Steam Box Catch-All

Seems interesting. I do get tired of tinkering from time to time.

But this is probably for the mass audience, not us PC enthusiasts. Buy a box, it plays these 1000 games on Steam. Wow what a library. That's way more than x or y console.

Ulairi wrote:

I think people are getting too bogged down on it being the same thing as an Xbox or PS3. It's not going to be (in my opinion) just that, it can be that, but it's going to be much more like the Alien Ware X51 that released. The perfect TV box or put it on your desk and treat it like a traditional PC. The Steam library is too large to forgo the keyboard and mouse interface and so much of the content is built on Windows that I'm sure it will run Windows 8, Microsoft will be a partner and companies like Dell, HP and whomever can create their own "steambox" as long as they meet minimums. The most analogous situation I can think of is Windows Phone. Anyone can release a Windows Phone as long as the minimum specs, as designed by Valve are met.

i think ulairi is the closest to what is allegedly in the works.

Think less of iphone, and think more android or windows phone. steam would just set the specs, and perhaps release their own model in partnership with a well-known maufacturer... that by itself could set things in the right direction for pc-gaming as a whole and bridge the gap between consoles and PCs...

the alienware x51 already attempted to do this... but did it half-heartedly: the design and specs are there, but its still too expensive. but to make it any less expensive would probably hurt their overall brand as a boutique for serious gamers who don't want to build their own machine. part of their marketing is the price margin over their owners' (dell) stuff. i.e. "if its expensive, it must run faster / better!"

one problem that i see with all this... how does the manufacturer of a "steam console" make money? count on steam to make a profit with its expanded gamer base, no problem...

but what about the manufacturer? what manufacturer would try to make a cheap mini-pc and undercut its existing product line? makes no sense to me. a few ways i see out of this quandry:

a. steam contracts a manufacturer to build this thing (drops its own dime), no profit sharing, steam sells hardware at cost or perhaps even at a loss, anticipating massive revenue through added customers from its software client. but i don't see how they're going to prevent the buyers from purchasing it for the sake of having a pc and skip the gaming... the console manufacturers don't really have this problem. xbox360 and ps3 are both pretty lame without buying games.

b. hardware is co-developed by steam and a manufacturer at cost, probably not at loss, but hey who knows... manufacturer dips into shared profits from software revenue from steam client. steam client collects info about our computers optionally, but maybe these boxes would be set up to interface with the steam server so that there is accurate info about who bought what with what box...and so if the box was used to buy software, manufacturer gets a cut?

c. same as option b., but manufacturer takes a haircut at the potential of selling upgrades for this box (i.e. more powerful gpu, RAM) could this be enticing to a company like ASUS who makes video cards and motherboards? maybe a deal would involve a combination of b. & c.? (profit sharing from software revenues + chance to make lots of money from upgrades)

anyway you look at it... if they try it out and it becomes successful, it can only mean win for pc-gamers as far as im concerned.

i love the way i can buy a game these days, and despite my being two generations behind the curve (still working with a Radeon HD 5900-series card), I'm playing all the latest games without a hitch. Sure my settings aren't maxed out, but its still prettier than any console.

KimJongIl wrote:

a. steam contracts a manufacturer to build this thing (drops its own dime), no profit sharing, steam sells hardware at cost or perhaps even at a loss, anticipating massive revenue through added customers from its software client. but i don't see how they're going to prevent the buyers from purchasing it for the sake of having a pc and skip the gaming... the console manufacturers don't really have this problem. xbox360 and ps3 are both pretty lame without buying games.

b. hardware is co-developed by steam and a manufacturer at cost, probably not at loss, but hey who knows... manufacturer dips into shared profits from software revenue from steam client. steam client collects info about our computers optionally, but maybe these boxes would be set up to interface with the steam server so that there is accurate info about who bought what with what box...and so if the box was used to buy software, manufacturer gets a cut?

c. same as option b., but manufacturer takes a haircut at the potential of selling upgrades for this box (i.e. more powerful gpu, RAM) could this be enticing to a company like ASUS who makes video cards and motherboards? maybe a deal would involve a combination of b. & c.? (profit sharing from software revenues + chance to make lots of money from upgrades)

Thinking along those lines, I think Valve might want to help PC manufacturers do something to be a bit like Apple.

Currently, consumer PCs are generally cheap generic boxes for web browsing, whereas Apple for the consumer is seen as a fashionable premium brand PCs for web browsing at a premium price. A bit of a over-simplification, but I'm sure the impression is true for a lot of people. Apple have a nice margin on their line of macs, and I'm sure the generic PC manufacturers would like some of Apple's action as much as they would like the console action. Valve could be giving them a good way to sell to that market.

