• Welcome to Talking Time's third iteration! If you would like to register for an account, or have already registered but have not yet been confirmed, please read the following:

    1. The CAPTCHA key's answer is "Percy"
    2. Once you've completed the registration process please email us from the email you used for registration at percyreghelper@gmail.com and include the username you used for registration

    Once you have completed these steps, Moderation Staff will be able to get your account approved.

Steam

From an industry analysis perspective, I don't think the interesting question is whether the Steam Machine will be a success - even if Sam Altman hadn't ruined gaming like he ruins everything he touches, it seemed destined to be a niche luxury device even among gaming PCs - but whether SteamOS will be a success. I hope so; I quite like it.

For myself, I was already wanting to bring my gaming PC back up to standards now that graphics escalation has plateaued following the expiration of Moore's Law (a topic for another post), and it'd cost nearly that much to upgrade my old desktop, which I'd just be putting some gaming-focused Linux distro on anyway, so I figure I'll spring for the nice form factor for a Gabecube.
 
The HTPC market is different beast than the handheld PC market and filled with a lot more alternatives, including just making room for full fat desktop by your TV. I'm not surprised Valve isn't as willing to subsidized a Steam Machine to the same extent they did the Steam Deck, especially since they got the Steam Frame still coming too, and they've already tried Steam Machines once before to less than stellar results.
 
Becksworth said:
The HTPC market is different beast than the handheld PC market and filled with a lot more alternatives, including just making room for full fat desktop by your TV. I'm not surprised Valve isn't as willing to subsidized a Steam Machine to the same extent they did the Steam Deck, especially since they got the Steam Frame still coming too, and they've already tried Steam Machines once before to less than stellar results.
Click to expand...
Double posting, but I saw a good point that if the price was too competitive compared to traditional PC hardware they would get businesses, crypto farms, and other people with non gaming use cases trying to buy up their stock, which is an issue the Deck and Frame don't/won't have, and would completely undermine the point of Valve wanting to subsidize the Steam Machine.
 
I was expecting the Steam Machine to be around a grand, but I thought it would ship with a controller. Gotta pay extra for that, I guess!

Being almost completely ignorant of the back end of the tech biz, I still think Valve has enough money saved up being the PC gaming monopoly and not making games to sell this thing at more of a loss, simply for good optics. This is a PR disaster for them, regardless of how much control they have.
 
PC gaming is a different business from console gaming. Selling this thing at a loss like a console would be counterproductive for them, because the platform that they're trying to draw users into is not the Steam Machine, but rather Steam itself. SteamOS is the real product, being a whole operating system designed to put its users into the Steam store with less friction than the Steam client. If they outcompete other OEMs, that means fewer, not more, devices running SteamOS.

This isn't just my analysis. In their own words:

Is this the Valve console?

We think of Steam Machine as an extension of PC gaming, not as a console.

The traditional console model is to sell hardware at a loss and make up the revenue with subscription services or by selling games that are locked-in to the hardware. We think this can make sense for a single business in the short term but that open ecosystems are better for customers over the long term. PC gaming's history proves this: The openness of the PC gaming space has enabled it to be the primary driver of hardware and software innovation for decades.

The strength of PC gaming is the ability to play the games you want on the hardware you want. Steam Machine is *a* solution to these problems (and we think it's a great one), but it's not the only solution, and we don't want it to be.
Click to expand...
 
Bongo said:
Another news item overshadowed by the price announcement is that SteamOS is now available to end users, not just OEMs, albeit with some caveats.
Click to expand...
That's great. Android devices have a preliminary version of SteamOS based on the ARM version, which has a ton of potential. Will be very cool down the road for people with Retroids/Odins/Thors, as it basically can make them mini Steamdecks.
R.R. Bigman said:
Thanks for the clarification.

I still think Valve messed up big with this.
Click to expand...
It seems like bad luck that RAM prices skyrocketed right now. I was also reading elsewhere that Valve can't really subsidize/underprice it because then bitcoin miners, etc. will buy out the stock and hoard them. Just a shitty situation for people who want to buy or sell a computer to play videogames on.
 
Wild that we now inhabit a timeline where the Switch 2 at $500 is the budget option for mainstream gaming.
 
I just want something I can hook to my TV and play Steam/PC games. I'm less concerned about it being a Steam-specific thing, though it seemed like that would be beneficial to some degree.

Don't much care on the controller front, I'm happy using my Xbox controllers.

That said, supposing I was to get one on the lower end, can you expand the storage on it?
 
