Do we know how much the Valve Steam Machine will retail for at MSRP? I've seen grumblings of $500, but I don't know if that's fact or rumor. Too high to be competitive, but I'm still not sure if that's the point.
The Steam OS and PC gaming in the living room just doesn't grab me. I dunno, it doesn't make sense to me. I want to play PC games at my desk, with proper mouse and keyboard and everything sitting ergonomically correct. I find myself basically unable to sit on my couch and enjoy a console game these days, even with a bigass HDTV and nice setup all around. I doubt having PC games in that same environment would make me like it any more.
There are a handful of games I have on steam that I think would be better with a controller and -maybe- a living room setup. Games like Driver: San Francisco come to mind. But that's also console port, so I dunno.
Yeah I was actually thinking of my sad console backlog and I realized the other night that if I had my console hooked up to my monitors and could play at my desk, I'd play a LOT more console games. I should do that.
Steam Machines will retail at whatever price you can imagine. They're OEM systems that run Linux. Any manufacturer could make one and submit it to get the fancy name. You could build one yourself.
I have a gaming PC in my living room and find that gaming is super comfortable with a large lapdesk, full-size keyboard and mouse, and half-reclined in the recliner. I have a full home theater system with a 86" projector screen and 1080p projector.
This reminds me of when watch nerds tear down what we're doing at Shinola. They're all "THIS IS STUPID AND WHY WOULD ANYONE BUY THIS AND QUARTZ SUCKS AND ONLY IDIOTS WANT THESE AND IT WILL NEVER WORK AND THEY'LL BE OUT OF BUSINESS IN MONTHS AND THE NAME IS HORRIBLE"
And those people are not our customers, and in the meantime we're selling out all over the world and we cannot possibly make enough watches to meet demand right now.
We are aware there are just 300 units for beta testing? This isn't a finished product. They sent out a variety of hardware quick and dirty to test different scenarios.
I think one of the neat things about gaming on a mass market HDTV vs. a good PC monitor is the fact that they seem to scale 1280X720 in a more forgiving manor. A good PC monitor up close you can see every flaw you are basically forced to run the monitors native to get a good clean image, for many of us 1920X1080 or higher, but scale up 720P sitting across from a mass market HDTV on your couch, it looks pretty good. Building something on a reasonably efficient quad core and a single R7 270x you should be able to scale well enough on an HDTV to play every single modern game well. With hardware scanners adjusting game settings appropriately for users it should be pretty plug and play. Of course some kids will want to be cool and play in 4K, but for most of us, we should be able to build a decent Steam Box for around the cost of an Xbox One, utilize our library's and have it run fairly quiet and efficient in our living room.
Also, in regards to value props, one of the biggest value props for the steam box is the new controller. That thing is unlike anything we've ever gamed with, and it is wholly unique to the Steam Box. And a controller is important enough to move units (see also: Nintendo Wii). If marketed correctly, the controller alone could push units onto TV stands all over.
I'm just going to load SteamOS on my old Shuttle box, use the streaming feature to offload the heavy graphics processing to my gaming rig and, if that works well enough, just look into buying a controller to plug into it. Total out of pocket cost? Whatever the controller costs.
Pretty sure noone's shitting on the thread because of any delusions - they're likely doing it because this rant came out of left field. You're doing this hyperanalysis of hardware specs in giant paragraphs - we read 2 sentences and basically TL;DR it to "I'M MAD AS HELL AND HERE'S WHY" but the why is confusing or ...confusing.
Personally, I don't feel a steambox is for anyone that already has a gaming computer. We're set, all we need is an HDMI cord.
Since it's a discussion you want, however, a few trends I'm noticing... - There is clearly a fight going on for our living rooms, Valve seems to want a piece (bigscreen mode, steamboxen, controller to cater to consolers) and Microsoft/Apple/Roku/etc. are all gunning for it with various 'value adds' in their own ways - Form factors rarely change from a tech standpoint - at least they haven't much in ...what? ...like since PCIe was released? Vidjacards got longer, that's about it, so I don't agree with your PC hardware changes standpoint - Casual/independent gaming has exploded, no need for huge hardware to run that - Sony's jumped on board with their support of indie as well, so someone's taken notice outside of Valve - Nintendo's been using it as a jumpoff for years with the Wii
So, as I keep saying, like it or not Valve is not going to build or ship a 'console killer.' Deal with it. There is no financial incentive or reason for Valve to do it themselves and every reason not to. Will they ship the controller? Oh hell yes - that thing is a straight up money printer. Convince OEMs to ship Steamboxes? Almost definitely, since "gaming" hardware is almost entirely hype-over-substance and people are only cheerful to get suckered into it. Make Gaben a shitton of money in the process? Well duh, otherwise they wouldn't do it - like it or not, Valve is not some mythical Nirvana where making money is secondary to anything else. Valve is all about making money hand over fist - and losing money selling a small quantity of systems at very low margins is anathema to that.
I mean this in the nicest way possible: duh. That's the point of an OEM program.
Comments
Summary: amusing gif on the next post.
The Steam OS and PC gaming in the living room just doesn't grab me. I dunno, it doesn't make sense to me. I want to play PC games at my desk, with proper mouse and keyboard and everything sitting ergonomically correct. I find myself basically unable to sit on my couch and enjoy a console game these days, even with a bigass HDTV and nice setup all around. I doubt having PC games in that same environment would make me like it any more.
There are a handful of games I have on steam that I think would be better with a controller and -maybe- a living room setup. Games like Driver: San Francisco come to mind. But that's also console port, so I dunno.
We'd be better off just buying HDMI cables than building dedicated boxen.
someone post another amusing gif
And those people are not our customers, and in the meantime we're selling out all over the world and we cannot possibly make enough watches to meet demand right now.
I think one of the neat things about gaming on a mass market HDTV vs. a good PC monitor is the fact that they seem to scale 1280X720 in a more forgiving manor. A good PC monitor up close you can see every flaw you are basically forced to run the monitors native to get a good clean image, for many of us 1920X1080 or higher, but scale up 720P sitting across from a mass market HDTV on your couch, it looks pretty good. Building something on a reasonably efficient quad core and a single R7 270x you should be able to scale well enough on an HDTV to play every single modern game well. With hardware scanners adjusting game settings appropriately for users it should be pretty plug and play. Of course some kids will want to be cool and play in 4K, but for most of us, we should be able to build a decent Steam Box for around the cost of an Xbox One, utilize our library's and have it run fairly quiet and efficient in our living room.
Too many words, not enough flashy moving pictures to make comprehension more readily available to those of us who just don't give two shits.
Personally, I don't feel a steambox is for anyone that already has a gaming computer. We're set, all we need is an HDMI cord.
Since it's a discussion you want, however, a few trends I'm noticing...
- There is clearly a fight going on for our living rooms, Valve seems to want a piece (bigscreen mode, steamboxen, controller to cater to consolers) and Microsoft/Apple/Roku/etc. are all gunning for it with various 'value adds' in their own ways
- Form factors rarely change from a tech standpoint - at least they haven't much in ...what? ...like since PCIe was released? Vidjacards got longer, that's about it, so I don't agree with your PC hardware changes standpoint
- Casual/independent gaming has exploded, no need for huge hardware to run that - Sony's jumped on board with their support of indie as well, so someone's taken notice outside of Valve - Nintendo's been using it as a jumpoff for years with the Wii