More talk of Steam "box" Dec. 8

[mizzou]

As described in this thread the steam of has no market. I fail to see how it is different from a PC.

It is a non-competitively priced console with a very short lifespan for those looking to play the newest titles. It is no different than if MS came out with a backward compatible successor to the Xbox every 3 years except charge more for it.

Steam has no market? It is it's own market! It has it's own delivery system, etc. etc.

The only hurdle Steambox would have, is getting games to run on a non-windows based platform. That's it.

It's a pretty big hurdle though.

A steam box would be as different to a PC as an XBOX360 is different to a PC. They are pretty much the same

 

[Lonyo]

Steam has no market? It is it's own market! It has it's own delivery system, etc. etc.

The only hurdle Steambox would have, is getting games to run on a non-windows based platform. That's it.

It's a pretty big hurdle though.

A steam box would be as different to a PC as an XBOX360 is different to a PC. They are pretty much the same

Steam only has value when combined with software that runs.
Steam on Linux has almost no value, as it has almost no games.

The "only hurdle" is a massive hurdle. Another hurdle is getting people to care about a Linux Steam box, when, you know... regular PC? Make your own Linux box for Steam on linux?

Gabe even seems to have indicated it's pretty pointless, by saying it will be a locked down piece of uselessness, and people who actually want to do things should just make/buy a PC.
When even the guy who owns the company behind it thinks it doesn't offer much... you can consider maybe it doesn't offer much.

 

[Dijeangenie]

Steam only has value when combined with software that runs.
Steam on Linux has almost no value, as it has almost no games.

The "only hurdle" is a massive hurdle. Another hurdle is getting people to care about a Linux Steam box, when, you know... regular PC? Make your own Linux box for Steam on linux?

Gabe even seems to have indicated it's pretty pointless, by saying it will be a locked down piece of uselessness, and people who actually want to do things should just make/buy a PC.
When even the guy who owns the company behind it thinks it doesn't offer much... you can consider maybe it doesn't offer much.

Another major issue I can't see how they will get around is longevity. Consoles have to be replaced every x years (quite a while on this generation) to continue to play new releases, b/c games are well optimised for that particular console hardware. The problem this Steambox will have is that it will run PC games which are not optimised for its own particular hardware and therefore it will only last 2 or 3 years of playing new releases (unless it took up such a large share of the market that graphical fidelity in games basically stagnates and games do not become more demanding).

 

[Red Storm]

Another major issue I can't see how they will get around is longevity. Consoles have to be replaced every x years (quite a while on this generation) to continue to play new releases, b/c games are well optimised for that particular console hardware. The problem this Steambox will have is that it will run PC games which are not optimised for its own particular hardware and therefore it will only last 2 or 3 years of playing new releases (unless it took up such a large share of the market that graphical fidelity in games basically stagnates and games do not become more demanding).

The 5850 came out what, three years ago? And it's still a pretty damn good video card that can play games well.

Having to buy new video cards every year is a myth.

 

[KaOTiK]

Yeah, I'm rocking a GTX 480 superclocked edition and it is coming in on 3 years old soon and it still does a hell of a job running everything.

 

[Lonyo]

The 5850 came out what, three years ago? And it's still a pretty damn good video card that can play games well.

Having to buy new video cards every year is a myth.

No one is talking about having to buy a new card every year, but when you consider you are talking about $300 videocards, and comparing them to consoles, which are not far off $300 often, even buying twice in 6 years is a lot, and that's JUST the videocard.

And if they decide (based on the idiotic form factor revealed so far), to go with something too small, then the initial power will be low, meaning you will need to upgrade.

Start high, and of course the need to upgrade regularly isn't there, but if you start at the low end, it's not going to last long.

 

[Jodell88]

What's the big issue?

Anyone can build a steam box if they want to, just like a PC.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Yeah, I'm rocking a GTX 480 superclocked edition and it is coming in on 3 years old soon and it still does a hell of a job running everything.

hell I'm running a gtx 260 and it still runs effectively everything well, even BF3. Generally we all buy new cards for wants not needs.

 

[Red Storm]

No one is talking about having to buy a new card every year, but when you consider you are talking about $300 videocards, and comparing them to consoles, which are not far off $300 often, even buying twice in 6 years is a lot, and that's JUST the videocard.

And if they decide (based on the idiotic form factor revealed so far), to go with something too small, then the initial power will be low, meaning you will need to upgrade.

Start high, and of course the need to upgrade regularly isn't there, but if you start at the low end, it's not going to last long.

New consoles are $400 and up. And let's not even go into how much cheaper PC games are (and that's the main thing gamers buy).

The wonderful thing about this supposed Steam Box is that you never have to buy it. We can all continue to build our own gaming rigs or using laptops or whatever we want. Console gamers have no such choice.

 

[lupi]

hell I'm running a gtx 260 and it still runs effectively everything well, even BF3. Generally we all buy new cards for wants not needs.

that's not true or you're running a substandard rez.

 

[Kalmah]

The way that I see it is that the Steambox is going to have 3 crowds:

* PC gamers that probably aren't going to have a whole lot to do with it. If the hardware is cheaper than it is to build a PC and gives considerable performance it will probably snag some of those that might like to keep their main pc separate from their gaming system. If I was on a budget and in desperate need of an upgrade I might find myself considering it as a short-term solution.