Valve is wise enough to see that it's not just about themselves, that they can't do it themselves and have all the cake for themselves. Apple have worked for ages to make their market the way it is, and Valve isn't about to start working against the flow of how the PC ecosystem works. Compare how valve let just anyone run a server for their game, charge for that service, with EA and their closed system of approved server providers.

Bottle wrote:

It depends on how they're planning on releasing it. If they want to attract a bunch of new customers, I'd assume they'd want to have a shiny new game for it. That almost seems like a given.

If it's just aimed at already-existing PC customers who want to PC game in their living room, then it would be a lot less important. But if that's the case, the whole thing almost seems silly. They could just release their big picture mode and call it a day.

This isn't a console.

Jayhawker wrote:

I think that unless the Valve Box is limiting in some way, there is no point. Look at the review for Alienware's X51 at Verge. They show that BF3 and The Witcher run well, at middling settings. only Just Cause 2 ran well at the highest settings, and they still needed to drop AA to 8x from 16x.

Going forward, it is not designed to be a gaming beast, but instead to be a target for developers not to overshoot. THAT'S what makes consoles attractive. I don't have to fiddle with drivers or worry that I need to upgrade anything to play. If a games has issues, the developers failed. In PC gaming, they get to tell the use he just failed to provide a good system.

I'm all for an awesome PC console. But I'm not may 3-4 times as much for a console I have to dial back my settings and deal with drivers. That's what drove me away from PC gaming to begin with.

For this to work, Valve needs developers to target their standards. That's a limit.

I don't think Valve really wants to compete with the consoles. There is no way to compete with the closed systems without throwing away what people already like about PC gaming and Steam. I think this is much more like what the PC Gaming Alliance and Microsoft said they were going to do with the Windows Experience Rating, try to set some baselines and make PC gaming easier. I think one of the results will be a core set of standards for developers to try to target because they want their games to run on the "steam box" well. The fact that I can install Origin on it and keep on playing is a good thing.

I do take issue that with consoles you don't have to fiddle with things, I have to get updates on my Xbox and PS3 all the dang time. Really, even with a PC it's gotten very easy with drivers auto downloading and Steam telling players to get their latest GPU drivers. There are more issues with games not working but without requiring certification I don't see some of those issues going away. There are pluses and negatives to all the platforms.

I think people (not singling anyone out here) are getting to hyped up in the Steam Console thing when I think Valve is aiming much lower than that. They don't want to compete with Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo. I think this is more about doing what the PC Gaming Alliance couldn't get done.

I do want to add how sad it is that Microsoft has completely thrown away the PC when it comes to games. I don't think anyone up in Redmond gives two hoots if another game comes out on Windows, in fact I wish they'd rather it didn't come to Windows so they could get it on Xbox instead.

Ulairi wrote:
Bottle wrote:

It depends on how they're planning on releasing it. If they want to attract a bunch of new customers, I'd assume they'd want to have a shiny new game for it. That almost seems like a given.

If it's just aimed at already-existing PC customers who want to PC game in their living room, then it would be a lot less important. But if that's the case, the whole thing almost seems silly. They could just release their big picture mode and call it a day.

This isn't a console.

I didn't say it was a console. In fact, I'd be amazed and worried if it was. I said as much earlier.

It's pretty clear that it's going to be some new kind of living product. I just don't know what direction they're going to take with it.

Sorry to interfere, I read the discussion, but I think we are missing the point.

What I think, what I saw, is that Valve will finally "say" : If you get our platform, you should get this brand.

Like NVIDIA advertising within the first second of a game, or even AMD/INTEL that does it!

If you currently go on dell.com for north america, and setup a X51, any model of X51 from Alienware, you have the default option check mark to install Steam on your machine.

Valve do already have "exclusive", steamwork does that. So, they will work hand in hand with a supplier, and TELL US ABOUT IT : They got already Fans, a following... Instead of currently saying we are a Digital supplier for a PC Platform game.

For me, that's the SteamBox I see coming soon.

Jayhawker wrote:
I do want to add how sad it is that Microsoft has completely thrown away the PC when it comes to games. I don't think anyone up in Redmond gives two hoots if another game comes out on Windows, in fact I wish they'd rather it didn't come to Windows so they could get it on Xbox instead.

I'm going to assume that the problem lies with the difficulty in supporting evolving hardware and software specs. If you eliminate gaming, it has to make supporting OS's so much easier. Apple clamps down the hardware, since they control that. Microsoft is forced to try and slow down the growing specs required by games.

