Most of us reading this site want Steam Machines to do well. Not all of us will be interested in buying the hardware, but we're aware that its success is also tied to the success of Linux as a gaming platform, which is why I'm pretty miffed that the OEMs and Valve have messed it up.
Valve have done well with the controller and with making SteamOS pretty coherent and user-friendly, but messed it up when it came to defining what a Steam Machine actually is, leaving it open to interpretation. I've said this time and time again, but the original Steam Machines line-up was a complete mess. We had everything from $1500 PCs to ludicrously overpriced machines which didn't even have discreet graphics cards.
Even the best offerings fall short. Alienware's cheapest offering comes in at $450 (this should be the ideal price point in my opinion), but offers a mere 4GB RAM. If you want to scale this up to 8GB, you have to pay $750 since it also means upping the CPU to an i5. Does a GTX 960 need an i5 to do its thing? No, not really. You might get a few extra frames or do better in a more CPU-intensive game, but if one tries to step outside the worldview of a PC gamer and into one of a console gamer, then it doesn't take long to realise that those $200 aren't worth it, but $20 for an extra stick of 4GB RAM would be worth it.
This is perhaps the most frustrating thing. Most of the time, the specs are completely wrong, but when they're not then the price is a serious problem. An Intel i3 and Nvidia 960/1060 series (or AMD equivalent) are the perfect mass market specs for a sofa 1080p gamer just coming off a console. Someone with more needs than that will know how to build a PC and will do it cheaper and better than an OEM.
With the GTX1060 coming out, estimated to have a performance somewhere between a 970 and 980 (probably more on the side of a 980, but I like being conservative) at $250, and if AMD's Zen architecture lives up to the hype and delivers the same price/performance ratio benefits that the Piledriver architecture did, then we could be looking at a new era for the Steam Machine if things are done right this time round.
So what should be done right? First and foremost, deliver the best performance at the lowest cost possible. There is absolutely no room for diminishing returns here, which is why I can't advocate i7s or even i5s. Upgradability would also be a nice plus and a huge selling point if it's approached in a way where a non-technically minded user can get an upgrade easily through using modular designs (there's a lot of possibilities here, but too much to go into for this article). This has the potential to be a massive selling point over this last console generation, which was underpowered on release.
The second, and perhaps more controversial, point is that Valve should really take a few lessons from the console world. By this I mean manufacturing their own machine (which doesn't mean exclusivity). While the idea of everyone building their own box is amicable, the disadvantages far outweigh the benefits. This is what makes consoles so competitive, gives them (historically, not this last generation) great performance compared to PCs on launch at a much better price, with a considerable lifespan.
There's a few reasons for this. Firstly, there's economies of scale, with a single manufacturer pumping out tonnes of machines, the production costs are lower for a number of reasons which this article won't touch upon. Secondly, the benefits of optimisation are tremendous. If everyone is developing for the same hardware, it's easy to accommodate for and optimise a game to get the most out of that hardware - this is one of the main reasons why consoles have such a long lifespan, considering this optimisation also gets better with time. The third reason is simply a retail one, since a high street vendor is far more likely to stock Steam Machines if there's only one option, again for a number of reasons. There's probably more, such as the ability to sell hardware at a loss or a significantly lower profit margin (since that money is made back through game sales), but those are the main ones.
In essence, for Steam Machines to succeed, I would like to see something priced at just over $400 (might be a bit optimistic, but possible with lower profit margins) made by Valve and at those sweet spot specs I mentioned earlier. The original launch was very underwhelming, but there's still a lot of potential to turn things around significantly if Valve come to their senses. Even without them making their own hardware, there's still room for OEMs to improve a lot. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Valve have done well with the controller and with making SteamOS pretty coherent and user-friendly, but messed it up when it came to defining what a Steam Machine actually is, leaving it open to interpretation. I've said this time and time again, but the original Steam Machines line-up was a complete mess. We had everything from $1500 PCs to ludicrously overpriced machines which didn't even have discreet graphics cards.
Even the best offerings fall short. Alienware's cheapest offering comes in at $450 (this should be the ideal price point in my opinion), but offers a mere 4GB RAM. If you want to scale this up to 8GB, you have to pay $750 since it also means upping the CPU to an i5. Does a GTX 960 need an i5 to do its thing? No, not really. You might get a few extra frames or do better in a more CPU-intensive game, but if one tries to step outside the worldview of a PC gamer and into one of a console gamer, then it doesn't take long to realise that those $200 aren't worth it, but $20 for an extra stick of 4GB RAM would be worth it.
