As of the time of writing, Google's Stadia game streaming service is now officially dead. Whether you loved it or not, you can now repurpose any Stadia controller as a standard Bluetooth controller.
The Stadia gamepad connected directly to the cloud service rather than to your device, but it had a fallback Bluetooth mode that laid dormant. Google will now let you unlock that Bluetooth mode for free to give that controller a second lease at life. You can use the Bluetooth mode with locally-downloaded games on your PC and with other game streaming services.
If you want to enable Bluetooth mode, just go to Google's online tool. Make sure your Stadia controller has at least 10% battery, then connect your controller to your browser and follow the on-screen instructions. You have until December 31st, 2023 to do this --- if you haven't made the switch before 2024 rolls around, the controller will end up becoming a paperweight forever.
The Stadia controller wasn't half bad in its day, and we're glad to see Google isn't letting it go to waste -- for the units that undergo the switch, anyway.
Source: Google Stadia