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[Cutebrute]

Fuck a steambox, after this announcement I want to see a Steam handheld/tablet. A Linux based tablet that will natively play a number of PC games and can then stream my non-native Steam games to my handheld device any where in the home?


That's more enticing than the Shield IMO.

 

[Facism]

mmm, the smell of OS competition. Going to be lovely.

 

[keyrat]

I don't see the point of this OS at all. Why would I bother installing it? I don't game on my TV.

HL3 timed exclusive. Just install SteamOS and you can play. It's free (the OS), and they'll likely make it easy for you.

 

[maverick40]

Underwhelming but classic GAF claiming this as the second coming of Christ

 

[IMBored]

Is there any page with more specific details of this announcement?
SteamOS could be pretty cool and drive up the adoption rate of Linux, but they don't say when it'll be ready to download, games that support it, what are the performance advantages or even what is the compatibility of the distro, specifically with AMD cards.

 

[JCreasy]

This is begging for an Xzibit "Yo dawg, we heard you like pc gaming so made an os for your pc so you can stream to your other PC."

 

[v1lla21]

Hurry! All of you that are getting the PS4 bombard that one guy on twitter who is taking game suggestions and tell him you want SteamOS!! If we can get Gaikai to stream, why not SteamOS too? Hell they can make it only for PS+ subscribers or for a premium but it'd be cool to have it on the PS4.

I might build an HTPC, not sure yet. Let's see what else is announced.

 

[Protocol7]

Could someone explain why people are overly, exaggeratedly reacting to this news? (from non Linus fanboys if possible please? )

I'm a very open minded person, but I don't see how this is "exciting".

 

[adamantypants]

18 pages in an hour. Holy shit

Also, holy shit.

 

[R3TRO]

I don't understand who is the audience for this. Well except Valve fanboys of course.

Agreed, what a waste.

 

[Dolor]

I'm in. I have two HTPCs now, but my best rig sits in my office. One HTPC will quickly now become my streaming box so that I can get all that OC'ed 780 goodness on my bigscreen.

 

[pixlexic]

... or I could take a Titan GPU and put it into my windows PC that I already have setup the way I want.

I am not saying a bad idea, just not going to make me change my OS just because it's Valve.

Interesting idea about installing it into a TV or some such. But then you need a HD and such (Samsung)

Who is saying you have to change?

Instead if buying an Xbox people will now have the opportunity to buy a tiered open steam box.

No one is saying you have to replace your windows setup if that is what you like. It's just options and if windows ten is no longer open then you still have options.

 

[Dmented]

You're being extremely short-sighted. Valve is in it for the LONG haul. In 10 years, SteamOS might be the leading gaming platform over PS5 and Xbox Two. This won't happen overnight, but the only way it ever can is Valve doing their own thing. This is like Microsoft Windows 1.0. Great things will follow in the decades (not years) to come.

This. I get that people want big things NOW but it just isn't going to work like that sadly. With much added support from Valve and other devs, this could be something huge satisfying all crowds instead of few because of exclusivity. An open future is a bright future, I'm curious to see what happens.

 

[Anteater]

I don't see the point of this OS at all. Why would I bother installing it? I don't game on my TV.

You can install it on any computers with a monitor.

It's just another option for people who would like a dedicated gaming OS, you don't really have to use it though, as I think games will continue being multiplatforms, and the OS is free so that's cool.

 

[opticalmace]

i am kind off worry
i am not used to linux
all my life was on Windows
i have Gaming laptop
and my most of my work depend on windows products
installing other OS in my laptop seem a bit hassle for me
are they gonna stop making games for windows ?
are they gonna be exclusive games for steam OS ?
i also play BF3 and some game on Origin
what is gonna happen ?

and i use Dolphine and PCSX2 all the time

This is some fine poetry.

edit: God dammit, how was I beaten? lol

 

[Giever]

I'm guessing reveal #2 will be their controller, and #3 will be the general idea of different manufacturer's Steamboxes, and Valve's personal 'Better' (as they've discussed before, the kind of default) model.

 

[Crub]

Metro: Last Light and Rome II likely coming to SteamOS/Linux? That's newsworthy in its own right.

 

[c0de]

It's going to be super abstracted away and easy to use.

A dollar for every time I heard that!

 

[No Love]

This is super fucking exciting. I won't mind dual-booting if it gives performance gains, stability gains, and as more and more high profile games support it. You can be sure that Valve will offer incentives for developers to switch.

 

[shaolinx1]

Windows app store is poison to Steam, less so are competitors like Origin, uPlay, etc.
Its in Valves best interest to lock them out, even with massive effort and expense, that's all this is, not a great gift to gamers.
Still, I'm looking forward to giving it a go, have lots of games in my Linux steam client but performance ain't great.

