Steam Machines

[romxxii]

Disc based is NOT DRM, nor is it evil.

Allow me to introduce you to my old friend, SecuROM [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SecuROM]. It's part of the reason I limit buying disk-based games, and prefer digital downloads. In case you didn't want to click through, here's the definition:

SecuROM is a controversial CD/DVD copy protection and digital rights management (DRM) product developed by Sony DADC. Its purpose is to resist home media duplication devices, professional duplicators, and reverse engineering of software, primarily commercial computer games running under the Microsoft Windows platform. The method of disc protection in current versions is Data Position Measurement; this may or may not be used in conjunction with online DRM components.

Or how about my old nemesis, the reason I can't install old Ubisoft games, Starforce [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StarForce]?

Wow you have a weird view of gaming if you think having a physical copy to play a game is a bad thing. It's far better than digital DRM, as much as I like Steam I prefer disc over it anyday.

I've had disks die out on me over the years. Physical copies go bad; that's a reality of the DVD's engineering. They did not design it to last. What makes it worse is that the DRM requires the disk in the drive, which is pointless since all the data's already on your hard drive. What these programs do is they expose your disk to more wear and tear when it didn't have to be.

I did read what you said about 'disc' drm but ignored it because I don't care about your strange view on it.

Glad to know you're ignoring my arguments because you don't care. Next time, try not replying. It'll be easier on the both of us.

 

[Daverson]

I think the best thing about the steambox is that it's the "pc vs. console" killer. Whenever someone enraged lunatic comes up and start's spouting about how PC/Console is clearly superior, you just "but what about the steambox?", and they'll have no idea whether you're agreeing with them or not, be forced to concede, and buy you a turkey sandwich.

I assume that's what happens when you win a flamewar on the internet, you get a free turkey sandwich? I'll be honest, I can't see why someone would get involved in the damn things otherwise.

 

[RyQ_TMC]

And Valve trying to force publishers to adopt by measures like refusing to accept non-Linux ready games on Steam might backfire horribly.

Not sure where you got that last part. As Valve has constantly said, it's business as usual over at the Windows gaming side of things. Valve's not touching that.

That was just an idea of what measures they could try and introduce to force publishers to fund Linux versions of their games. My idea, not based on any statement by Valve. And bear in mind that anything they say now, they can very wall backtrack from if they decide a different course of action is better for them. I'm not holding it against them, it's how a lot of companies operate.

But how exactly they would act to induce catalogue expansion is not the point here. What I'm trying to say is that if Valve tries any strategy other than banking on the Steam brand and hoping the expansion occurs naturally, other publishers might decide it's better to establish a competing platform. And I don't mean Origin or GFWL, it might even come to a little coalition of big names joining forces to create an "anti-Steam". Right now, Steam is a major distribution platform for them and trying to undermine it doesn't really work in their interest. But they might decide otherwise if Valve starts throwing its weight around.

Here's one thing to remember: All the next-gen consoles have zero backwards compatibility (i.e. fresh game library), so they've been vaguely promising some stream service like Gaikai to give you access to your old games on teh new consoles. This is what Valve's promising with the streaming. The difference is, instead of depending on an external service like Gaikai, you'll be streaming from your home PC to your living room.

I can definitely see the advantage of using what is effectively a Linux PC as a game console, with regards to backwards compatibility for later generations. And I think it's really good. I just don't think it's such a big factor for most gamers. For us at the Escapist Forums, sure, we like to engage in some nostalgia, replay old games and whatnot. But is backwards compatibility really that important for the majority of AAA consumers? Games are simply toys for most people, they don't look for profound experiences, as long as they can frag when they can't shag. If they can't run the 5-year old edition of their favourite AAA franchise, they're just gonna shrug and move on.

Introducing some level of "exclusivity" would be a way of accomplishing that.

I think that's what Half Life 3 is for.

And would it be SteamBox/SteamOS-exclusive? If that's what Valve is planning, then it's a big gamble.

 

[RicoADF]

I did read what you said about 'disc' drm but ignored it because I don't care about your strange view on it.

