News Valve announces SteamOS

That and the fact that GPU drivers for the longest time have been sub-par. Today, intel's open source drivers are just barely behind windows, nvidia's closed source drivers are overall on par (sometimes better than windows), AMD's open source drivers are very usable and are improving every month, and AMD's catalyst drivers are fine if you have a very specific setup. Nvidia's open source drivers are basically unusable for gaming.

 

Indeed, and they do say "Watch for announcements in the coming weeks about all the AAA titles coming natively to SteamOS in 2014. Access the full Steam catalog of nearly 3000 games and desktop software titles via in-home streaming."

All they need to do is get the SB price right, if its more expensive than next gen consoles people wont see the reason to buy one. The question is can OEM's make a box able to play most games for around £450 ?

 

I'm not interested in the steambox itself but would be interesred in building my own htpc to run SteamOS. Wonder if a mini-ITX build utilising one of the next gen AMD APU's would be powerful enough?

 

Depend on the games you want to run. Will be enough for streaming from your rig without doubt

 

If steam want massive adoption of their new os all they have to do is make HL3 a SteamOS exclusive then sit back and hope the servers don't crash.....

 

I wouldn't be surprised at all if they do that, assuming HL3 is announced this week to come at the same time as SteamOS/Steambox. I bet at the very least they'll offer it up for beta testing early on SteamOS.

 

Valve don't want massive adoption of SOS, they want to change to console market into a more open environment both in software and hardware terms. The current console market is entirely proprietary and Windows is heading down the same road. Its why Gabe Newell called Windows 8 "a catastrophe" and said Microsoft's new operating system will make people "rage quit computing."

The whole reason for SOS and the expected SB is to recreate the open platform that PC's have historically been known for, where the user is free to create there own content for games, mod the software and hardware should they wish.

http://caas.raptr.com/valves-newell-shares-his-vision-for-steams-user-focused-future/

Many major company's are trying to exert greater control over their systems in the form of proprietary system, Apple and Microsoft's apps stores, Sony and Microsoft licensing on consoles. This stifles innovation, limits content, cost more, slows the pace of change, to name just some of the disadvantages.

 

I think the more the merrier, having options is always a good thing. Probably won't be for me though... The only reason why consoles/living room gaming interest me in the slightest is due to their exclusive titles.

 

Greetings!

 

It not only what games Valve can release, it the whole eco system of not having to wait ages for your games to be patched, the massive amount of user created content, cheaper games, free games, as Newell said you cant compete with your users when it comes to content.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/report/article/gabe-newell-claims-users-have-defeated-valve-created-content-and-thats-a-go

 

I agree that Valve wants to change things - but they need to make an impact and get the user base first. If everybody carries on with Steam on Windows it won't change a thing. By making some games exclusive to SteamOS/Steam on Linux - at least for a while - they can get that.

 

2nd Announcement is Steam Machines.

http://store.steampowered.com/livingroom/SteamMachines/

Beta signup is open now. I can't wait to see what the hardware looks like. In beta it will probably just be a box with the software pre-installed, but who knows, maybe it will be more like the final product.

 

Does that mean OEM's have already signed up to make Steambox's ?
If so that answers the question of what Valve was doing at CES 2013, schmoozing with OEM's.
It should be interesting to see what boxes they come up with.

 

Actually you can side-load Modern apps. Pandora did it as a proof of concept.

 

Not going to happen. The guy who wrote that obviously doesn't understand Microsoft's income stream, which is 65% enterprise to start with. As for Windows on home PCs: most people don't use them for games; that's what they have consoles for. That's why they're switching to tablets. A Steambox could challenge Xbox, possibly, but only in the indie games market. And most people will simply end up buying both consoles.

 

Here's some wild speculation for you...

I just noticed that HL2, Ep1 & Ep2 all received a small update through Steam. It has been a long time since I've seen any of them get updated. They are, after all, 6-7 yr old single player games.

It makes me wonder - why now? Is it a way of testing engine improvements in the wild without minimum disruption to their multi-player revenue streams?

Around a year ago Gabe said he was waiting for a game to roll [Source Engine 2] out with - Given the recent Steam OS announcement and pending Steam box announcement I can't help but hope they're following the tried and tested model of shipping a new platform with a must-have game.

 

Side loading apps is intended for developers and businesses with internal apps.

My original statement wasn't if you could run a Metro app not from Microsoft, it was if you can download metro apps from somewhere other than the Microsoft store. And besides even if you can it is obvious this is not what Microsoft wants as they wouldn't get their %30 cut of every app sold.

If most people don't use PC's for games why has Steam seen a year on year growth of over %76 despite year on year unit declines in PC sales ? If anything people are switching to PC's for gaming as they find out its a more desirable platform to play games on.

Game Over? Why Video-Game-Console Sales Are Plummeting

 

Regardless of intentions, you can visit a website, click on a download link, install a program that is Metro.

Because the only PCs that are left in the home environment are those of gamers. So proportionally that share grows while the overall number shrinks. We are still talking about a relatively small number, though, compared to Enterprise computing.

Meanwhile both Microsoft and Sony are about to launch new consoles, which may affect sales of current models adversely. But the article you link to particularly blames the move to mobile gaming on tablets and smartphones for the slump in physical console games. QED.

In any case: good thing all around. Steam is awesome (I wish it would be allowed a portal on Windows RT; if I was Microsoft I would be courting them fiercely) and Microsoft has been moved to revamp its own games division, which cannot be a bad thing.

 

That's one program in beta! The intention of the industry as a whole is to exert more control, more licensing, more hoops to jump through, less user input, less modding, basically moving away from the openness that made people choose a PC over a Mac.

Leaving the enterprise market aside as SOS and SB isn't intended to challenge enterprise OS's
I wouldn't call a market of over 50Mil relatively small in numbers, the steam user base is similar in size to the XBOX (afaik)

Yup new consoles are due out so it maybe affecting sales, and the article does say about the move to mobile gaming. But even tablet sales are in decline i would prefer to be in a growing market such as Steam than a declining market.

Either way you and i cant see into the future, i wish we could

My point is the whole devices market, PC's, Mobile, Consoles, etc, etc is more fluid than it has probably ever been.
And i don't think taking choice and control away from the user is good business practice, when a new device comes out that lets people do what you cant or wont let them do, they will drop your product for one that does.