I'm betting they want to get games to gamers through Steam no matter the hardware or device. I have doubts they would lock out the Windows based Steam user base from exclusives, which probably makes up 99% of Steam users. Just sayin.

 

[Anustart]

I'm excited for this, but am I the only one who doesn't want to play PC games in the living room? On a tv? I mean, it's a great option for people, but I really hope this isn't Valve's main focus. Although destroying people in CS:GO who are playing on a TV screen with a gamepad sounds appealing.

Is the desktop PC, KB+M, gamer really a dying breed after all?

Playing on a TV and using a KB + M aren't mutually exclusive....

 

[SentryDown]

What if they released an ARM version where you could install it on one of them £40 android TV sticks?

Why would I plug something in my TV if I can just play on my desktop ?

 

[marc^o^]

Steambox will be the best of console and PC worlds, if they have a sexy controller.

 

[QaaQer]

i hope stuff like origin and battle.net and many other non steam games will work on SteamOS too.
Steam is great but at the end the games on steam are only around 20% responsible for my play time on PC.

they have to or this thing is dead in the water. It has to be open, and Valve says it is.

 

[Tacitus_]

...and each one of those will be made capable of launching a virtual SteamOS to run SteamOS exclusive titles.

Uh-uh. That would be a sure way to kill performance. The other option is dual booting which kills the convenience factor of this. They're not going to abandon over 90% of their market to promote this.

 

[Lasthope106]

I don't get it. If it's a linux distro with some kind of modification... why not just use ubuntu + normal steam? It'd be massively more capable and you can always use big picture... seriously I don't get it.

Probably because they tried that approach and found things they needed to change that didn't exactly align with Ubuntu's priorities. Doing this way they have the freedom to completely rewrite parts of the OS to optimize it for gaming. Although, I'm curious how this could end up breaking other applications.

 

[Starbuck2907]

One more time...

Hundreds of great games are already running natively on SteamOS. Watch for announcements in the coming weeks about all the AAA titles coming natively to SteamOS in 2014. Access the full Steam catalog of over nearly 3000 games and desktop software titles via in-home streaming.

Any bets on what these AAA game announcements coming to SteamOS are?

 

[FiveMinuteHero]

If Valve are so keen on SteamOS, why not make it for HTPC *AND* Desktop?
Then we could really parade 'Windows is dead'.

 

[Hari Seldon]

I'm excited for this, but am I the only one who doesn't want to play PC games in the living room? On a tv? I mean, it's a great option for people, but I really hope this isn't Valve's main focus. Although destroying people in CS:GO who are playing on a TV screen with a gamepad sounds appealing.

Is the desktop PC, KB+M, gamer really a dying breed after all?

Yeah I don't care about playing games in my living room at all. I am hoping that this will still be useful in a mouse/keyboard office environment.

 

[Doctor_Thomas]

Until SteamOS is preinstalled on every laptop with embedded graphics and every prebuilt desktop from a store, then this will not take off.

Windows isn't the biggest OS because people are going out and installing it on their Linux netbooks.

 

[Fushichou187]

2. Steambox

Spoiler

compatible with 360/XB1/DS4 controllers

3.

Spoiler

PS4 is a stealth steambox. Yes, I'm drunk.

 

[imBask]

does streaming a game affect your bandwith cap? because if so, then i'll just put the SteamOS right next to Netflix in my "looks cool but I can't use it" pile

 

[Dunlop]

Yes, the streaming option that SteamOS provides. All PC/Mac games can be streamed to the SteamOS device.

Read the website guys

thanks,

Website is firewalled at work, you guys are my eyes

 

[Atrophis]

If the performance gains are significant everyone who cares about max performance is going to be dual-booting this.

 

[Draft]

This is the sexy announcement, but the more exciting one would be Valve dumping $50 million or whatever into OpenGL and turning it into something that rivals DX.

 

[test_account]

From what they list on the page they have specific optimizations made for that. I do not know how big the difference is though, neither do I know enough about this to say how they do it.

I see, i didnt know that Valve wrote this on their website, thanks for the info. I guess time will tell when people do benchmarks between the different operating systems

 

[Deku Tree]

So how are Valve going to get people to use their SteamOS?

 

[pixlexic]

Underwhelming but classic GAF claiming this as the second coming of Christ

Seems the opposite to me. Classic short sightless.

But same happened when steam was released.

 

[jediyoshi]

Another thing I wont even bother to use, why fix something that doesnt need a fix.

This isn't meant to replace the standard steam ui on your desktop machine.

 

[Ledsen]

Could someone explain why people are overly, exaggeratedly reacting to this news? (from non Linus fanboys if possible please? )

I'm a very open minded person, but I don't see how this is "exciting".