Glad to know you're ignoring my arguments because you don't care. Next time, try not replying. It'll be easier on the both of us.

After you had that attitude about the games listed, I stopped caring about your view. Securom hasn't caused me issues, all my discs work so unless your pirating games I see no issue.

 

[JenSeven]

The most interesting thing here is that Microsoft have been trying to battle Steam for years now on the PC market.
Their Games For Windows Live was a complete failure (I thing I remember hearing somewhere that they actually discontinued it).
The news that their main competitor on the PC market is moving to consoles must be a huge shock for them.
With the game backlog of Valve and their complete and total dominance on the PC market (not counting the battlenet and arenanet userbase) I think Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo have a real battle on their hands trying to fight Valve here.
They have the userbase, the OS, the games, the resources and the hardware to give the competition a run for their money and run away with their money.

Next year will surely be a year to behold.

 

[PoolCleaningRobot]

Consoles don't require steam/Origin, and there are still quite a few (although less AAA) games that are still sold as hard copy and only have disc based protection. It's not all steam/origin :-/
As much as I like steam I like to keep my options open, I only get from steam when its cheap as being digital it has little value by default, thus I pay little for it. Hard copies are what I pay premium for.

Same. At the very least, you also get an offline copy for storage which in the case of the ps3's blue rays could be up to 100 gigs. 10 years or more down the line, I'll probably be able to rip and emulate them without resorting to piracy and 20 gig torrent downloads. Steam is great for trying games and pc games but if it's a game I want to hold onto, I'll get console version

On topic, it's one of the only things dividing me on the SteamOS and Steam boxes. You're basically still limited to download only cause disk based drm has basically made disks pointless on pc. If Valve also came out with some form of physical media, I'd be more than sold (though I probably download the OS anyway)

 

[romxxii]

I did read what you said about 'disc' drm but ignored it because I don't care about your strange view on it.

Glad to know you're ignoring my arguments because you don't care. Next time, try not replying. It'll be easier on the both of us.

After you had that attitude about the games listed, I stopped caring about your view. Securom hasn't caused me issues, all my discs work so unless your pirating games I see no issue.

And like I said, the one disk that was giving me trouble was an original copy. I stopped pirating games a while back, and if you don't believe me you can add me on Steam and see how many games I own legally.

Honestly, the nerve of you to be a jackass, even when I already explained what I meant. Next time, just don't reply if you don't really care.

 

[romxxii]

That was just an idea of what measures they could try and introduce to force publishers to fund Linux versions of their games. My idea, not based on any statement by Valve. And bear in mind that anything they say now, they can very wall backtrack from if they decide a different course of action is better for them. I'm not holding it against them, it's how a lot of companies operate.

Well if Gabe's smart, he won't. This is the man whose view on piracy was that it's a service issue, and that to combat it meant to add value to his service. Hence, Steam sales, cloud saves, download and install onto any machine. That's the kind of convenience that I've given up disks for.

But how exactly they would act to induce catalogue expansion is not the point here. What I'm trying to say is that if Valve tries any strategy other than banking on the Steam brand and hoping the expansion occurs naturally...

I'm guessing they're trying to work out the same agreements that MS and Sony have with the publishers. As to what they're bringing to the table? They're probably using their current user base as a measuring stick.

...other publishers might decide it's better to establish a competing platform. And I don't mean Origin or GFWL, it might even come to a little coalition of big names joining forces to create an "anti-Steam". Right now, Steam is a major distribution platform for them and trying to undermine it doesn't really work in their interest. But they might decide otherwise if Valve starts throwing its weight around.

Doubtful. On the off chance that Valve does become evil or anti-competitor, the most that the publishers will probably do is back another distribution platform. However they all know that Steam is the man to talk to if they want their games published on PC.

I can definitely see the advantage of using what is effectively a Linux PC as a game console, with regards to backwards compatibility for later generations. And I think it's really good. I just don't think it's such a big factor for most gamers. For us at the Escapist Forums, sure, we like to engage in some nostalgia, replay old games and whatnot.

Glad we're on the same page here.