You have to wonder if Microsoft figured out that it is better to drive gaming to the Xbox, and then use Windows 8 to be the portal of all of the social aspects of gaming. I don't think it will bother Microsoft to let Valve take over PC gaming, and the headaches it creates, as long as it is done within the Windows environment.

The thing about "the PC version problem" that makes me scratch my head is that it's not as though the PC is some strange new platform that companies have just recently been asked to make work for gaming, it's been around longer than any of them. You've got multi-billion dollar companies who just can't be bothered, because presumably the grass is greener on the console side and of course vested interests from MS.

The thing that will be interesting is similar to the Valve/Origin situation, where EA sees it's worth investing something into - If/when something like this takes off, who's going to want a piece of cake and what are they going to do to try and lock people out, if they can at all? (seeing as it's a PC, not a closed console)

Anyone can put Steam on a PC without Valve doing anything special. We'll see PCs with target specs that Valve will set for suppliers to meet to get some "steam powered" logo and the hopes that developers have targets to build/port to to make it easier to game. I don't think this is going to be a megaton.

Scratched wrote:
Jayhawker wrote:
I do want to add how sad it is that Microsoft has completely thrown away the PC when it comes to games. I don't think anyone up in Redmond gives two hoots if another game comes out on Windows, in fact I wish they'd rather it didn't come to Windows so they could get it on Xbox instead.

I'm going to assume that the problem lies with the difficulty in supporting evolving hardware and software specs. If you eliminate gaming, it has to make supporting OS's so much easier. Apple clamps down the hardware, since they control that. Microsoft is forced to try and slow down the growing specs required by games.

You have to wonder if Microsoft figured out that it is better to drive gaming to the Xbox, and then use Windows 8 to be the portal of all of the social aspects of gaming. I don't think it will bother Microsoft to let Valve take over PC gaming, and the headaches it creates, as long as it is done within the Windows environment.

The thing about "the PC version problem" that makes me scratch my head is that it's not as though the PC is some strange new platform that companies have just recently been asked to make work for gaming, it's been around longer than any of them. You've got multi-billion dollar companies who just can't be bothered, because presumably the grass is greener on the console side and of course vested interests from MS.

The thing that will be interesting is similar to the Valve/Origin situation, where EA sees it's worth investing something into - If/when something like this takes off, who's going to want a piece of cake and what are they going to do to try and lock people out, if they can at all? (seeing as it's a PC, not a closed console)

I think consoles are going to be the ones getting "console gaming is dead" stories in 5 or 10 years (not that console gaming will be dead). I think EA is going to much rather sell you their game through their service than through BestBuy or GameStop. Removing the barriers between the service and the users is what has gone on in Asia and I think that's where we will see gaming go on here. There are so many problems with the packaged goods business and with the traditional closed consoles digital distribution won't be able to really take off because the retailers won't let it.

IMAGE(http://v.cdn.cad-comic.com/comics/cad-20120305-20729.png)

Jayhawker wrote:

PC gaming is obviously worth it to many, many people. But the level of fiddling is dramatically more on the PC.

The fiddling is part of the fun. I have a friend who spends more time fiddling with his load order in Wrye Bash than he does actually playing Oblivion.

There's something eminently satisfying about a really well tuned set of Oblivion mods.

This is a great idea from Valve. The data from Steam means they know exactly what spec to make the machine. They can advertise it as a machine which will quickly, easily run the entire library of Steam games.

Some people don't enjoy fiddling with .ini files as much as I do.

The only time I ever fiddle with PC games is when I'm trying to run something old. Thief 2, for instance, took a fair bit of tweaking to get the T2X fan mod running. But almost everything is just point and shoot these days. The only troubleshooting I remember doing in the last couple years, with a current game, is updating my video drivers.

Of course, there was a fair bit of fiddling when I first built the PC and installed all the initial drivers. That took a number of hours. But once it was done, it was pretty much done, and I haven't needed to do anything other than video drivers in ages.

edit: well, okay, Dragon Age and ME2 took some fiddling for the DLC. But I think of that as being EA stupidity rather than anything inherent to the PC. DLC on Steam seems to just be integrated.

I haven't had to fiddle with anything since I installed Windows 7 - it comes with all the recent drivers up to its release, and turning on the updates usually downloads the latest drivers for various devices automatically. I haven't even installed the drivers for my Logitech mouse and wireless keyboard. I plugged them in and they just worked. The most I've had to do is to okay Windows going online to search for the latest drivers, and then DL and installation mostly happened in the background.

Of course, I make a point of staying away from buggy games, at least until I can DL all the fixes in one go.