This is perhaps the most frustrating thing. Most of the time, the specs are completely wrong, but when they're not then the price is a serious problem. An Intel i3 and Nvidia 960/1060 series (or AMD equivalent) are the perfect mass market specs for a sofa 1080p gamer just coming off a console. Someone with more needs than that will know how to build a PC and will do it cheaper and better than an OEM.
With the GTX1060 coming out, estimated to have a performance somewhere between a 970 and 980 (probably more on the side of a 980, but I like being conservative) at $250, and if AMD's Zen architecture lives up to the hype and delivers the same price/performance ratio benefits that the Piledriver architecture did, then we could be looking at a new era for the Steam Machine if things are done right this time round.
So what should be done right? First and foremost, deliver the best performance at the lowest cost possible. There is absolutely no room for diminishing returns here, which is why I can't advocate i7s or even i5s. Upgradability would also be a nice plus and a huge selling point if it's approached in a way where a non-technically minded user can get an upgrade easily through using modular designs (there's a lot of possibilities here, but too much to go into for this article). This has the potential to be a massive selling point over this last console generation, which was underpowered on release.
The second, and perhaps more controversial, point is that Valve should really take a few lessons from the console world. By this I mean manufacturing their own machine (which doesn't mean exclusivity). While the idea of everyone building their own box is amicable, the disadvantages far outweigh the benefits. This is what makes consoles so competitive, gives them (historically, not this last generation) great performance compared to PCs on launch at a much better price, with a considerable lifespan.
There's a few reasons for this. Firstly, there's economies of scale, with a single manufacturer pumping out tonnes of machines, the production costs are lower for a number of reasons which this article won't touch upon. Secondly, the benefits of optimisation are tremendous. If everyone is developing for the same hardware, it's easy to accommodate for and optimise a game to get the most out of that hardware - this is one of the main reasons why consoles have such a long lifespan, considering this optimisation also gets better with time. The third reason is simply a retail one, since a high street vendor is far more likely to stock Steam Machines if there's only one option, again for a number of reasons. There's probably more, such as the ability to sell hardware at a loss or a significantly lower profit margin (since that money is made back through game sales), but those are the main ones.
In essence, for Steam Machines to succeed, I would like to see something priced at just over $400 (might be a bit optimistic, but possible with lower profit margins) made by Valve and at those sweet spot specs I mentioned earlier. The original launch was very underwhelming, but there's still a lot of potential to turn things around significantly if Valve come to their senses. Even without them making their own hardware, there's still room for OEMs to improve a lot. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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that's a great deal!
I read the comment and most of them where like "i bought the window$ version", "how can I install window$", etc when talking about OS.
didn't saw the word "Linux" or someone referring to other Linux distros rather than Steam OS
I can agree with most of it, but I do also believe valve is aiming for long term.
They have always done so, and it dont seem like they care now, but Im sure they know what they are doing.
I think that "big productions" needs to be defined for the sake of this thread. Let's set the bar with a game that went from being a "small production", low profile, indie game to being a well recognized, high profile game in just a few years: Minecraft. What really seems to matter in determining whether a game is big, is if the gaming public recognizes it by name. People want to buy into a system that has access to games which they recognize. The titles that he listed fit that criteria despite also being console centric.
+++1 I'm nearly to the point where I would rather just give up on ultra high end graphics just to have a minimal nano PC. I'm so tired of heat and noise and size. But most of all I'm tired of waiting for new hardware to finally enable my goals. My dream system currently only serves as a staging platform and it sits next to my giant main tower as if to taunt me.
https://sli.mg/GAPACS https://sli.mg/ZavHiM
Unfortunately, the only things that reasonably fit inside of it are old embedded Kabini APUs.
Last edited by GustyGhost on 11 July 2016 at 7:56 pm UTC
the biggest issue is game support.
there is only a handful of genuine AAA games on linux/steamOS
I really like how steamOS has come along, when I built my first steam machine I had sound issues, performance issues and no WIFI. all of those problems have vanished over time with updates. I don't like the browser much but everything else is coming alone nicely.