This is the first step. SkyNet is forming. I'll say it again:

You're being extremely short-sighted. Valve is in it for the LONG haul. In 10 years, SteamOS might be the leading gaming platform over PS5 and Xbox Two. This won't happen overnight, but the only way it ever can is Valve doing their own thing. This is like Microsoft Windows 1.0. Great things will follow in the decades (not years) to come.

 

[darkside31337]

You're being extremely short-sighted. Valve is in it for the LONG haul. In 10 years, SteamOS might be the leading gaming platform over PS5 and Xbox Two. This won't happen overnight, but the only way it ever can is Valve doing their own thing. This is like Microsoft Windows 1.0. Great things will follow in the decades (not years) to come.

Except this isn't anything like that analogy because Windows already exists.

I get why Valve is doing this, like 95% of the people who use Steam are on Windows. If the idea of a SteamOS is to somehow lower that number then they are insane.

It makes more sense to me thanks to the point Opiate brought up. That this isn't even really a thing built for the PC - or as a Windows replacement - in the first place.

 

[Horse Detective]

i am kind off worry
i am not used to linux
all my life was on Windows
i have Gaming laptop
and my most of my work depend on windows products
installing other OS in my laptop seem a bit hassle for me
are they gonna stop making games for windows ?
are they gonna be exclusive games for steam OS ?
i also play BF3 and some game on Origin
what is gonna happen ?

and i use Dolphine and PCSX2 all the time

oh my god


they better tag you

 

[EatChildren]

I'm seeing some confusion here. You do not need two PCs to play games using SteamOS.

You know how some games support MacOS, and some games only support Windows? SteamOS will be exactly the same. Some games will support SteamOS natively. Some games will not.

If your game does support SteamOS, you can install it directly to the device, just as you do with Steam now, just as you download games to your gaming consoles, and just as you install games to your smartphones. SteamOS supported games will be purchasable, downloadable, installable, and playable right from the source.

If your game does not support SteamOS, you can install it to a Windows or Mac device as we currently do, and stream the game over a local network to a SteamOS device. So if I had a SteamOS box in my lounge room, but a game that does not support SteamOS, I could turn on my Windows 7 PC in my bedroom, turn on Steam, install the game there, and play it in the lounge room on my SteamOS device by streaming data over the network from my PC.

Though this will obviously be problematic for games that don't support SteamOS, Valve has made a point that they're working closely with developers to ensure games do work with SteamOS. And if a game is native to SteamOS, it can be installed directly to a SteamOS device. Absolutely zero streaming required. Examples, going by the SteamOS home page: Total War: Rome II and Metro: Last Light.

 

[Tacitus_]

They don't, I hope to GOD they won't, and I hope Valve never let's them.

That would be bloody hilarious given how pissy Gabe has been about walled gardens on the OS level lately.

 

[Felix Lighter]

they have to or this thing is dead in the water. It has to be open, and Valve says it is.

It'll be open but Valve is not going to develop a Linux version of Origin or Battle.NET and they aren't going to port EA's games.

 

[BoosterDuck]

So how are Valve going to get people to use their SteamOS?

TF2/DOTA 2 items?

 

[Cartman86]

Normal people don't plug the PC into the TV. It has lots of issues that can't be solved without doing something like this. Getting monitors to switch, audio outputs, crashing to desktop, controls. These amount to big obstacles for people. And that assumes they even try in the first place. This is a smart move. Will I get one? I'm leaning towards no right now. I've solved a lot of these problems for myself and I don't want to spend more money on 2 different PC's. If whatever controller it uses is cool and works on a Windows PC I will get that. The biggest thing for me would be to build a cheap in enough box to run the streaming.

 

[Fragamemnon]

can someone explain to me what is good about this?

a Linux based OS to put on my windows pc? why not just use windows which has a lot of other no-gaming benefits

if valve plans on releasing their own hardware or getting a runtime platform rooted in their software stack thing to OEMs in an attractive manner, starting from a base of Windows just wouldn't work. Licensing costs and the inability to directly change the operating system level of the stack make Windows not an option.

If they wanted to have their own hardware and/or provide to users/OEMs a turnkey operating system+frontend+services stack, they basically had to fork Linux to make it work. Nothing else had anything remotely reasonable drivers and Valve does have most of their games running on it already with some reasonable grassroots indie / small studio/publisher support.

 

[2+2=5]

Let me understand, is it a full os like windows and linux, or something media/games centric like consoles' os?

 

[Lingitiz]

If Valve are so keen on SteamOS, why not make it for HTPC *AND* Desktop?
Then we could really parade 'Windows is dead'.

Doesn't it say they are releasing it for free download pretty soon?