There's definitely something of a halo effect when it comes to technology. PCs still have the reputation of sorting out IRQ DMA and IO addresses, freeing up memory in config.sys/autoexec.bat, BSODs and buggy drivers even when it's the exception rather than the norm now. Consoles have a reputation of being plug and play, even though we're seeing a lot of mandatory installs (or installs to get decent load times) and bugs and patches.

pcgamer.com says ...

"The Verge suggest that it would be an open platform capable of running different types of client software, not just Steam, and would receive regular hardware updates at set intervals every few years, allowing developers to plan their games around a predictable upgrade cycle."

win for manufactuers, game developers, steam, and gamers if it gets out the door and is successful.

what is "it" then?

simply put: a standard by which game developers and manufacturers can work with.

isn't that what consoles deliver for manufactuers and developers? (albeit without much adaptability / flexibility for the end-users...yuck.)

we'll see what happens this week.

Scratched wrote:

There's definitely something of a halo effect when it comes to technology. PCs still have the reputation of sorting out IRQ DMA and IO addresses, freeing up memory in config.sys/autoexec.bat, BSODs and buggy drivers even when it's the exception rather than the norm now. Consoles have a reputation of being plug and play, even though we're seeing a lot of mandatory installs (or installs to get decent load times) and bugs and patches.

yep, which is why i think steam sees an opportunity... they have the technology...they just need to go nuts w/ marketing to those who haven't seen what we see.

what I see: I don't recall having in the last several years, much of any problem that stopped my game playing cold while on steam. you just buy, install, and double click...and click yes on the installer.

i know i sound like a steam fan-boy. in reality, i'm just lazy and don't want to spend hours figuring out how to make it work or work better... don't want to shop 50 billion places looking for the best deal. if someone else can show me deals, download, and maintain my library better, i'm there.

Malor wrote:

The only time I ever fiddle with PC games is when I'm trying to run something old. Thief 2, for instance, took a fair bit of tweaking to get the T2X fan mod running. But almost everything is just point and shoot these days. The only troubleshooting I remember doing in the last couple years, with a current game, is updating my video drivers.

Of course, there was a fair bit of fiddling when I first built the PC and installed all the initial drivers. That took a number of hours. But once it was done, it was pretty much done, and I haven't needed to do anything other than video drivers in ages.

edit: well, okay, Dragon Age and ME2 took some fiddling for the DLC. But I think of that as being EA stupidity rather than anything inherent to the PC. DLC on Steam seems to just be integrated.

LarryC wrote:

I haven't had to fiddle with anything since I installed Windows 7 - it comes with all the recent drivers up to its release, and turning on the updates usually downloads the latest drivers for various devices automatically. I haven't even installed the drivers for my Logitech mouse and wireless keyboard. I plugged them in and they just worked. The most I've had to do is to okay Windows going online to search for the latest drivers, and then DL and installation mostly happened in the background.

Of course, I make a point of staying away from buggy games, at least until I can DL all the fixes in one go.

http://www.gamerswithjobs.com/node/1...

At the very least as a PC gamer that has a HTPC that I use to watch shows and to game on sometimes I would like if with this Valve improves the 10' view of Steam and makes it more controller friendly. Right now I use Windows 7s media center with a remote to watch tv and then have to get the keyboard and mouse out to switch to steam and then switch to a controller to play most games. (If it need a keyboard I usually us my desktop and play there, the wife doesn't like to leave out the keyboard in the living room) I would love it if Steam got media functions and then also would be configurable to be nicer to read/use from the couch with a controller/remote.

Scratched wrote:

There's definitely something of a halo effect when it comes to technology. PCs still have the reputation of sorting out IRQ DMA and IO addresses, freeing up memory in config.sys/autoexec.bat, BSODs and buggy drivers even when it's the exception rather than the norm now. Consoles have a reputation of being plug and play, even though we're seeing a lot of mandatory installs (or installs to get decent load times) and bugs and patches.

Although I realize it is a combination of more complex games and poor hardware, it looks like consoles are starting to erode their "plug and play" reputation. There is the RROD issue on the XBOX, frequent and annoying updates on the PS3, and forced installs on both. I'm not saying that consoles are anywhere near the PC, but it is interesting to see what has happened this console generation.

I'm not sure how useful a Wiki that will be, at least for newish games. Stuff from the Win95 era is problematic, and there's a good number of XP-era games that don't work well (Silent Storm comes to mind), but it seems like most everything post-Vista is almost completely plug and play.

A quick look only shows 211 games, out of how many thousands? An awful lot of them are very old, too, like Planescape:Torment and all the Jane's games and ... sheesh, I'd guess at least half the total entries are 90s and older.

