Steam Controller Demo From Pax Prime With Valve Talking About It

Quoting: miroI still see an issue there - the controllers/batteries can not be charged when a wire is attached.

That is kinda annoying, one would have to have rechargeable ones + a charger. Honestly, I know this from friends who have a XBox and call me for gaming, saying something like hey bro, bring a 12 pack of batteries from the store, we're gonna need them.

This actually means that people are not always having chargers or appropriate batteries, hence battery sales go up, but these little things are really not healthy for our environment. So it is a question of mother nature, our money, ..and last but not least it is unconvincing for gamers to have a battery box instead of just plugging that thing in once a session is finished to recharge overnight.

Seriously, I want it built-in into that controller, don't tell me to buy a charger and 2 times the rechargeables, since one pair of these has to be in the gamepad, the other one in the charger to swap them every now and then. That is BS.

This has been discussed to death on the Steam Controller's forum on Steam. It has been established that rechargeable batteries that you can switch out with ease are a superior solution to a proprietary battery pack built into the controller. I'll link you to the two biggest of these threads so you can see why it most certainly is not bullshit.

It uses batteries?

AA Batteries?

As you can see, some gamers aren't thrilled by the idea of using AA batteries. I, however, am ecstatic that Valve chose to go with the superior choice of allowing gamers to use rechargeable AA batteries as opposed to a proprietary battery pack built into the controller that will someday not be able to hold a charge. rendering the controller a useless brick. Now that's bad for the environment!

Quoting: CreakI think this SteamController has a huge potential in e-sport games. Each player can customize its own controller layout. It would not only be about the game techniques, but also about how smart the player customized his controller for, say, a specific street fighter character. Then, as an amateur, you could use the same layout as this e-sport player, or that one...

I see also lots of other use case, but this one just popped in my mind.

I seriously doubt it. It lacks the precision for FPS games, precision and buttons for RTS and MOBA and pro fighting game players use special custom controllers.

Quoting: MaxPower

Quoting: miroI still see an issue there - the controllers/batteries can not be charged when a wire is attached.

Hopefully some third party company might do some battery pack for it (The same way the wii had some)

Quoting: ricki42EDIT to add: Estimated 5 meters of wireless communications range.

Is it me or is it a bit short ? Is it 5 meters in an ideal environment and 2-3 meters in real life ?

Still looking forward to it though.

5 meters is 16 feet. That doesn't seem short at all.

Quoting: FutureSutureAs you can see, some gamers aren't thrilled by the idea of using AA batteries. I, however, am ecstatic that Valve chose to go with the superior choice of allowing gamers to use rechargeable AA batteries as opposed to a proprietary battery pack built into the controller that will someday not be able to hold a charge. rendering the controller a useless brick. Now that's bad for the environment!

Should it not be able to charge AA batteries? I mean, just because its batteries aren't proprietary (which is a good thing) doesn't mean it can't also act as a charger..

Quoting: feyerbrand5 meters is 16 feet. That doesn't seem short at all.

But as it says at the linked page: Actual results may vary. If it turns out to be 2-3 meters in your specific living room that could turn out to be too short. Personally, I have a HDMI-cable running from my desktop to my TV, which easily adds a meter to the distance the controllers have to cover.
But maybe Valve is sensible enough to not put idealised measurements up on their product description? Although alot of companies aren't...

Quoting: ricki42From a reddit comment:
I have around 40 hours of gameplay with it and all have 82% battery life left.

If this is true, that's impressive. Even if the 82% are way off and it's 10% left, getting >40 hours is pretty good.

It's probably witchcraft, but most likely a game which uses no controller rumble.

The battery location seems to be good from a design and weight balance standpoint, but if you have to change them its almost double the work.

I'm interested in the lifespan of the touch pads, as I carved the analog sticks of my XBOX 360 controllers with my -- obviously not gnawed -- fingernails.

Just got an email from Steam to verify my shipping address by Sep. 25. Looking forward to getting my hands on the controller!

@FutureSuture

I didn't mean it that way - my idea was to have no proprietary battery pack built into the controller fore sure - I meant replaceable batteries of course, + the ability to recharge them via cable.

As a technician and with more than 500mA coming from any USB port I see no real reason why one would not be able to charge them. Surely, this requires some technology in there and a max. capacity allowed, but I'd see it as a benefit in any way.

But true, some built in pack that can not be replaced, is true BS, I was not even thinking about that

I will only buy it if it comes in a wired variety. I think there is enough waste in the world without me dumping a bunch of batteries every week.

Also, from a purely practical perspective: I do not use a gamepad for all the games, so it may be laying around for a while. No fun finding out that the batteries are dead and need recharging / replacing when I do want to use it. Also, all the wireless input devices I have tried, had all sorts of stability and accuracy problems when not on full charge. Like a keyboard repeating key strokes, or a mouse pointer jumping around.

That said I do trip over the cables from time to time, so I know the sentiment. Hope they make both versions, so we can all be happy. :)

Quoting: LinasI will only buy it if it comes in a wired variety. I think there is enough waste in the world without me dumping a bunch of batteries every week.

You can use the controller wired or wireless. From what I've read, when you connect it via wire you can remove the batteries.

It uses a standard mini-USB plug.