* Console gamers that get bought into the idea. How this happens is yet to be seen. Maybe if a system was in place for easy upgrades(can take it to gamestop to have them convert steambox v1 to steambox v2 for $, for instance) If they can be shown the benefits of an upgradable system that is...

* I forgot what number 3 was...

Take into consideration that you can get $60 games on steam sales for $10 or less and it's a win.

 

[Cattlegod]

Not having it run windows is a major fail imho

 

[badb0y]

I don't the official valve steam box is going to run games locally. I think Valve is going to try its hand with cloud gaming.

*Ducks and runs away*

 

[VulgarDisplay]

Actually, I wouldn't be opposed to the steam box being a super cheap set top box that streamed games from my own home PC over a network. Could have the huge noisey rig tucked away in the basement and a little set top box with a controller streaming my games to me on the big screen in the living room.

 

[arkcom]

Could be streaming based until more games start to support linux.

I don't the official valve steam box is going to run games locally. I think Valve is going to try its hand with cloud gaming.

*Ducks and runs away*

:thumbsup:

 

[VulgarDisplay]

http://www.pcgamer.com/2013/01/09/valve-gabe-newell-steam-box/

Holy crap, I was right. I made that post then clicked on PC gamer and this article was there.

Steambox looks like it will basically be a home PC gaming rig with enough power to render games for "multiple" users.

“The Steam Box will also be a server,” Newell said. “Any PC can serve multiple monitors, so over time, the next-generation (post-Kepler) you can have one GPU that’s serving up eight simultaneous game calls. So, you could have one PC and eight televisions and eight controllers and everybody getting great performance out of it. We’re used to having one monitor, or two monitors—now we’re saying lets expand that a little bit.”

Awesome if true.

Need to release Goldeneye 64 for this. No more screen peeking.

 

[badb0y]

http://www.pcgamer.com/2013/01/09/valve-gabe-newell-steam-box/

Holy crap, I was right. I made that post then clicked on PC gamer and this article was there.

Steambox looks like it will basically be a home PC gaming rig with enough power to render games for "multiple" users.



Awesome if true.

Need to release Goldeneye 64 for this. No more screen peeking.

Oh, and Half-Life 3. (Just kidding about that last part, but we saw you jump a little in your chair.)

Cheeky c**ts!!!

 

[Fanatical Meat]

that's not true or you're running a substandard rez.

1680x1050, medium settings. Yes its absolutely true.
Personally I can't notice any real difference from the 1080 monitor on our 2nd PC. I want to play BF3 on ultra @ 1080 but honestly it looks pretty good with my current set up and why obsess over it.

 

[EDUSAN]

what you guys are not considering is that steambox is not a pc, as the pc has a wide variety of hardware choices to build it, making videogame companies not caring much... doing bad ports, or having compatibility issues...

that is, for me, the nice thing about the console. It will be a standarized PC.
Make companies do exclusives for steambox + steam store prices = win
and, considering that steambox will have a fixed setup of hardware i imagine less troubles to make games be able to run on it

having linux is a downside... ALTHOUGH valve could came up with an idea to make windows games run on linux (which is completely possible)

i shouldnt continue thinking the limitations of pc PORTED to a console

 

[BD2003]

Right now the entire concept just sounds confused. Like not even gabe knows what it's supposed to be. It's a Linux based, client server platform....that's somehow supposed to leverage years of Windows based, single user PC games? I'm just not understanding how he thinks it's going to get from A to Z, when no one will be on board for the transition. It'd be an entirely new platform and paradigm that is going to be impossible to get devs to support. PC support is still a little iffy.....no major developer is going to start porting to Linux until its been successful for years, and it won't be successful without that support. Win 8 is kind of shitty, but it has to be far shittier to cause a mass exodus. Valve may not like being tethered to windows....but they are.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Its Gabe's apple tv project like Jobs had. Have has ludicrously productive employees this is his side project. It doesn't need to be a huge hit

 

[Dijeangenie]

The 5850 came out what, three years ago? And it's still a pretty damn good video card that can play games well.

Having to buy new video cards every year is a myth.

Who said it has a 5850 in? Plus the last 3 years have seen very little improvement in graphical fidelity in games (if at all) however over the next 3 years will almost certainly see far more improvement as we are going to see a new generation of consoles.

 

[Dijeangenie]

Yeah, I'm rocking a GTX 480 superclocked edition and it is coming in on 3 years old soon and it still does a hell of a job running everything.

yeah but what did that cost you

 

[Red Storm]

yeah but what did that cost you

I'm 99% sure that card plus all the games he's bought would be much much cheaper than a console with the same number of games.

I am very intrigued by this server idea. I personally would LOVE local streaming for all my games. That way I don't need a big beefy laptop or a desktop, I can game on my super thin Ultrabook and/or tablet while having the server packed away in a closet do all the work.

 

[BD2003]

It's all just way too ambitious. Some of the stuff like the server, full Linux support....that's got to be like 4-5 years out. Remember, Valve time is like 20% the speed of normal time. Short term we might see a few manufacturers making windows boxes with big picture and a controller packed in.