My understanding is that you can upgrade the RAM and SSD. Theoretically, of course, providing you take out a second mortgage on your house.

I really thought they'd try to wait out the RAMpocylpse, but they must have run out of time and have to move these. Shame, it was a good idea.
 
The Digital Foundry folks say it does have expandable storage, in the sense that you can replace the NVMe SSD. I assume you'd just download Steam OS to a USB flashdrive to reinstall it.
 
I got to place my order for a Steam Machine today. Sooner than I expected! I had vowed to finally play Elden Ring on it once it arrives, and so I shall.
 
4-So said:
Wild that we now inhabit a timeline where the Switch 2 at $500 is the budget option for mainstream gaming.
Click to expand...
Nintendo handhelds used to be absurdly cheap. the Game Boy launched at like 90 dollars in the US.
image.png
screen-2026-07-01-20-08.png

(from issue 21 of The Games Machine & Volume 2, Number 4 of the Game Player's Strategy Guide to Nintendo Games.)

someone would probably link you that image of Walmart selling Gamecubes for $49 as well, but that photo was taken after the Wii released despite claims to the contrary. so it was just them trying to clear out stock.
bro-wake-up-its-2002-lets-get-a-gamecube-for-49-v0-otdr2wbgx9ma1.jpg
 
Yeah, I rememberr paying around $90 at Walmart for my Gameboy back in late '90 or early '91. My memory is murky on the exact time but I know it wasn't quite at release.

My grandfather had given me a giant plastic water jug, one of those big water jugs used at some of the older water coolers like the kind you would find in doctor's offices. I used to put loose change I found in it. Anyway, after it got nice and heavy, my mom and I spent half a day wrapping pennies so I could cash them in. I want to say I had something like $70 in change, which I cashed in at the bank, and mom helped me cover the rest. Good times.
 
Of course, $90 in 1990 is equivalent to $230 today. Way cheaper than current consoles but not crazy for a handheld with specs that were pretty bare bones even for its time.
 
I was thinking about trying to learn how to build a PC using parts I could “come across” since the Steam Machine is just too damn expensive, and I haven’t had a great experience with my Steam Deck. Steam Deck having somewhat shoddy parts that need replacing after fairly moderate use over a year or two was not what I was expecting after shelling out almost six hundred dollars.
 
R.R. Bigman said:
I was thinking about trying to learn how to build a PC using parts I could “come across” since the Steam Machine is just too damn expensive, and I haven’t had a great experience with my Steam Deck. Steam Deck having somewhat shoddy parts that need replacing after fairly moderate use over a year or two was not what I was expecting after shelling out almost six hundred dollars.
Click to expand...
What have you needed to replace? I've clocked hundreds of hours on it over several years with no issues.
 
The R2 button broke a spring last year and doesn’t work as well as it used to. Bongo nicely linked to a guide to fix it for me earlier in this thread, but the parts would end up costing over a hundred dollars and I don’t believe in myself enough to try to take the device apart to the extent that is needed for the repair.
 
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention my Steam Machine arrived on Tuesday. This thing is great! I had some hiccups in setting it up because it turns out my HDMI receiver is a piece of shit, but part of what you pay for is really good support.

Make no mistake a Steam Machine is still PC gaming with all that entails - smoother than ever, but still not the frictionless experience of a true console. But I'd say it handles the couch use case about as well as a PC possibly can. For someone coming from a PC background, it's clear that you (or an OEM) can build a more powerful SteamOS PC for the same price, or an equivalently capable one for cheaper; and if you want to do that, you totally should. For someone coming from a console-only background, the immutability of the OS makes it really hard to break and really easy to troubleshoot, and you can expect any game desginated as fully compatible to run well with no fuss; but even though fiddling with settings is rarely necessary, "rarely" doesn't mean "never" and you do still need to be willing to do it.

Listen, though, the case on this little guy is absolutely fantastic. It's extremely quiet, it runs cool, it looks tasteful, and it's got surprisingly well-integrated informational features. I might change my mind if in a few years I want to upgrade something buried deeper than the storage or RAM, of course, but I'm making a pretty big bet that I'm unlikely to want to get back on the upgrade treadmill any time soon.

As promised, I started playing Elden Ring finally. Seems good. I also set it up to launch some non-Steam games through Steam. Ship of Harkinian is an impressive project, let me tell you; I didn't go through all the steps needed to run it purely from a controller, but I was at least able to confirm that I can.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top