• So Then, Why Should You Buy A Steam Machine?
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This article does not in any way take into context non technical gamers. Im not saying casual gamers, I'm saying non technical gamers. Sure. I can build a steam machine, but you know what, only a very special technical portion of the gaming populous know how to actually achieve that, myself included. The rest are better off buying a prebuilt product that comes with a warranty, works out of the box and plays all their steam games on the TV.
Me? I wouldn't. Every title on that machine is already available to me on my PC and I have precisely 0 interest in playing them in my living room. I'm just not part of the steambox's market.
[QUOTE=dude2193;43472704]This article does not in any way take into context non technical gamers. Im not saying casual gamers, I'm saying non technical gamers. Sure. I can build a steam machine, but you know what, only a very special technical portion of the gaming populous know how to actually achieve that, myself included. The rest are better off buying a prebuilt product that comes with a warranty, works out of the box and [B]plays all their steam games on the TV.[/B][/QUOTE] Except the Steambox doesn't. It plays a currently pretty small selection of games. Also, why even focus on the current steam user? They're already using Steam, and they probably chose PC gaming simply because they [I]don't[/I] want to play on their couch. Valve should be going for the console gamers, not the current Steam users.
[QUOTE=GoDong-DK;43472971]Also, why even focus on the current steam user? They're already using Steam, and they probably chose PC gaming simply because they [I]don't[/I] want to play on their couch. Valve should be going for the console gamers, not the current Steam users.[/QUOTE] Because a lot of us want to play on the couch. I would like to but my computer is in my bedroom, not my living room. And most games don't support controllers. The steambox could make a lot more developers implement controller support of some kind into their games. And I'm not a huge fan of current consoles. If I had money, I would love to get one of the cheaper steamboxes. And people shouldn't bash the whole steambox thing just because a few manufacturers decided to make some really expensive SBs.
[QUOTE=Pelf;43473161]Because a lot of us want to play on the couch. I would like to but my computer is in my bedroom, not my living room. And most games don't support controllers. The steambox could make a lot more developers implement controller support of some kind into their games. And I'm not a huge fan of current consoles. If I had money, I would love to get one of the cheaper steamboxes.[/QUOTE] Some games have started taking Big Picture onboard, since Steam OS == Linux it should mean the PC games will have much better controller support across the board since they need that usability.
I am probably way off the mark here but I'll assume some things to ask a question: With the streaming software ability promised in mind. Why wouldn't a steam user build a cheap POS to receive the stream instead of building/buying a machine to play it in the first place?
[QUOTE=whatthe;43473211]I am probably way off the mark here but I'll assume some things to ask a question: With the streaming software ability promised in mind. Why wouldn't a steam user build a cheap POS to receive the stream instead of building/buying a machine to play it in the first place?[/QUOTE] They can (once the streaming beta is over).
[quote]So Then, Why Should You Buy A Steam Machine?[/quote] If you have more money than sense and the name "Valve" is the only real selling point to you, then I'd say it's a solid purchase.
[QUOTE=Pelf;43473161]Because a lot of us want to play on the couch. I would like to but my computer is in my bedroom, not my living room. And most games don't support controllers. The steambox could make a lot more developers implement controller support of some kind into their games. And I'm not a huge fan of current consoles. If I had money, I would love to get one of the cheaper steamboxes. And people shouldn't bash the whole steambox thing just because a few manufacturers decided to make some really expensive SBs.[/QUOTE] Games on the Steam box will of course support the controller, but at the time - are there actually any games on the Steam box? Will there be any? Valve has shown that they could get hardware partners onboard, but so far I haven't heard about any big developers saying "Yeah, we'll definitely put our shit on the Steambox!". And should Steambox users compete with normal PC users in multiplayer? Controller vs KB+M is simply not fair, as shown by the original Xbox (I think).
[QUOTE=GoDong-DK;43476524]Games on the Steam box will of course support the controller, but at the time - are there actually any games on the Steam box? Will there be any? Valve has shown that they could get hardware partners onboard, but so far I haven't heard about any big developers saying "Yeah, we'll definitely put our shit on the Steambox!". And should Steambox users compete with normal PC users in multiplayer? Controller vs KB+M is simply not fair, as shown by the original Xbox (I think).[/QUOTE] Many developers have already shown support for Linux as a viable platform (just 12-14% of all titles are on Steam for Linux, which is quite a lot considering it's early days), I imagine as more titles become available the number of "AAA" games will increase. As for balance issues, since the steam controller is supposedly better than a regular gamepad I imagine it should be possible to play against random players without issues. Pro players would be gaming at their desk anyhow.
[QUOTE=danharibo;43476620]Many developers have already shown support for Linux as a viable platform (just 12-14% of all titles are on Steam for Linux, which is quite a lot considering it's early days), I imagine as more titles become available the number of "AAA" games will increase. As for balance issues, since the steam controller is supposedly better than a regular gamepad I imagine it should be possible to play against random players without issues. Pro players would be gaming at their desk anyhow.[/QUOTE] About 1% of Steam users (at least those taking the Steam hardware survey) use Linux - and while 12-14% of all steam titles may be available, I'm sure we're both aware of that those 12-14% aren't the big games at all. They're all, with a few notable exceptions such as Valve titles, Gmod, Rust (and apparently CKII and EUIV) pretty much indie games (Gmod and Rust are arguably pretty mainstream), and while there's nothing wrong with that, it makes it not that attractive as a gaming platform. AAA won't suddenly come out simply because the volume of Linux games should increase (why should it, either way?), they'll come out when there's enough users on Linux for it to be viable. Even Mac OSX, with its 5% of Steam users, isn't guaranteed to get the new "big" games, though it's less bleak than the Linux market. And I'm not really convinced about the controller - I guess we'll wait till we've tried it out to judge.
[QUOTE=GoDong-DK;43476807]About 1% of Steam users (at least those taking the Steam hardware survey) use Linux[/quote] It's between 1 and 2%, but we could argue all day about the statistical significance of the hwsurvery. [QUOTE=GoDong-DK;43476807]and while 12-14% of all steam titles may be available, I'm sure we're both aware of that those 12-14% aren't the big games at all. They're all, with a few notable exceptions such as Valve titles, Gmod, Rust (and apparently CKII and EUIV) pretty much indie games (Gmod and Rust are arguably pretty mainstream), and while there's nothing wrong with that, it makes it not that attractive as a gaming platform.[/quote] For some people certainly, but the catalog is increasing in size quite rapidly. There are already a couple of independent developers like Double Fine on board with the idea and should CryTek and Epic finally get their technology in order (supposedly CryTek will have a working Mac and Linux engine for star citizen) there shouldn't be any major technical hurdles preventing the majority of games being release on the platform. [QUOTE=GoDong-DK;43476807]AAA won't suddenly come out simply because the volume of Linux games should increase (why should it, either way?), they'll come out when there's enough users on Linux for it to be viable. Even Mac OSX, with its 5% of Steam users, isn't guaranteed to get the new "big" games, though it's less bleak than the Linux market.[/QUOTE] For sure with <10% many bigger titles will give it a miss (especially if they require a lot of technical work like in the case of UE3 titles where there's no Linux support built in), but the user base is increasing (along with the total number of steam users). [QUOTE=GoDong-DK;43476807]And I'm not really convinced about the controller - I guess we'll wait till we've tried it out to judge.[/QUOTE] I think I would find the controller quite useful for navigating my OS since it can behave like a trackpad out of the box, it's a bit of a pain to get a gamepad to switch between gamepad and mouse emulation (not to mention it sucks using joysticks to control a cursor).
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