But is backwards compatibility really that important for the majority of AAA consumers? Games are simply toys for most people, they don't look for profound experiences, as long as they can frag when they can't shag. If they can't run the 5-year old edition of their favourite AAA franchise, they're just gonna shrug and move on.

I'd say backwards compatibility is a pretty big issue, at least if you look at this whole XBone/PS4 debacle. When they were first announced, nearly every gaming site, every forum, had at least three loud blokes who couldn't understand why the new consoles couldn't be backwards compatible (short answer: change in architecture; emulation would cost extra).

And would it be SteamBox/SteamOS-exclusive? If that's what Valve is planning, then it's a big gamble.

I think if they do release it in 2014 as a launch title, they could make it Steam (Windows PC) and SteamOS exclusive. That's one way to rake in the big bucks: Those with PCs (i.e. fully indoctrinated to Steam) will purchase en masse to record numbers, while those on consoles (continuing to stick to their "I don't know hardware" defense)end up buying Steam Machines just to play Half Life 3. Of course, to be a system seller it has to be really, really, really good.

 

[Lightknight]

I'm hoping that the steam boxes will do two things.

1. Make the pc into a party box, which the consoles have thus far owned thanks to multiple controller inputs and easy plug and play elements that any hope of multiplayer on a single pc would require an extensive understanding of input/output use. Not to mention software that has been made for pc hasn't bothered with such a subject of local single machine multiplayer.

2. Create a standardized tiered market standard for pc requirements. This could be a lot more mobile than the console market with a new box every year that represents the next upper tier while not being as varied as the pc market as a whole. If the steam box manufacturer becomes just one or two companies, then we could even see some optimizations if the hardware is standardized.

 

[Lord_Gremlin]

Is SteamOS a threat to consoles? No.
But it will murder and bury Windows PC gaming and completely murder Windows 8.

 

[clippen05]

Is SteamOS a threat to consoles? No.
But it will murder and bury Windows PC gaming and completely murder Windows 8.

Not sure if sarcasm but that's completely wrong. Steam Machines aren't for the hardcore PC gamers who build their own rig; they're all gonna stick with what they have. Your analysis couldn't be father from the mark. Steam machines are meant for console users who don't want the responsibilities of maintaining a PC or want a "better" living room experience.

 

[Lightknight]

Is SteamOS a threat to consoles? No.
But it will murder and bury Windows PC gaming and completely murder Windows 8.

Doubtful if your first assumption is true. I don't expect the average pc user to install the steamOS on their regular pc which is regularly used for non-gaming functions. If the Steamboxes do sell well with the SteamOS already installed then we may see Linux get a significant boost.

 

[lacktheknack]

Is SteamOS a threat to consoles? No.
But it will murder and bury Windows PC gaming and completely murder Windows 8.

Not sure if sarcasm but that's completely wrong. Steam Machines aren't for the hardcore PC gamers who build their own rig; they're all gonna stick with what they have. Your analysis couldn't be father from the mark. Steam machines are meant for console users who don't want the responsibilities of maintaining a PC or want a "better" living room experience.

You're talking about Steam Machines.

He's talking about SteamOS.

 

[Tanakh]

you don't know what is actually do-able on an (original) xbox do you ?

well if you feel like edumacating yourself google "xbox media center" for a start...

and for "it has custom made CPU, GPU, MoBo, everything..." don't kid yourself: its a PC.

Ahhh... so being able to play most videos, music, podcasts, and other digital media files is supposed to be impressive? I don't get it, it seems like the software is so lightweight it can be run on anything including iphones, android phones and the ouya. How is this an example of the xbox being a valuable piece of hardware?

And I don't "kid myself", one thing is that it has PC pieces, the other is that they should be build around custom firmware thus will NOT read standard PC OS. You can't install current Linux or Windows on your xbox right, why do you think this new steamOS will magically allow you to?

You're talking about Steam Machines.

He's talking about SteamOS.

Damn you and your reading comprehension! Beat me to it. Anyway for the post you quoted, PC enthusiast spend hundreds/thousands more to get a 10% to 20% performance increase, they will surely adopt steamOS if it gives them a 5% to 10% increase for free while keeping all the advantages for gaming a windows PC has.