But games aren't coming out for steamOS, a new doom reboot is out. It even has openGL and vulcan support but I cant play it on my steam box. I really don't want to buy more windows games so I'm going to just do without it unless I can get it cheap/2nd hand on PS4.
until that problem is fixed everything else is minor. Steam needs more to get developers to buy in and release games on Linux/steamOS.
one can only hope that when vulcan becomes more the norm it will be much easier for devs to release and support on Linux. But as we can see from the Doom example its no guarantee.
Guess what... We bought him an Xbox One!
Even though I wanted to buy him a Steam Machine it was a HUGE NOPE!!!
He is 4 years old and the games/titles plus the performance that the Xbox has is far more superior than the currently Steam machine.
We have spend like 300 Euro + 1 game included.
We bought also some Lego Games as well because he loves Lego Titles for another 100 Euro and thats it.
Now we all enjoying the awesomeness of the console... and I am so happy that I didnt get him a Steam Machine.
I challenge you to tell me some SteamOS Titles for a 4 year old boy that he would have fun...
The answer is simple :
Well he wouldnt be able play the titles he really wanted to play but I Would enforce him to play the titles that were available for him if any would satisfy him.
So instead of having my baby crying I have chosen to buy him an Xbox one :)
Last edited by wolfyrion on 11 July 2016 at 9:29 pm UTC
There are many flaws with the actual software itself and Valve appear to have done little updating long-term. I know they operate in Valve Time but to get more than just the enhustiasts to buy your product, you will to actually become a customer focused company with actual support and a decent release/update schedule for the software.
As for SteamOS it, well I'll give my faults on what Valve can do as a company to improve what they currently have.
1) The acutal OS itself. currently SteamOS is nothing more than a stripped down Debian Linux that boots to Steam in Big Picture Mode. This needs to change. You still have the option to drop back to the desktop mode. While this should exist, it should be hidden behind a developer section of the option menu that is hidden by default. While it would still be Debian running Steam, at least make an attempt to hide that to the end user.
2) Streaming Services. The Xbox One and PlayStation 4 do well in having a range of applications to enjoy a wide range of stremaing services that are available. To do this on SteamOS, you have to use the web browser and hope it works. This is pretty poor and has a number of issues (such as videos not pausing when you leave the web browser).
3) Multimedia Support. This is, again, non-existance without installing software outside of Steam. On both of the consoles (those that actually complete with Steam Machines in a way) you can put a CD, DVD or Blu-ray in and they'll play. Most Steam Machines don't ship with drives for physical media but this is still something that needs to be considered for those who do make use of them.
4) Triple A games. Being able to play big games like Grand Theft Auto V, FIFA, Call of Duty (still popular in the console crowd) or DOOM would do well for both desktop Linux as well as SteamOS. There are some big money games realisitcally we need native ports by developers who will take the time to make a good product.
5) Drivers. You guys all know the drill with this but having more incentive to use the platform will provide greater encouragement to the vendors to put more resources into drivers.
Right now, de-facto that is the $450 Alienware Steam Machine. Dell tried really hard to make this the baseline Steam Machine to compete at the console level, and IMO, they did a damn fine job of it. It's not only 4GB RAM, since it also has 2GB video card RAM, so technically the $450 unit comes installed with 6GB total RAM...
Agreed that the upgrade path for the Alienware SM's is very wonky, not something that makes you feel good as a consumer - having to pay a lot more money for a "package deal" with unwanted features added just to get the one feature you did want, like more RAM.
Lack of AAA titles already mentioned by several, and I agree. The few AAA titles we have are all victories, but they are still few and far between, and many of those were retroactive ports vs. day one releases, which is what console gamers expect: day one AAA title releases to get all excited about on their console.
Another factor no one in this thread has touched on: uniform controller support across all console games. This is still a *huge* problem with SteamOS. If you just buy a $450 Alienware SM, plug it in and grab the included Steam Controller - that should be it. Period. F***ing Period! Every native title you load up on your new console should work flawlessly and with very little effort on the included Steam Controller. That is a console baseline going back decades - since consoles began, actually.
Valve, in their pursuit to be "different", has broken that sacred console trust any and every console gamer will expect to be 100% honored.
Sometimes the Steam Controller works with a linux port, sometimes it doesn't.
Ex: Euro Truck 2, Escape Goat 2. Load a clean SteamOS, load those two games up, grab your controller to play, and have... SS$$hpplLLlll! Yep, bug hit the windshield, it's a trainwreck right out of the gate.
