Valve admits "Steam Machines aren't exactly flying off shelves"

[HEXUS]

But Valve is still working hard on Linux gaming and expanding Vulkan API support.

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[tweake628]

can anyone tell me what system is in the picture above ???

[Corky34]

AFAIK it's the Asus ROG GR8.

[tweake628]

yup that's it ... thanks a lot

[Spud1]

Steam machines are really a solution looking for a problem imo..the concept is great, but the reality is that there isn't really much point to them. If you could buy steam machines which could cope with 1080p gaming for under £500, then fine...but you can't as most are inthe £1k+ bracket, at which point they are just SFF gaming PCs and you may as well run Windows so you can do other useful things wtih it. Then there is the fact that the majority of games on Steam are not optimised for controllers, and if you want to play games primarily with a controller then for most people you are much better off with a dedicated console, where 99.9% of games will be controller optimised..and it will be cheaper to go wtih it.

Good idea to try and make a PC Console, but without huge subsidies from Valve they are just way too expensive. It's worth remembering that this has been the case with consoles for a long time too Sony/Microsoft etc typically lose money on their consoles when they first launch - upwards of £300-£400 in some cases on lauch, and they make this back on game sales and eventual scale as component/build prices drop during the lifespan of a console. Valve didn't really do this with "steam machines" which was always going to leave them at a disadvantage.

imo they should keep SteamOS going but the concept of steam machines is pretty much dead.

[Jonj1611]

I agree Spud1, it was an extremely niche market.

[KN1GHT]

Couldn't have said it better myself.

[spacein_vader]

IMO SteamOS and Steam machines never really needed to sell to be useful to Valve. They appeared when there were fears that the next consumer version of Windows would be locked to using the Windows store which would lock out Steam, GabeN ranted about it at the tkme.

It was effectively part PR pressure and part insurance policy, when it became clear that MS would still allow Win32 it was left to wither on the vine.

[DanceswithUnix]

It was effectively part PR pressure and part insurance policy, when it became clear that MS would still allow Win32 it was left to wither on the vine.

It could be argued that the existence of steam machines helps keep the pressure on for MS to keep Windows open.

I think SteamOS was partly a development environment for Linux games. One of the big questions in Linux development is "which flavour do I code for" and this gave a clear and definite answer for games. Then it is up to the likes of Fedora to put what's needed in place for their compatibility.

[Corky34]

....when it became clear that MS would still allow Win32 it was left to wither on the vine.

To be fair there's plenty of circumstantial evidence that that's Microsoft's end goal, if, and it's a big if, they do decide to go down that route it won't be for at least another 2-3 years as people would probably stick two fingers up and switch back to Windows 7, after 2020 it's going to be either the Microsoft way or the highway.

[spacein_vader]

To be fair there's plenty of circumstantial evidence that that's Microsoft's end goal, if, and it's a big if, they do decide to go down that route it won't be for at least another 2-3 years as people would probably stick two fingers up and switch back to Windows 7, after 2020 it's going to be either the Microsoft way or the highway.

Longer than that. Windows 8 EOL is another couple of years after 7. I know the interface is horrible but if it's the only supported way to access Win32 (and for what it's worth I don't think it will be,) people will install something like Start8 and hold their nose.

[jimbouk]

Aside from consumers (who cares about them?) and indie developers I can't exactly see people being concerned about Windows becoming a closed platform. DRM will be harder to crack, compatibility will be less of an issue, and the already rich companies can pay for frontpage marketplace access to sell <generic shooter> 17 for a large fee then rake in 3 times as much for pay-to-win content. Win for large devs. Microsoft get a cut of all the sales, win for M$.

[aidanjt]

I wouldn't expect so, the prices we were looking at were too high, and AAA titles with Linux ports were few and far between.

It was a nice grand vision that just didn't get enough support behind it.

[shaithis]

It was a great idea but the initial gains most people envisaged were brought about by DX12 in the end.....and I think that was it's achilles heel, most people that were interested were interested for the potential performance gains, rather than moving away from Windows.

I'd still like to see it succeed but it has gone far too quiet I fear.

[DanceswithUnix]

It was a great idea but the initial gains most people envisaged were brought about by DX12 in the end.....and I think that was it's achilles heel, most people that were interested were interested for the potential performance gains, rather than moving away from Windows.

I'd still like to see it succeed but it has gone far too quiet I fear.

Bit of both there I think, but the downsides were just too big. Lots of software was never ported, and those games that were used a porting layer that threw away 30% performance.

I'm typing this on a Linux box that is has Steam installed, but the only game I generally play atm is Elite which isn't available in Linux. I play it with the Rift, which isn't supported in Linux. So I dual boot into Windows. When I want to get some work done, I boot back into Linux.

I don't think it is the SteamOS or Linux platform I think people just don't care that much either way. But to lose both performance and choice, nah.

The only way to get SteamOS adopted is to release HalfLife 3 and Portal 3 as SteamOS exclusives. Then we'll see how good Microsoft's Linux on Windows emulation layer is

[shaithis]

The only way to get SteamOS adopted is to release HalfLife 3 and Portal 3 as SteamOS exclusives. Then we'll see how good Microsoft's Linux on Windows emulation layer is

If valve are serious about SteamOS, then that would be a good way to push it. It would certainly make or break the entire project
I'm still surprised the rift doesn't work, I thought SteamVR had been fully ported over?