 

[Andrew_C]

First of all the original xbox hardware is dated, like 12 years dated, there is no point at all to use that hardware or build an OS for it outside nostalgia.

Secondly, it has custom made CPU, GPU, MoBo, everything.... and the data for those components is not available, meaning you will need to do a fucking lot of high level reverse engineering to fit your OS to that.

In short, you would need to be a genius and devote years to reverse engineer the specifications of that hardware and then fit it to an OS, all to use crap super dated hardware; or have been an intel and nvidia engineer and be willing to have your ass sued to China. It is NOT going to happen.

Actually, the hardware in the original XBox is pretty standard with an NVidia designed GPU and Intel Pentium III CPU, and is (IIRRC) still supported by the Linux Kernel. There were several GNU/Linux Distros that supported the original XBox. None of them appear to be up to date, though. Even XBMC no longer supports it (although there is a fork that does). Obviously it needs to be modded.

I doubt you could get SteamOS running well on it, though, considering the old hardware and the fact it only has 64Mb memory, shared with the GPU. Even a Raspberry Pi has more memory (256Mb or 512Mb, depending on the model), but I doubt that Valve is planning to support ARM architecture CPU's at the moment.

 

[StriderShinryu]

Is SteamOS a threat to consoles? No.
But it will murder and bury Windows PC gaming and completely murder Windows 8.

For dedicated gamers? Maybe, as a side OS to Windows. But amongst the vast majority of PC users who use their PC for everything but maybe an occasional few minutes of gaming here and there? I find that pretty unlikely.

It's a tad myopic just to assume that because X might be "better" for a subset of gamers that it's going to become the standard for everyone. Remember, we're talking about people who, when taking their PC in to Best Buy tech support, have to be asked if they make sure it was tutned on and tf they tried just rebooting it.

 

[Tanakh]

snip

Humm, it is interesting to see they didn't bother to put special restrictions on the hardware, my bad. Still, can't see this working as a regular forked distro of steamOS due the legal issues of making it running custom software and because... well, a toaster has as much processing power this days (figuratively) why bother with it?

 

[Lightknight]

2. Create a standardized tiered market standard for pc requirements. This could be a lot more mobile than the console market with a new box every year that represents the next upper tier while not being as varied as the pc market as a whole. If the steam box manufacturer becomes just one or two companies, then we could even see some optimizations if the hardware is standardized.

you could simplistically do this by basically taking the top-middle-and bottom choices from a gfx card rundown on tom hardware guide and reissuing the "console" every years or so.

you give the rig a performance number somehow and you put the same number on the games (much like windows experience).

you also track those using a machine at each number (much like valves hardware surveys)

developers would then instinctively go for the widest base/performance band suitable for their game (much as they do with PCs).

all in all you could do that with just a bit of clever marketing/standardization/promotion.

although it would be far more interesting if they came out with something left feild like maybe a consumer electronics level form factor that had some kind of consumer friendly "carts" that held upgradable gpu/cpu/memory units on a base unit that dealt with connectivity and power and sound...could be 1080 and 4K base units or something...

"I" could do that. But get 100 people in the room and they may all come to a slightly different conclusion.

There are two ways to standardize the setups. One is just pure specs and overall output. That's generally what we're doing now and what you just recommended. Having tiered boxes that specifically hit those marks would make the standard more legitimate.

The second way is to have a limited number of hardware configurations in the steam boxes. If the developers know exactly what hardware is likely to be in the boxes and if there are few enough boxes to make the work manageable, they can optimize for those hardware components in the same way console developers do now. One of the reasons that the specs of a console can't be directly compared to a pc is that developers can optimize for maximum performance in a way they can't currently do in pcs where they don't know the cpu/gpu combo or even the RAM brand or amount.

 

[Darth_Payn]

Well, color me excited. A couple things, though: is it possible to get Steam running on one of the existing home consoles (since I play the Orange Box on XBOX 360) and I don't get the hate for Uplay. It's worked out well for me on PoP and Assassin's Creed.