have purchased it in the hope that it would "work" for as long as they needed it to.

What about avoiding the February update? The "Gamestream may continue to function temporarily, but it will no longer be supported and will eventually cease to function; all other services supported by Nvidia Games, including GeForce NOW, will require an app update in order to continue to work.

So: GameStream will be removed, and if you try to continue using Shield as is, it will not work, interfering with other features until you update to a post-GameStream future.

It is hard not to sympathize with the reaction of customers to this. For some, GameStream was important in their choice of GPU, as these services require participation in the broader Nvidia ecosystem, not to mention the impact on other popular services such as Moonlight (opens in new tab) that require GameStream. Not to mention the impact.

We have asked Nvidia for further comment and will update if we hear back.