Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Valve is about to win the console generation

xeiaso.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

531–540 of 556 posts

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#531

Post by Fnoord »

tombert wrote: post #530
Fnoord wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds interesting because with NixOS it should be very easy to move your config to the next thing, and honestly I prefer NixOS over Arch. What I wanted to ask you: have you converted the device into a STB as well or is that still standalone?

I'm afraid I don't know what an STB is.

Set top box [1], like an Nvidia Shield TV [2], to play (digital) TV and other programs. My point being, would you be able to have this machine function as such (not so much portable, rather standalone with a remote control). Because that way, you take the hardware STB out of the equation, saving you (on the Nvidia Shield TV Pro) a good 200 EUR.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Set-top_box

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nvidia_Shield_TV

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#532

Post by fooker »

ninetyninenine wrote: post #193
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 needs IP. Something as iconic as Kratos or Mario. That's how you go toe to toe with consoles.

Well, they have IP, IP2, IP2 Episode 2, etc etc.

Maybe some day they'll have IP3!

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#533

Post by fooker »

827a wrote: post #354
stavros wrote: post #231

> The big thing I want to see in practice is their implementation of foveated rendering. This beautiful hack abuses the fact that human eyes have the most sharpness and fidelity at the exact centre of your field of vision, whereas your peripheral vision is abysmal at it. This means that on average you only have to render about 10% of the frame at maximum quality for it to feel like it's running at full resolution all…

What they're saying is that they might have a foviated rendering solution in addition to the foviated streaming solution we know about, and we'd like to hear about it.

Implementing foveated rendering is pretty much up to the game developers.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#534

Post by aaomidi »

LexiMax wrote: post #415
aaomidi wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We’re going to have to figure out a better way of dealing with cheaters. You could be playing against an AI model specifically trained on that game. No anti cheat is going to detect that.

I find it much more likely that Valve enables Secure Boot on their Steam hardware. I imagine that if this happens, it will be followed by popular Linux distros finally becoming serious about their Secure Boot implementations, instead of simply shimming it or seen as a rarely-used feature reserved for enterprise distros like RHEL. Some of us actually think that having some sort of validation that our OS hasn't been ta…

But again this doesn’t solve the problem where an AI model can just play the game.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#535

Post by somenameforme »

johnnyanmac wrote: post #523
somenameforme wrote: post #491

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The $400 system linked above can run modern games in 4k/120FPS. And that was far from some search for the most efficient price:performance build, it was just the first thing that came up on a quick search. If one is willing to do things like buy a refurbished hardware and assume you already have an OS, you could easily bring that down to $300 and maybe even start pushing towards $200. Gaming has just gotten so absurd…

Older games at medium settings, or shooters at low settings sure. If that's your compromise for frames then a relative potato can still play it. I'm not sure I call that "modern" in the same way something God of War Ragnarok is "modern". >Though that is one area where many Japanese studios are still lagging behind the rest. Its a different model. They aren't trying to sell millions of copies to report engagement and…

Delta Force was released in January of this year. He was running it at 4k and 120FPS in medium. If you're willing to go for 60FPS or 1920x1080 I'm certain he could have it running in ultra or whatever at 60FPS. And that was on a less than $400 PC. Similarly he was also playing CS2 (released late 2023) in medium 4k at what seemed to average around 90FPS.

For contrast most PS5 games are going to run at 1080p at the highest, which is then upscaled to 4k output, and generally capped at 60FPS.

----

I think Japanese studios are simply mispricing their games. Shin Megami Tensei V is a game that could probably be quite big on the PC but instead has less than 3500 reviews (as a ballpark for sales) because of a price that's way outside the peak point on the supply:demand curve. It also has almost no regional pricing adjustments - like $50 in India and Vietnam, $40 in China, etc, for a game may as well have a label saying 'please pirate me, I don't want your patronage.'

In classical advertising it was believed that lowering the price of something was subconsciously associated with a lower quality/brand damage in the consumer, and they're probably still under this school of thought. But I think at this point it's largely obsolete, certainly in software. People, in general, just don't pay $60 (or anywhere near it) for games on PC anymore.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#536

Post by Arainach »

SirMaster wrote: post #528
Arainach wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None at the AAA-tier which sell consoles.

DotA isn't AAA tier? It's the #2 game by a big margin on Steam. And also League of Legends is just as big. How are these not AAA tier games?

LoL can't be played on the Steam Deck. This is common among the top multiplayer games due to anticheat.

It's almost certain no one bought a Steam Deck primarily to play DotA, and it remains to be seen if any has a meaningful impact on the Steam Machine, but I doubt it.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#537

Post by altairprime »

Hikikomori wrote: post #507
Orygin wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are as useless on linux as they are on Windows. How many cheaters on the latest games with Kernel AC?

Not really. On linux you can just load your cheat as a kernel module and its undetectable by userspace anticheat. On windows with kernel anti cheat you would need to find some vulnerable driver, sign your own driver, or use external cheats like DMA or vision based. This funnels cheat devs into using a few methods that anti cheat devs can focus on for detection. Is it perfect? Clearly not as there's plenty of cheaters…

Precisely. And this is where secure boot + attestation comes in: making Linux able to prove itself as unmodded to the server, makes it a possible target for multiplayer game developers.

Re: Valve is about to win the console generation

#540

Post by Fire-Dragon-DoL »

pixelatedindex wrote: post #39
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.

$699 (maybe 799 for a more premium model) seems to be a good compromise given what it would take to build a sufficiently similar PC while being close enough to the PS5/Switch. Xbox is practically dead. I don’t think it needs to compete on price directly, if it can deliver the polish of a console. It can also play up the angle of being a full blown computer.

I think the steam machine will be 999 given they said "priced as a pc". I hope to be wrong, because at 700 it's insta buy for me.
Post reply on HN