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Valve is about to win the console generation

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Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#151

Post by echelon »

AceJohnny2 wrote: post #71

I don't really understand the early enthusiasm about the Steam Machine, and I happily own a Steam Deck. "It's on par with a PS5!" You mean the thing that was launched over 5 years ago (exactly!) ? We don't know its price yet, which is the most crucial detail.

I don't play games much anymore, so maybe I'm not the right person to respond.

Why would anyone ever buy a console again? This thing has the ultimate library and works on all platforms.

Steam seems to have played the best game of chess in the industry. Sony and Microsoft were battling over exclusives and acquisitions and ways to screw over customers. This came out of left field and looks a million times better than Xbox or PS5. It has people's entire libraries on it, and the games are cheap and portable. There's no lock down. No funny business.

I almost want one. I'm excited about it and I don't even think I'd play it.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#152

Post by [deleted] »

sedatk wrote: post #33
SchemaLoad wrote: post #21

I think the hardest battle is going to be with anti cheat. The anti cheat that developers want basically requires dystopian levels of restrictions which are against everything valve has done on SteamOS so far. Personally I'd love if we all just went back to playing on personal servers with your real life friends or people you otherwise trust. But I don't think this is would go over well with the average online gamer.

If anti-virus software can function in user mode, anti-cheat software can too. https://www.theverge.com/news/692637/microsoft-windows-kerne...

[deleted]

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#153

Post by lucyjojo »

SchemaLoad wrote: post #107
kouteiheika wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I hardly understand the headline. Steam machine is just a computer, and since it can be used for other stuff than playing games, then it can't have the cheap pricing of a console. I don't understand this train of thought. It absolutely can have the cheap pricing of a console, as long as Steam is the default store, and the majority of users will use the console as-is and buy games on Steam. Let me give a quick analo…

The main problem I see is that if this is any cheaper than it's hardware, people will buy 100s of them and stack them in server racks for CI runners or whatever. Generating only losses for Valve and making the hardware unavailable to gamers. It needs to either be at market rate or locked down to only be useful for gaming.

you don't remember playstation clusters?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3_cluster

that said, practically buying hundreds of them should prove to be quite difficult.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#154

Post by zeta0134 »

feffe wrote: post #123
Normal_gaussian wrote: post #46

Valve certainly won't win it, but they're bringing the heat where it wasn't before. SteamOS is the important part here - if it is proven to be a good console experience (which the deck has basically proven already) then licensing of the OS to other manufacturers will put a lot of pressure on integrated h/w s/w manufacturers. Unlike the handheld format, the tvbox console is fairly easy to manufacture and is tolerant o…

Steam on Linux works really well now. I sort of built my own steam machine a few months back with a framework desktop that now sits in my TV rack. Gaming on it is a really good experience. Had to buy a PS5 controller though because I could not get the XBOX controller to work over bluetooth which was a bit of a bummer. For me the new controller is most interesting as most games have XBOX controller support (with xbox…

I just built one of these as well. For your Xbox controller, see if this works: find any Windows PC and download the Xbox Accessories app. Connect the controller (via USB) and update its firmware. Once I did this, I was able to pair it with the framework desktop via bluetooth (under linux) reliably, and it's been rock solid ever since. Apparently some of the models shipped with buggy firmware that linux really doesn't like for whatever reason.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#155

Post by tombert »

Mistletoe wrote: post #131
tombert wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My main game console right now is one of those little gaming boxes you can buy on Amazon for about $400, where I have installed NixOS + Jovian to get the "SteamOS" interface. I really like it. It really does feel like a "game console"; usually when I've made my own console using Linux, it always feels kind of janky. For example, RetroPie on the Raspberry Pi is pretty cool, but it doesn't feel like a proper commercial…

Do you have link to the little gaming box?

Yep! https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D733JFML?th=1

The one I ordered had 32 gigs of memory; this was more than a year ago so I'm sure there are better ones now, but I have to say that I feel like this thing "punches above its weight" in that it does seem to run a lot more stuff than I thought it would at a decent framerate.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#156

Post by tapoxi »

nodja wrote: post #73
NelsonMinar wrote: post #22

As the article says, "The only way that they could mess this up is with the pricing. ... I'd expect the pricing to be super aggressive." The price to beat is the $400-$500 price point of PS5 and XBox. I'm guessing Valve is going to have a very hard time matching that. We'll know soon enough.

All they have to do is market the fact you don't have to pay for online. PS5 + 3 years of PS Plus = $740 Steam Machine = $700 Add/remove more years of PS Plus if the SM turns out to be more/less expensive. If you add the fact that games on PC are usually cheaper and have sales more often then it's a no brainer, but that won't convince the FIFA and COD players.

This system won't run FIFA, GTA Online, Battlefield, Valorant or CoD, it's a nonstarter for many.

Sure you don't need to subscribe to PS+, but that's somewhat easier to swallow since PS+ gives you games with the subscription.

I'm still interested in this for playing older games but I have a Steam Deck and it still isn't remotely as seamless as my Switch or PS5.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#157

Post by thordenmark »

Attached my old gaming rig to the TV to run Steam on it and it is a better experience than any consoles I have (being a gaming nerd I have everything from my old Atari 2600 and most mainstreams systems since then up to PS5).

This is good news to hear Valve going in strong for the console market.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#158

Post by wraptile »

itsn0tm3 wrote: post #149
wraptile wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These are not winner games these days. Gaming trends are so fast that indie games like the one where you play a duck with a gun is what's driving the gaming community these days.

I would say that‘s a bit overly simplified, as much as the indie or indie like game scene is thriving, so is the online multiplayer scene. Gaming is huge and just because one thing is big doesn’t mean another is not. Not a zero sum game here.

Sure but not being able to play 4 games is not an indication of success either way. It's not 2012 when you had to have Call of Duty - you can not have battlefield, cod or fort nite and still never run out of incredible, popular games to play.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#159

Post by solid_fuel »

SchemaLoad wrote: post #107
kouteiheika wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I hardly understand the headline. Steam machine is just a computer, and since it can be used for other stuff than playing games, then it can't have the cheap pricing of a console. I don't understand this train of thought. It absolutely can have the cheap pricing of a console, as long as Steam is the default store, and the majority of users will use the console as-is and buy games on Steam. Let me give a quick analo…

The main problem I see is that if this is any cheaper than it's hardware, people will buy 100s of them and stack them in server racks for CI runners or whatever. Generating only losses for Valve and making the hardware unavailable to gamers. It needs to either be at market rate or locked down to only be useful for gaming.

I think the limitation on server gear these days is electricity price vs compute, with the hardware price being an up front investment but not dominating the lifetime cost. At least at this end of the price range - it's a consumer GPU, not an A100 or anything.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#160

Post by pjerem »

SchemaLoad wrote: post #107
kouteiheika wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I hardly understand the headline. Steam machine is just a computer, and since it can be used for other stuff than playing games, then it can't have the cheap pricing of a console. I don't understand this train of thought. It absolutely can have the cheap pricing of a console, as long as Steam is the default store, and the majority of users will use the console as-is and buy games on Steam. Let me give a quick analo…

The main problem I see is that if this is any cheaper than it's hardware, people will buy 100s of them and stack them in server racks for CI runners or whatever. Generating only losses for Valve and making the hardware unavailable to gamers. It needs to either be at market rate or locked down to only be useful for gaming.

Iiuc, unlike Sony’s PS3 (which were bought and used like this), Steam is the unique distributor so it would be easy for them to not allow (or make really difficult to) buying thousands of machines.

(Or they could sell it everywhere for higher price but the Machine would come with a non transferable Steam gift card.)

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