The problem is one of the genius features of the Steam Controller is 360 controller emulation mode. In Windows Steam, any game that recognizes a 360 controller will also see the Steam Controller as a 360 controller. Every one - every single Steam game in Windows, that works, and it works brilliantly.
Linux ported Steam games? Not so much. Some Linux ports correctly see the Steam Controller and the 360 controller they are demanding you use or you ain't playing our game with the intended profile.
So, you're left with keyboard/mouse emulation with no actual keyboard or mouse, just a ton of config options to wade through. Console player says: waaaaat???? This isn't a console....
So, Valve says handy user profiles will organically fix this. Have you tried some of the "top rated" user profiles for a game when it trainwrecks due to the recommended profile the dev made not working since it assumes 360 emulation works, which now doesn't due to their bad Linux port?
I have tried some of the "top" user profiles. Trainwreck again. The users *also* often assume 360 emulation will just be working for all games, and/or, the lopsided choices they made for the "best way" to play the game will most likely be like trying to learn the Mandarin Chinese language to you. Hard hard fail there, that is not solving any Steam Machine adoption problems for existing console users.
Now lets head into what realy bothers me in the comment section.
AAA titles vs Indie Games
-------------------------
AAA titles are nothing short than productions with a huge development budget. They neither define what is good or what is bad. They can be hit or miss like any other game too.
Indie games ... you guess it they have useally only a very small development budget. They also neither define what is good or bad and they can be hit or miss too.
So what is more important is what "type" (for the lack of an other word) of game you want to play on your "console". If you are searching for the next big gfx over gameplay stumbled down to suit the masses AAA game .. go for it. If you want new ideas / fresh gameplay and don't bother gfx to much you will find so many nice games in the indie section that you will have troubles to play them all.
Since people don't bring up examples i'm going to do so for an okish priced steam machine
jump and run -> Super Meatboy / VVVVVV / They Bleed Pixels / Outland
cars or similar 3D -> GRID Autosport / Euro Truck Simulator / American Truck Simulator / F1 2015
timekillers galore (building) -> Terraria / Minecraft / KSP / Factorio / Starbound ....
timekillers galore (rougelite) -> Rogue Legacy / The Binding of Isaac / FTL ....
Point & Click -> Deponia / Day of the Tentacle Remastred / Grim Fandango (and add all the GOG scummvm lineup) ..
timekillers galore (space get me) -> X-Series / The Last Federation / Stellaris
FPS -> Bioshock / Borderlands / Metro / Half Life Series ...
RPG's -> Pillars of Eternity / Baldurs Gate I + II Enhanced / Icewind Dale Enhanced / The Witcher 2 ...
Metroidvania -> Axiom Verge / Salt and Sanctuary / La Mulana / Cave Story+
and so much more ...
Of course we still need some areas covered better ... openworld rpg (FF XV maybe ...) and openworld action games.EA Sportscatalog or just simple things like an other table for the Pro Pinball Series.
I also wish we would have another action rpg series besides Torchlight with high production value (Diablo / Path of Exile) or the biggest one in the Ring Dark Souls Series.
But in the end saying Steam OS is haveing to few games feels just wrong. At this point patience is a good advice.
For me steam machines do have other problems:
While the steamcontroller is great not all mappings works the same on windows and linux and you not always find a working mapping for linux.
Streaming games to twitch or any other service like fucking all modern consoles do.
Spotify / Hulu / Netflix ... integration.
Reduced navigation overhead in Steam Big Picture.
Easier to use community functions.
Integrated skinning of steam big picture.
I repeat myself ... patiance ... what steam machines / steam os has done in so few years is probably more than we could ever hoped for. Maybe you guys should step one step back , compare the situation when we got 1 humble bundle every 3 months and what we get now.
Last edited by Glog78 on 12 July 2016 at 12:39 am UTC
Personally when I use term indie, I simply mean self funded studios and their games. They can be high quality, and big budget (Star Citizen for example). The same way, games funded by the publishers can be low quality (but usually are high budget). So original meaning of AAA (quality) wouldn't apply to them. That's why I simply avoid using this term. It never contributes any clarity to the discussion (quite on the contrary).
Last edited by Shmerl on 12 July 2016 at 12:49 am UTC