You do see games with problems sometimes, but honestly, I'd say that PC gaming is only just a scoche worse than consoles these days. The faceplants (like that recent id game, was it Rage?) are really quite rare.

I've got all three consoles, but I play on the PC whenever I have the choice. It's no more effort, and it looks better.

The problem with the PC and why that wiki is needed is a long term thing. Operating systems change, 'common' hardware changes, so a 'PC game' might as well be 'a PC game from the era of a specific version of windows' and need fixes. Consoles don't have to deal with this as backwards compatibility is the exception not the norm, a SNES game is a SNES game, and probably only works on a SNES.

Jayhawker wrote:
Malor wrote:

The only time I ever fiddle with PC games is when I'm trying to run something old. Thief 2, for instance, took a fair bit of tweaking to get the T2X fan mod running. But almost everything is just point and shoot these days. The only troubleshooting I remember doing in the last couple years, with a current game, is updating my video drivers.

Of course, there was a fair bit of fiddling when I first built the PC and installed all the initial drivers. That took a number of hours. But once it was done, it was pretty much done, and I haven't needed to do anything other than video drivers in ages.

edit: well, okay, Dragon Age and ME2 took some fiddling for the DLC. But I think of that as being EA stupidity rather than anything inherent to the PC. DLC on Steam seems to just be integrated.

LarryC wrote:

I haven't had to fiddle with anything since I installed Windows 7 - it comes with all the recent drivers up to its release, and turning on the updates usually downloads the latest drivers for various devices automatically. I haven't even installed the drivers for my Logitech mouse and wireless keyboard. I plugged them in and they just worked. The most I've had to do is to okay Windows going online to search for the latest drivers, and then DL and installation mostly happened in the background.

Of course, I make a point of staying away from buggy games, at least until I can DL all the fixes in one go.

http://www.gamerswithjobs.com/node/1...

How long ago did you give up on PC gaming?

IMAGE(http://got-steam.com/ProdImages/steambunk-box.jpg)
Found a link to this shiny box. I'd so go for that!

So, what if Steam would make the box with custom made parts?
A highly tweaked videocard maybe? I know companies already do this.
But wouldn't Valve be able to take a bit of that market that way?

Did anyone point out that the hardware business is generally terrible to be in? tough margins and support nightmares.. I give Valve credit if they can pull it off but then it only makes sense if you can get people to pay WAY more than market value on the hardware OR completely control the "software" environment. Sorta like Razer and their laptop.. its about $800-$1000 over market value for a gimmicky touchpad... so that's all margin for them.

Unless its the scale of Alienware.. and even they only survived getting absorbed into a larger corporate parent to enjoy some economies of scale..

Or its simply like suggest above a "valve approved reference design" that 3rd parties can adopt... with various Valve embedded software and perhaps a controller or something.

Scratched wrote:

There's definitely something of a halo effect when it comes to technology. PCs still have the reputation of sorting out IRQ DMA and IO addresses, freeing up memory in config.sys/autoexec.bat, BSODs and buggy drivers even when it's the exception rather than the norm now.

I don't know about that. It's different, in that mucking around isn't generally required to get something up and running, but there's always this kind of tweaking to try an squeeze a little bit extra performance out of your system. For instance.

juv3nal wrote:
Scratched wrote:

There's definitely something of a halo effect when it comes to technology. PCs still have the reputation of sorting out IRQ DMA and IO addresses, freeing up memory in config.sys/autoexec.bat, BSODs and buggy drivers even when it's the exception rather than the norm now.

I don't know about that. It's different, in that mucking around isn't generally required to get something up and running, but there's always this kind of tweaking to try an squeeze a little bit extra performance out of your system. For instance.

That's where I'd sit too. Quite often the defaults on a game are good, you'll be in and playing with a reasonable framerate and a reasonable amount of pretty, but you can push it higher/lower as you like. There's still some games that are outliers, either really well performing or really badly and you've got to get the persuader stick out on it.

Valve says they aren't making a console, just contracting hardware to test the 10 ft interface they've been working on.

shoptroll wrote:
MannishBoy wrote:

Valve says they aren't making a console, just contracting hardware to test the 10 ft interface they've been working on.

For what it's worth, the specs on the hardware they built (if you follow the links to the Kotaku article and the reports on a Valve employee building up a test machine) are pretty close to a high-end 2011 Mac Mini and I don't think there's any other big-name vendors like HP or Dell which make consumer machines in that form factor. So they pretty much have to go DIY for testing different configurations.

Dell used to have the Inspiron Zino. But I think it's canceled. Now they just have those new Alienwares.